I'd always assumed that every Luger had it's own unique number ... but thinking about this deeper leaves me a bit perplexed.
I've never seen a Luger with a number larger than 4 digits... if we use the full set, this allows for 10,000 unique numbers. I've read online that the German and Axis powers fielded 15,000,000 soldiers in WWII. If we make the conservative guess that only 10% of this force were issued such serial numbered
Lugers, and if each Luger were uniquely numbered, this would require a 7 digit number. I've never seen a Luger showing more than a four digit number, plus I've never heard of two Lugers with the same number. So one of these observations is wrong... either there are a lot of Lugers around with higher than 4 digit numbers... or there are a lot of Lugers around with the same identical numbers.
If rather than the numbers being unique to one particular gun, the numbers instead represent one particular gunsmith,, or one particular gunsmith team, or one one particular gunsmith shop/factory... this is starting to make better sense (this leads to the conclusion that there can potentially be many guns with the same number).
If these numbers then refer to the maker's ID rather than the gun's own ID... does it make sense that every part of the gun would be manufactured by the exact same individual - as in the case of a gun with all matched numbers? Wouldn't Axis gunsmith shops/factories have figured out the magic of industrial scale specialization/division of labor such that one man or team specialized in barrels and was particularly tooled for this, while another person/team was particularly tooled and specialized in ejector/firing-pin assemblies, etc? Rather than all of these persons/teams using the same number, wouldn't it make the most sense (from a quality control point at least) for each such person/team to use their own unique number?
Speculating on the likely mass production environment of these Lugers... it seems possible/likely that completed Lugers would be rolling out of the gunsmith shops/factories as new with all "mis-matched numbers" representing the multiple persons and teams that went into the final (precise jigsaw-puzzle like) assembly.
In this scenario... guns with completely matched number sets should seem a peculiar curio... perhaps the product of smaller shops/factories that could better afford the time (the war time luxury) to produce such numerically matched, numerically perfect examples.
Is it a known/accepted observation that there are a lot of Lugers around with the same four and two digit numbers?
I've never seen a Luger with a number larger than 4 digits... if we use the full set, this allows for 10,000 unique numbers. I've read online that the German and Axis powers fielded 15,000,000 soldiers in WWII. If we make the conservative guess that only 10% of this force were issued such serial numbered
Lugers, and if each Luger were uniquely numbered, this would require a 7 digit number. I've never seen a Luger showing more than a four digit number, plus I've never heard of two Lugers with the same number. So one of these observations is wrong... either there are a lot of Lugers around with higher than 4 digit numbers... or there are a lot of Lugers around with the same identical numbers.
If rather than the numbers being unique to one particular gun, the numbers instead represent one particular gunsmith,, or one particular gunsmith team, or one one particular gunsmith shop/factory... this is starting to make better sense (this leads to the conclusion that there can potentially be many guns with the same number).
If these numbers then refer to the maker's ID rather than the gun's own ID... does it make sense that every part of the gun would be manufactured by the exact same individual - as in the case of a gun with all matched numbers? Wouldn't Axis gunsmith shops/factories have figured out the magic of industrial scale specialization/division of labor such that one man or team specialized in barrels and was particularly tooled for this, while another person/team was particularly tooled and specialized in ejector/firing-pin assemblies, etc? Rather than all of these persons/teams using the same number, wouldn't it make the most sense (from a quality control point at least) for each such person/team to use their own unique number?
Speculating on the likely mass production environment of these Lugers... it seems possible/likely that completed Lugers would be rolling out of the gunsmith shops/factories as new with all "mis-matched numbers" representing the multiple persons and teams that went into the final (precise jigsaw-puzzle like) assembly.
In this scenario... guns with completely matched number sets should seem a peculiar curio... perhaps the product of smaller shops/factories that could better afford the time (the war time luxury) to produce such numerically matched, numerically perfect examples.
Is it a known/accepted observation that there are a lot of Lugers around with the same four and two digit numbers?