This question may seem strange - indeed, if you look through our weapons literature, you may get the impression that we have comprehensive information about the TT pistol and its creator Fyodor Vasilyevich Tokarev. However, in reality, everything is not so simple, and in the history of the creation of TT there are many blank spots.
I managed to thoroughly study the work of Fyodor Vasilyevich Tokarev after the third year of the weapons and machine gun faculty of the Tula Mechanical Institute. Thanks to the recommendation of the deputy dean of the faculty Markov, I and my roommate in the dormitory, Vladimir Zharikov, had the opportunity to earn some money at the Tula factory # 536. We had to clean up all samples of small arms and aircraft machine-gun and cannon weapons in the factory museum. My share was a collection of almost all (including experienced) Tokarev self-loading rifles and pistols.
The classic version of the Browning pistol arr. 1903 g.
Partial disassembly of the classic Browning arr. 1903 g.
TT pistol
Putting these samples in order, I could not help but notice that the former Cossack Esaul was an excellent artisan and very inventive designer.
These qualities of Tokarev are confirmed, in particular, by the fact that at the end of his career, working in the Moscow design bureau of aviation and missile weapons of A. E. Nudelman, where Fyodor Vasilyevich was given the opportunity to continue weapons creativity, he preferred to improve the panoramic camera invented by him FT-2. The movable lens of this camera made it possible to take pictures on 35 mm film, not 36 mm wide, as usual, but 130 mm!
Browning 1903 K and TT. Left view
"Browning 1903 K" and TT with incomplete disassembly
But back to the TT pistol. The main question that arises about this weapon is: "What did Fyodor Vasilyevich do in this sample himself, and what did he borrow?" The legitimacy of such a statement becomes obvious after acquaintance with the 9-mm pistols of John M. Browning, model 1903. Moreover, the conclusion suggests itself that the TT is in its pure form a copy of one of the Browning models.
John Moises Browning's pistols were developed on the basis of his own patent in 1897. The following examples of Browning pistols are considered the most typical: a pistol of a sample of 1900 of caliber 7, 65 mm, a pistol of a sample of 1903 of a caliber of 9 mm and a pistol of a sample of 1906 of caliber 6, 35 mm.
The last sample does not apply to military-type weapons due to its small caliber. For each of these pistols, a cartridge was simultaneously developed. At one time, it was popular to classify these models and their corresponding cartridges by numbers from one to three. The first number designated the cartridge and pistol caliber 6, 35 mm, the second caliber 7, 65 mm and the third caliber 9 mm.
Large quantities of Browning pistols were produced in Belgium at the factory "Fabrique Nationale d. Armes de Guerre S. A." Herstal-Liege. Products made directly from Belgium are distinguished by the stylized abbreviation "FN" on both plastic grip cheeks.
Pistols were in service with the army and police of many countries.
The model of the 9-mm Browning pistol of the 1903 model was also actively used in Russia - the gendarmerie officers were armed with it.
The peculiarity of the 9-mm "Browning" model 1903consists in inertial locking of the barrel bore, although its ballistic impulse cartridge is not much inferior to the 9-mm cartridge of the 1908 Parabellum pistol. The length of the Browning cartridge is 1.5 mm less than the Parabellum cartridge (28 mm against 29.5 mm), but the sleeve longer by 1.3 mm (20.3 mm versus 19 mm). According to our now ingrained practice, this cartridge is designated 9x20.
Browning 1903 K and TT. Right view
The pistol has a smooth outer shape and a closed trigger position, which makes it convenient for pocket carry too. The trigger is placed inside the back of the frame and rotates on an axis that serves as a safety bar. The combat spring is lamellar, it is located in the rear wall of the handle and consists of two branches. The long branch acts on the trigger through the roller, which is installed on the protrusion of the trigger, and the short branch abuts against the trigger link jumper. A hammer with a spring is located in the bore of the bolt casing. In the bolt, the striker is held by a transverse pin.
On one axis with the trigger, there is a block with two feathers guiding the sleeve removed from the chamber. The left feather has a tooth that serves as a reflector. The next cartridge rests on the protrusions of both feathers from below. There is a through hole in the block for the passage of the disconnector. We see exactly the same feathers and a similar arrangement of the reflector and disconnector on the removable assembly of the trigger firing mechanism of the TT pistol.
The release mechanism with an uncoupler allows only single fire. The descent is made in one piece with the trigger rod, the rod covers the magazine on both sides and moves in the socket inside the pistol frame.
The rear thrust link acts on the sear, in the same part above the thrust there is an uncoupler, which lowers the thrust and disengages it from the sear when the shutter rolls back.
Protection against an unauthorized shot is carried out by a flag safety catch and an automatic safety catch, which releases the sear when the pistol grip is squeezed with the palm of the hand. An uncoupler serves as a fuse against a premature shot, which does not allow the trigger thrust to act on the sear before the shutter comes to the extreme forward position. The safety catch can be turned on by turning its knurled head upwards only when the hammer is cocked. When the trigger is released, the safety catch cannot be turned, which serves as a trigger signal.
With the help of a safety catch, an incomplete disassembly of the pistol is carried out, for which it is necessary to pull the shutter casing so that the safety tooth goes into the cutout on the left side of the shutter casing. After that, the barrel can be rotated 120 degrees and the shutter casing with the barrel can be removed from the frame by sliding them forward.
A box-type magazine with a capacity of seven rounds with a single-row arrangement. The relatively small, according to modern views, the number of cartridges in the store is explained by the desire for a weapon that is compact in height. The magazine fits inside the handle and is locked with a latch at the bottom of the magazine. When the last cartridge is used up, the magazine feeder raises a tooth located on the right side of the shutter stop frame. The tooth, going into the cutout of the shutter casing, stops it in the extreme rear position.
Colt pistol mod. 1911 g.
The sight is permanent, it consists of a rear sight and a front sight. They are located on the casing-shutter.
This pistol layout, featuring a massive breech cover that covers the barrel along its entire length, and with a return spring under the barrel, above the barrel or around the barrel, is protected by a patent dated 1897 to John Moises Browning. Browning borrowed the location of the removable magazine in the handle from Hugo Borchardt. Since then, a similar scheme has been used by many designers.
When comparing "Browning" 1903with TT, the first thing that catches your eye is their external similarity, but inside these samples there are many differences - completely different locking mechanisms, significantly different shock-release mechanisms (the Browning has a closed trigger, the TT has an open and removable trigger). It would seem that in such a situation, there is no need to talk about blind copying of Browning's pistol by Tokarev. But there are still grounds for such assumptions!
I was able to find in the weapons collection of the technical office of the Tula TsKIB SOO a very unusual version of the "Browning" in 1903, which differs from the classic one with the trigger pulled out. Let's call it conditionally “Browning arr. 1903 K ".
“Browning arr. 1903 K "can be considered an extremely rare specimen, since it has not been described either in domestic or foreign literature. In the arms collection of the technical office of the Tula TsKIB SOO, where he is listed under the name "Browning" 1903 " In appearance, dimensions and weight data, this pistol is completely similar to the above-described sample chambered for 9x20 mm, but differs from it in the device of the firing mechanism, the absence of an automatic fuse and a flag safety mechanism.
Colt pistol mod. 1911 with incomplete disassembly
There are no factory marks and inscriptions on the casing and the pistol frame. Branding is available only on the breech of the barrel in the area of the sleeve opening.
The sample belongs to the class of weapons with inertial locking of the barrel. Its barrel, return mechanism and a replaceable seven-round magazine are interchangeable with the above-described Browning pistol of the 1903 model.
For incomplete disassembly of this sample, it is necessary, by pulling the breech casing and, trying to turn the barrel, to feel by touch the position when the bearing protrusions of the barrel will come out of engagement with the pistol frame and enter the cut of the breech casing.
The trigger mechanism of the pistol is a separate unit in the form of a block, in which the trigger with a mainspring inside it, a sear with a leaf spring and an uncoupler are assembled. After detaching the bolt cover, this unit is separated from the gun frame.
Externally, the unit and its parts are indistinguishable from similar TT pistols.
In the Tula city museum of weapons there is an experienced pistol made by F. V. Tokarev, which can be considered a prototype of the TT and which differs from Browning's pistol only in that it uses a 7.62 mm Mauser cartridge.
Thus, it is quite possible to say that it was originally intended to completely copy the TT from a rare modification of the Browning pistol with a detachable trigger firing mechanism.
F. V. Tokarev pistol mod. 1938 g.
Tokarev chose the Mauser cartridge only because at the end of 1920, by decision of the Artillery Department of the Red Army, the German company DWM (from 1922 Berliner Karlsruhe Industriewerke - BKIW) bought a license for its production. However, this ammunition turned out to be too powerful for inertial locking. To correct the situation, Fyodor Vasilyevich in the next version of the TT used the locking of the barrel in the image and likeness of the Colt pistol of the 1911 model - a swinging barrel controlled by an earring. Note that the "Colt" of the 1911 model was developed by the same Browning at the Colt factories.
This begs the question, why Tokarev, a very inventive designer, decided to explicitly copy when developing such a basically simple weapon as a self-loading pistol? All in the same Tula Museum of Weapons there are his original samples of self-loading rifles, structurally much more complex than TT. So, for example, its self-loading rifle SVT-38, which was put into service in 1938, is completely original in design. The same can be said about Tokarev's 1938 pistol.
| Caliber, mm | 9 |
| Weight of a pistol with a magazine without cartridges, kg | 0, 93 |
| Bullet muzzle velocity, m / s | 330 |
| Barrel length, mm | 128 |
| Pistol length, mm | 205 |
| Pistol height, mm | 120 |
| Weight of one cartridge, g | 11, 3 |
| Caliber, mm | 9 |
| Weight of a pistol with a magazine without cartridges, kg | 0, 93 |
| Bullet muzzle velocity, m / s | 330 |
| Barrel length, mm | 128 |
| Pistol length, mm | 205 |
| Pistol height, mm | 120 |
| Weight of one cartridge, g | 11, 3 |
| Caliber, mm | 7, 62 |
| Weight of a pistol with a magazine without cartridges, kg | 0, 825 |
| Bullet muzzle velocity, m / s | 420 |
| Barrel length, mm | 116 |
| Pistol length, mm | 195 |
| Pistol height, mm | 120 |
| Weight of one cartridge, g | 11, 9 |
There can be only one answer. The designer was simply ordered to copy a specific sample. Apparently, someone in the Soviet military elite dealt with the 1903 Browning and considered it an ideal pistol, which, due to its simple design, could be easily produced at our not very advanced weapons factories at that time. In fact, Tokarev's task was not to create an original domestic pistol, but to rearrange the Browning under the domestically produced cartridge 7, 62x25. They took as a basis not the most common model of the pistol, but its simplest, albeit rare, modification with a removable trigger mechanism. But the powerful ammunition still forced the designer to change the locking system in the pistol.
Such a variant of creating a TT is quite likely, since in Soviet arms history there are often cases when military and political leaders forced designers to make technical decisions dictated by their own predilections.
For example, on the same TT, Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny strongly discouraged Tokarev from using an automatic safety device that blocks the trigger if the pistol is released from his hand. And yet he achieved his goal - there is no automatic fuse on the TT!
Designer Sergey Gavrilovich Simonov told me that Kliment Efremovich Voroshilov insisted on replacing a simple and technologically advanced folding faceted bayonet, oxidized in black, on his SKS carbine, also folding, but bladed and shiny. Allegedly, the infantry, attacking with bayonets shining in the sun, will terrify the enemy. Sergei Gavrilovich spat, but together with the technician of his design bureau, Volkhny Vasily Kuzmich, they bungled such a bayonet.
Front and back sides of a business card, presented to the author of the article, Fyodor Vasilyevich Tokarev, during a personal acquaintance
From the editorial board of the magazine "Weapon"
The discovery by the author of the article, gunsmith engineer Dmitry Shiryaev, of a new, nowhere described modification of the Browning pistol in 1903 can be considered a small sensation. Moreover, the presence of a Browning with a detachable trigger firing mechanism in the TsKIB's technical office is confirmed by the employees working there. However, there is reason to believe that its origin is not as obvious as it seems to the author of the article, which means that the question of Tokarev's copying of this sample is not so unambiguous. Therefore, the editors of the magazine turned to gunsmiths and weapons historians with a request to express in the next issues of our publication their opinion on the origin of the mysterious sample and on the possibility of Tokarev copying it during the development of the TT pistol.
