It all started back in the second half of the 19th century
In 1865, Paul Mauser retired from active military service, which he served at the Ludwigsburg arsenal, where he managed not only to perfectly study the design features of various types of modern weapons, see their advantages and disadvantages, but also to understand the requirements of the military for weapons. used in combat conditions.
After demobilization, Paul returns to his native Obersdorf. The city in which he was born on June 27, 1838, and immediately after graduating from elementary school, as a 12-year-old teenager, went to work as an apprentice at the Württemberg Royal Arms Factory, where his father and four older brothers already worked as a blacksmith. It was here that he mastered the first basics of the business, to which, as it turns out in the future, he will devote his whole life.
He returns to begin a difficult and thorny path of intensive searches, disappointing mistakes, hopeful findings and solutions, which has stretched out for many years.
Only in 1871, the Mauser rifle appeared, which Paul made together with his older brother Wilhelm. Already in this, the very first, there was a rotary shutter that became characteristic of all subsequent models. Of course, she had flaws. The single-shot rifle did not have an ejector and therefore the spent cartridge case was removed by the shooter from the receiver by hand. But the first pancake did not come out lumpy. The high quality of the Mauser 71 has been confirmed by a number of awards from prestigious exhibitions. In Sydney (1879) and Melbourne (1880), the rifle won awards. In 1881 in Stuttgart - a gold medal.
It is not surprising that the "71st" became interested in the military. She, along with rifles Berdan (Russia, 1871) and Gras (France, 1874), became one of the first 4-line "small-caliber" with a sliding bolt, adopted by the "metal" cartridge. The Prussian War Office established the production of a rifle at its arsenal in Spandau. China bought 26 thousand copies of this model, Württemberg ordered 100 thousand. These orders gave the brothers the money they needed to continue improving the Mauser 71.
And the brothers had no doubts about the need to improve the design. The rapidly developing tactics of warfare put on the agenda an increase in the rate of fire of weapons. The American Civil War (1861-1865) clearly demonstrated the advantages of magazine rifles over breech-loading rifles. As a result, in 1866, a rifle with an under-barrel magazine made by Henry Winchester appears overseas. If Europe has lagged behind, then not much. In 1869, Switzerland begins to establish the production of the Veterli magazine rifle. A year later, Austria-Hungary does the same with the Fruvirt rifle. And in 1878, France also adopted the Gra-Kropachek rifle with an under-barrel magazine.
The Mauser brothers are also beginning to work in this direction. In 1878, they tried to install a horseshoe-shaped magazine of the Leve system on their "71" covering the rifle stock. Due to a significant increase in the size of the weapon, the experience turns out to be unsuccessful. As a result of the next attempt, the Mauser 71 has an under-barrel magazine, and its barrel becomes 55 mm shorter. In September 1881, Paul and Wilhelm show the Kaiser this very model, which became the last joint development.
On January 13, 1882, an older brother dies, and a new rifle, named "Gew 71/84", is put into production by Paul alone. In addition to the already proven rotary bolt, when retracted, the next cartridge was fed to the dispensing line, this model has an under-barrel magazine for 8 rounds and an ejector that provides automatic removal of the casings.
It seemed that the optimal solution had been found.
No, it wasn’t there. The Gew 71/84 was loaded one cartridge at a time, and this took time, which might not have been in the heat of battle. This forced the soldier to save ammunition. Save them for the most decisive, tipping point. As a result, the rifle continued to be mainly used as a single-shot.
And the arms business went ahead by leaps and bounds. In 1885, thanks to the efforts of the Austro-Hungarian engineer and inventor Ferdinand Mannlicher, a middle store with a batch loading appeared. The successful design immediately removed from the agenda the main drawback of the magazine weapon - slow loading.
Literally a year later, a special commission under the leadership of Colonel Lebel in France designed an 8-mm magazine rifle chambered for central ignition with smokeless powder and a lead bullet in a hard sheath. Smoke blinding arrow and thick powder carbon deposits in the bore were a thing of the past. Thus, the last obstacle was removed, which did not allow solving the problem of increasing the rate of fire of small arms.
All these technical innovations, which were essentially revolutionary, were taken into account by Paul Mauser in a model known as the "1888 commission rifle" and received the designation "Gew 88.". This rifle was, as it were, a synthesis of an improved one-piece "proprietary" Mauser bolt and a removable Mannlicher system magazine. In addition to them, a magazine box with a trigger guard appeared, and the barrel, in order to avoid bending it, was inside a metal casing that protected the shooter's hands from burns.
But the designer is unhappy with this pattern. He is not satisfied with the Mannlicher loading system. And he continues to search.
As a result, in the next year, 1889, Paul created the "Belgian Mauser", named after the country that adopted this model. In the new system, both the shutter and the single-row magazine have been significantly redesigned. The latter began to be equipped not with a pack, but with a clip. The bolt became longitudinally sliding and received two symmetrical locking lugs in front, which significantly increased the reliability of the structure.
In 1893, the "Belgian Mauser" was redesigned for a flangeless cartridge reduced to 7 mm caliber, as a result of which it surpassed all rifles of that time in terms of its ballistic characteristics.
The Mauser rifle begins to conquer the world without firing a single shot. In the same year, 1883, Turkey, Spain, Chile adopted it. Next up is Brazil and the Transvaal.
In 1895, 12185 rifles were purchased by Sweden. Moreover, the Karl Gustav plant acquires a license, and the Swedes begin independent production. At the "Swedish Mauser", known under the designation M96, a special flange appears in the front of the bolt shank, which protects the shooter's eyes from powder gases that could break through back when the liner broke or the primer was pierced. In addition, the M96 differed from other models by the heavier barrel, which increased the accuracy of the fire, and the upper protrusion of the trigger, which greatly facilitated the disassembly of the bolt.
So, step by step, Paul Mauser walked to his 1898 rifle. The famous Mauser 98, which combined all the best that was developed by the designer during the long and difficult 30 years of continuous work.
And therefore, there is nothing strange in the fact that on April 5, 1898, it was the Mauser G98 that was adopted by the German army. A rifle that took an active part in almost all wars of the first half of the 20th century. Well, about how and where she fought, I have already told ("What made the Mauser 98 (Mauser G98) rifle extraordinary popularity all over the world?").
