If firearms enthusiasts want to buy and sell guns owned by Nazis that is their right. If Rock Island Auctions wants to middleman Nazi weaponry like the “Outstanding Factory Cased Gold Plated and Engraved SA Presentation Model PP Pistol Attributed to Viktor Lutze – The Mate to Hitler’s Pistol,” so be it. But I’d like it to be known that the SA in the description stands for Sturmabteilung. Those would be the murderous “Brown Shirts” who assured Hitler’s rise to power. Including SA Obergruppenführer Viktor Lutze, who played an integral role in the Night of the Long Knives. Click here to read Hitler’s eulogy for his BFF. And then ask yourself if you’d ever do business with people who profit from the reputation of this evil man or, in fact, his beloved Führer.
Just my personal opinion, I would like to do with Nazi Memorabilia what was done with John Wayne Gacy’s paintings i.e. buy them up quietly and then destroy them.
Please note I am not talking about regular German Military issue gear just the Nazi garbage. I own a kar98 (post WWII) had a P-38 no problem. It’s the stuff with the Nazi history,SS, BrownShirt, and the death camps stuff.
Yes it’s historical, anything can be considered historical if you want to. I just believe that glorifying Nazi stuff is not a good idea.
Shields up/Kevlar on
NukemJim
+10 agreed in full. i’d love to have deep pockets enough to go to any gun show, buy all the nazi shite and dump some gas on it and shoot it up with some tracers.
+100 I’m with Robert on this.
Never Again.
I disagree with the idea that the Nazi stuff should be destroyed. Eradicating historical pieces won’t change history, but it certainly will help future generations forget it (which isn’t a good thing).
With that being said I don’t get the obsession with Nazi stuff – at all. I would never buy anything connected to the Nazis and would likely not do business with companies that made it a practice of taking profits earned through the sale of Nazi memorabilia.
Do you own any milsurp weapons from the Soviet Union? What about US military weapons?
All of them were used to kill people, yet people childishly demonize particular guns simply because of who held a particular gun.
When you make arguments like this, you’re actually arguing on the side of the gun grabbers and claiming that an inanimate object is capable of being “good” or “evil”.
Generally agree, but now they’ve got a gun that belonged to the Gestapo chief of Auschwitz. That is not history, but delving into the depths of depredation.
Rock Island is just making a buck. They are without scruples.
by your logic, you should also buy anything with a hammer and a sickle on it and destroy it. The soviets murdered far more people than the nazis (the chinese communists, even more). It utterly amazes me how they sell che guervara and hammer and sickle shirts in the stores, yet nobody does anything. not like if i wore a shirt with a swastika.
It happened 60 years ago. the jews havent been the only people persecuted by a tyrannical government. get over it.
I don’t think destroying the references to any tyrant is a particularly good idea. The quicker he us erased from history the quicker someone else will take his place. History is a PITA like that.
While I would be perfectly fine with destroying generic Nazi paraphernalia this piece has genuine historical significance because of the specific individual who owned it. That said, I would hate to see it end up in the hands of some neo-Nazi who wants it for all the wrong reasons. If I had the money I would seriously consider buying it and donating to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Israel’s Yad Vashem or somewhere else where it could be displayed in it’s proper historical context.
Meh
Creeps me out. If somebody wants to bring something like that into their home, I have no objection. But I wouldn’t.
I remember all you guys were in favor of Bonnie and Clyde’s gun auction and the Al Capone gun auction, but something’s wrong with these Nazi ones?
Doesn’t seem consistent.
Hey, I’m with Mikey for once!
As much as I dislike the man who owned the pistol and Nazis in general, it is in fact a finely engraved piece of history. I wouldn’t take pride in owning “a piece of Nazi history”, I’d take pride in owning the pistol itself.
It is a well executed piece of craftsmanship, but it symbolizes something abhorrent and the auction symbolizes a creepy fascination with Nazism. It’s like collecting photographs of homicide victims or slowing down to gawk at a nasty auto accident.
As opposed to a creepy fascination with a Middle Eastern nation?
Que?
The little lapel pin is a response to an anti-Semite who used to post here, not a fascination.
Now, If I had a room full of paraphernalia from Israel’s conquest of Canaan, that would be a little different. No?
It should be flown below the American flag, not at equal height. Same goes for every other flag.
I can’t imagine wanting to own any of that stuff, but I wouldn’t consider the object any less innocuous than any other war bring-back, be it an engraved pistol that probably never left its case, or a luger that probably did in particularly vile circumstances.
As to the auction firm– are they profiting from the notoriety of the previous owner? Perhaps, but so have many other such companies selling everything from Bonnie & Clyde Thompsons to cars and other items owned by generally evil people over the years. I wouldn’t think the intrinsic value of a historical artifact is in any way a condonation of the acts that may be associated with it, but, your mileage may vary.
During director Michael Mann’s DVD commentary on his excellent 1981 film Thief, which amusingly had notorious Jewel Thief John Santucci play a cop, and veteran Chicago detective Denis Farina play a brutish hitman, he mentions that the firearm props used were all working guns that at some time or another had been used in actual crimes.
Robert: Did you really stiff Stephen Wenger? Bad career move. I certainly won’t be looking in on your little blog again.
L Humphrey
Florida
Who what? Ping me at [email protected].
Leave the anthropomorphization of inanimate objects to the anti-gunners. It’s just a hunk of metal. A pretty hunk of metal. People are moral or immoral. Guns are not. Don’t go down that path. It doesn’t lead anywhere good for those of us who like these machines.
+1
It’s a pistol, and a well crafted one at that.
exactly!!!
Yea, I really hate when Roberts bigotry comes out in full force. He has no problem owning a gun and writing a review of said gun when it was made and used by the Soviets to murder innocent people, but if it was used against the superior Jews, then Yaweh No!, that’s just beyond evil.
I don’t give a crap who people are, I treat them equally, but I can’t help but wonder if this whole “We’re above reproach” attitude I see from certain Jewish people (like Rob) is why they’ve been so persecuted through the centuries.
Anyone who’s read this site or knows me personally knows that I value all human life equally—across all geographic, racial, ethnic or religious lines. I do not consider Jews superior to other people per se. I do not consider them beyond approach. In fact, TTAG’s published several articles wondering WTF about Jewish support for gun control. Your anti-semitic remark is as inaccurate as it is intolerant.
“Your anti-semitic remark is as inaccurate as it is intolerant.”
+10
What anti-semitic remark? Pointing out your hypocrisy for having no problem owning guns used to murder innocent non-jews but throwing a temper tantrum over a gun used to murder an innocent jew?
Your multiple rants show that you clearly value Jewish lives far more than other lives and you consider the death of a Jew to be much more significant than the death of a non-Jew. If you didn’t, then you’d view owning a Nazi gun the same way that you view owning a Soviet gun – but you’ve clearly stated multiple times that you don’t. Both groups did horrible things and killed millions of innocent people – yet you support buying guns from one (Soviets) and not the other (Nazis) merely because one group was anti-Jew.
If a firearm was owned by Stalin or one of his stooges I’d feel EXACTLY the same way. What makes you think any differently?
Because you’ve talked about Mosin-Nagant’s and other Soviet weapons plenty of times without any of the vitriol you use with German guns. You reserve your “the people who owned this gun killed innocent people, thus the gun is evil” argument for German guns and only German guns.
The gun in question is linked to a specific Nazi, which the auctioneer uses to add value to the gun. That’s the rub here, not the fact that the gun was macht auf Deutschland.
Not according to some of Rob’s previous anti-German posts. Also, why does it matter if we know the NAME of the person who owned it or not?
Again, your bias is showing. A gun that belonged to Hitler himself is no more evil than a gun that belonged to Teddy Roosevelt.
Anti-Nazi. Not anti-German. And I’m no big fan of Teddy Roosevelt. Not after reading The Imperial Cruise.
The infamous name is used to add value.
The name is infamous because he was a central figure in the Nazi party, a party which fervently dedicated itself to killing as many Jews, among others, as possible.
Lutze was big on killing Christians too, BTW.
haha nice logic. “You disagree with me, thus you are anti-sematic”. hilarious attitude from zionists…
Reminds me of my friend responding to complaints that he bought a foreign car. He claimed that he only bought cars built in America or by countries that we conquered.
We conquered the nazis. We don’t have to be afraid of them anymore.
That particular gun is not my taste, but I can see someone wanting it just because of the quality of the engraving, it is a very pretty pistol, even if it’s a little over the top for me. Were the craftsmen involved in making this gun part of the atrocities of Nazi Germany? I don’t know, but if yes, then I’d have less reason to find the pistol attractive.
The aversion I have to owning something like this is the flip side of the pride I would feel in owning a Garand like the one my grandfather used to help win that war.
I agree. They’re just hunks of metal. But sometimes they’re symbolic of something, like service in the SA. If his “Congrats on being the most genocidal lunatic” soup-bowl set was for sale, I wouldn’t want that, either.
But sometimes they’re symbolic of something, like service in the SA.
IMO, war bring-backs aren’t tributes to the people who made or used them, but trophies honoring the men who defeated them.
There is absolutely validity to that argument. But IMHO as such, it wouldn’t belong on my mantle. I’m not the guy that risked his ass to be in the position to liberate it.
And as I said earlier- if someone wants this thing, I have no objection. All I’m saying is I wouldn’t.
Yes, exactly. This soap box lecturing by TTAG on how owning a long-ago Nazi-owned firearm is getting ridiculous. It’s a piece of history, not an actual former human Nazi party member. This is the annoying, holier-than-though spewing that I’d expect from The Nation, not a gun site. Maybe Farago can also write for Newsweek or Huffington Post on the side?
So Farago, what do you think of owning a Nambu pistol that probably was used by a Japanese officer to murder Chinese civilians or execute US POWS with a shot to the head? How about a Makarov used by gulag guards in Siberia? Or is it the same as with the left, where only anything related to the Nazis is evil, but not to the commies, Japanese empire, etc.?
“How about a Makarov used by gulag guards in Siberia? Or is it the same as with the left, where only anything related to the Nazis is evil, but not to the commies, Japanese empire, etc.?”
LOL Exactly! Spot on! of course, rationality doesn’t always prevail when it is easier to sensationalize and demonize inanimate objects.
My Dad, RIP- served with the 88th infantry- Machine Gunner, Bronze Star, Italy,
WWll- If you think for one damn second that the VERY fine Mausers, the P38, the Pocket watch, the Iron Cross, the bayonets and swords, military export papers, holsters and other memorabilia I so treasure in any way glorify the Nazis, you’re way off- MY DAD, and MILLIONS of others, KICKED THEIR ASSES! As much as at times I appreciate the fine workmanship, the engineering of these weapons- never forgotten is the Evil they represent. Evil which was conquered. If I were a collector, would I support a business selling such historic pieces?
Absolutely!
Pwned. +1
This- a collector may think of an object like this as something that commemorates the Nazis, or he may think of it as a trophy. I think it makes a great deal of difference which.
As for Rock Island Auctions, they are obviously thinking of profit. What’s wrong with that? If they were trying to foster some sort of neo-nazi movement, that would be one thing.
RF, do you think all nazi guns should be destroyed? There are Lugers and KAR98s all over the place, by all accounts pretty good guns. And we took ’em from them. Do you feel there’s a difference between those and these highly personalized pieces?
Right on, JohnD!
“way off- MY DAD, and MILLIONS of others, KICKED THEIR ASSES! As much as at times I appreciate the fine workmanship, the engineering of these weapons- never forgotten is the Evil they represent. Evil which was conquered.”
Dont you love revisionist history? the nazis were largely defeated by a even more evil enemy that the united states foolishly decided to ally itself with: the Soviet Union. Look up the body counts caused by the Soviet government vs Nazi government and get back to me.
The US did anything but “kick their asses”. World War II was a long, drawn out struggle against battle-hardened, well-equipped, and well-trained enemies that only gave ground when they were certain they could make the Allies pay for it…in blood. Of course, the Soviet Union can be credited with destroying 75% of the wehrmacht, more than the Allied nations combined (I deliberately seperated the Soviet Union and Allies).
mosin nagants and other historic firearms produced in the soviet union must also represent “evil”. They seem to have killed far more than any luger or mauser rifle ever thought of killing.
of course, rheinmetall, the german company that produced the MG42 machine gun and cannons, produces the 120mm cannon for the M1 Abrams (and other NATO tanks). Interesting twist if i must say so.
I want a Mauser Karabiner 98k. I won’t feel bad for it, and I certainly don’t see the difference between the sales pitches I’ve seen for the K98k and the one in the description of this item, besides the one in this auction being a much finer piece of workmanship, regardless of the philosophies of those who created it.
I own a couple other items of Nazi “memorabilia.” It helps me remember my great uncle’s contributions in World War II, as he killed the sons of bitches in France who had the Hitler Youth dagger and combat bayonet I now own.
Levi B, I’m with you completely. My own dad brought back some trophies from the ETO that got lost along the way. Man, I wish I had that stuff now.
I hope someone buys it and donates it to the Holocaust museum. If every piece of history from that dark chapter of humanity was destroyed, the people that already claim (falsely) that it never happened would gain traction as time presses on. It’s important to have evidence of things, even of they are horrible atrocities, in fact I could argue moreso for them. Without evidence the sands of time wipe away the memory of past wrongs, and once forgotten can be repeated more easily. And I sure as hell don’t want my children/grand/great-great x1000 grandchildren to be around for another Holocaust.
I’d rather someone who values beautifully crafted firearms and has a love of history buys it and cherishes it.
My great grandfather fought in WWI. He was stationed in Cairo. While he was there, he bought a knife of Arabic design. It had Quaran inscriptions on the blade. Why did he buy it? It was cool looking. And the handle was elephant ivory…
These fools don’t care about what happened to the millions of innocent people who were tortured and murdered by those monsters, and they’re only interested in blood money. My shooting buddy was looking at his friends collection of war artifacts and he went to pick up a nazi arm band when he felt a sudden chill that scared the $hit out of him. He left the room ASAP and told his friend that there was something evil going on in that room. I believe his story 100 percent because he’s an honest man and he has no reason to make up such a weird story.
Would I like to own Walter Model’s pistol? Oh, hell yeah. Could I afford it? Oh, hell no.
I see nothing wrong with buying historically significant guns, no matter who owned them. We always say, and correctly, that guns don’t kill people, people kill people. So guns weren’t Nazis. People were Nazis. There is no such thing as a “Nazi gun.”
Owning a famous German’s gun is a wonderful reminder that millions of men like my father won that war. If they hadn’t, there might be a German auction house somewhere advertising Patton’s ivory handed pistols for sale, and a lot of us would not be around to read it.
If one chooses not to business with Rock Island that is their Right. That is what Liberty embraces. If one suggests that a transaction between two consenting parties, not undertaken shadowed by threat of force or form of coercion, should be restricted or outlawed is the foundation of despotism.
I’m Irish. My people have been enslaved, tortured, starved and murdered by the English for centuries. I think buying and collecting Webleys is a crime against humanity. Please stop.
+1,000,000
Please, TTAG Staff, stop the bigotry against guns from certain countries. Remember, they’re inanimate objects.
My antipathy towards Nazis is not bigotry. My disgust is aimed at the particular man who owned this particular weapon. [Note: other TTAG writers are free to hold their own opinion on this or any other subject.]
It is too bigotry because you show no such disgust towards owning / using a gun that was previously owned by a Soviet who murdered innocent people. You always ignore that whole aspect every time you go on your bigoted rants, and if you read the comments, I’m far from the only one who’s called you out on it.
Either stand by your claims and be against all guns used to kill innocent people, regardless of what country they were made in / what military regime used them, or realize that guns are inanimate objects and are incapable of being good or evil.
I have direct relatives who were killed by Nazi’s – yet I don’t throw a temper tantrum over people buying Nazi weapons. They’re a tool, nothing more, and they’re historical artifacts that should be preserved and cherished for the role they played in making the world what it is today as well as for their craftsmanship.
its a collectors item! get the f–k over it! a gun is a inanimate, mechanical devise composed of steel, alloy, wood, or plastic. thats it! it is not possessed by a evil nazis soul, nor does it represent atrocity any more any other firearm wielded by governments in the 20th century.
This auction house could care less about stigmas. A very rare firearm came into their possession and they exist to make money and keep collectors happy in that order.
I collect firearms and militaria from both Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany. I read books all about the Eastern Front, and I love learning about that period of history despite its tragic ambiance. Does that make me a die hard Nazi or Communist? Absolutely not. To say that one will always ingrain himself in the politics associated with what he collects is preposterous.
Yes, there are a few bad apples every harvest, but that doesn’t mean everyone who has a Mauser Kar98 in their collection is a goose-stepping Fascist. Let the anti-gun people stick to their whole guilty by association thing. We don’t need any of that here in our community.
Oh, I consider the Nazi and Stalin era interesting, and I suppose if I was rich, I might have some collector items. I have many WWII books and videos, but that hardly means I am of Communist or Nazi political leanings.
Actually, my politics is rather close to that of Ron Paul; and I do not think Adolph or Josef would have approved of him or me.
Actually, the Nazis and Communists are a good example of what not to do when running a government.
As Breitbart would say: So?
They didn’t do business with an evil man. They did business with his gun. Evil doesn’t travel through objects, son.
I have one of Hitler’s silver platters that my grandfather appropriated from Berchtesgaden. Does it make me evil? Does it make him evil for wanting to take it? I don’t keep it because I’m attracted to Nazism, I keep it because it is a memento of my grandfather’s sacrifice. He keeps the shrapnel in his back, I have the plate that he took.
By your logic, someone who owns a Confederate Enfield from the Civil War would be a supporter of slavery, rather than a plain old history nut.
I gotta say I’m with Bob on this one. I don’t buy those cute Che t-shirts, or Mao themed accessories, or Red Star badged toys from Russia, and I don’t want anything with any connections to the Nazis in my house.
I would definitely draw the line at owning the physical remains of victims of any war, whether lampshades of Jewish skin, Viet Cong trophy ears, or gold teeth from any number of wars. These belong with barbarities such as scalps and shrunken heads, and if kept as historical evidence, should be preserved in the hidden recesses of scholarly collections, or else given a decent burial or cremation. On the other hand, I own a number of historically significant weapons ranging from a pre-Civil War saber, a DWM Luger and Colt .45 auto, both brought back from France by my grandfather, along with his medals and the lifetime effects of lung damage from mustard gas, and a 1925 Russian Mosin Nagant revolver, that may well have, as the NKVD officer in Dr. Zhivago said, “Executed better men than I with a small pistol”. These items have the effect of reminding us that the events of the past were very real, full of the grim, terrifying reality that we too often forget. That is why most of us keep and collect them, not from any fondness for Nazism or Communism.
The person writing this MUST be jewish. Why are all you jews so tough on nazi items? Get over it…it’s the past…grow up and move on to your own kind to hate. You people kill me….you’d roll over your daddy to screw your own mother so why not get on the band wagon and make some money off these COLLECTIBLES!!!!!!!!! You’re the same type of scum bags that pushed JEW-BAY into disallowing Nazi collectibles and wrecking it for everyone else.
Do you think crying about these items will remove them all from the planet or make yourself look like complete fools that you really are?
I think I’m going to start a campaign on making the yar-muck offensive!!!!!!!!!!!!!
History belongs to the victors.
As winston churchhill said “history will be kind to me because i intend to write it’. the truth is all countrys commeted war crimes and on a scale which surpased even the alleged crimes of the NAZIS for example the british and americans bombed german citys during the ‘blitz’, day and night targeting civilians, 63 german citys with a total population of 25 million people were distroyed or devestated,all german citys with a population of 50,000 or more were from 50% to 80% distroyed. “It may be inconvient history but England rather than Germany initiated the murderous campane of bombing civilians thus bringing about retalation, Hitler wonted to reach an agreement with the allies to confine the use of aircraft to the battlefields.” the long surpressed story of the worst masecare in the history of the world the devestasation of Dresden in feb 1945 was one of those crimes against humanity whos authors would have been arrand at Nurumberg if that court had not be preverted.” they dont teach this stuff at school but its not a secret ,most of the posts above are written by ill educated people still suffering the effects of a 60 year old propagander campane, a campane whos purpose was to justerfy the attacking of civilian targets and the killing of other human targets, solders. They done this by convincing the mases that the germans were evil. Remember most of the stories about german concentration camps came from the soviets such storys about the shaving of humans to make pillows, making soup out of bodies, to sell to raise funds for the SS to gas chambers and crematoriams. During the nurumberg trials the so-called gas chambers at auswitch no longer exsited they had been “distroyed by the russians” what they had were bricks for the alledged gas chambers that were tested for cyclon B, because cyinide gas(cyclon B) reacts with the iron in the bricks, the levels found in the bricks were consistent with cyclon B being used once for delousing purposes the standed practice for delouing in those days and there were many other inconsistences in the trial. Wake up look at the evidence and gather your own conclutions instead of beleving everything your told, i remember a statement form a doctor who was following the front line trops in to europe (carnt remember his name) he stated that as far as he new, he was the only clinical pathologist in the whole US area of operations his role was to investergate alledged german war crimes he stated he autopsed over 100 bodies a day on accations (bodies from camps) he said that he never found any evadence of poisen in most cases they had died from desease like typhus a direct result of allied bombing and the reason they use to shave the detanees heads the reason for low levels of cyclone b in the bricks consistent with delousing, the reason the Americans burnt some camps to the ground because ‘they were crawling with lice and typhus’. the doctor actually stated that the story we have been told,that 6 million jews had been exacuted is a hoax and the product of propagada.
Remember the germans where and are people like you and me not an evil race. I would be proud to own this gun, sorry about the spelling.
I came across these comments and had to put my two cents in and thats probably the true value. I think its a good ideal to collect Nazi guns. It reveals who won the war. They are mostly captured guns that were trophies of war. If Hitler won the war there wouldnt be any guns to collect period because he confiscated all guns from civilians.
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