eBay Purchase, not what I thought it was!

 

Since showing it to a friend in Fultons at Bisley he showed me a couple of similar ones made of Bakelite, albeit both were broken.

The whole thing measures a little under 4x5" inches and the front has the legend, Property of DND.

Could this be of Canadian origin? 

 

That's rather encouraging, thank you Derek!

I did wonder that at first Geoff.

The British Army had a TR team from 1968 onwards furnished with Enfield conversions at first followed by L39's when the original conversions got tired. 

AJ Parker supplied most of the accessories like sights during this period which is why most of the L39's that turn up have Matchmaker foresight tunnels and AJP 4/47 rear sights.  

Shaun it's very common to find this combination; my best guess is because once the rifles were issued (without sights) the regiment or unit concerned would buy the extras mail order from AJ Parkers. Edna Parker was slow (to say the least!) to point out the insert holder would not take the 17mm inserts.

Strangely Brown wrote: The whole thing measures a little under 4x5" inches and the front has the legend, Property of DND.  Could this be of Canadian origin?

No pics of that legend?

Mick, my best 30 years at the oars service guess is that is most likely the product of one of the individual gun plumbers or their Service Battalion/REME cohorts.  

If it were some sort of stock item, you could requisition it from the bin rats (depending on how friendly your relationship with them and your ability to validate a need).

A stock item would also have a stock number, whether on a set of shoe laces, a helmet liner, a package of flannel patches, etc.  Some items you occasionally come across with DND markings but no number, but not many.

That has the appearance of somebody in the Service Battalion trades putting their artisan skills to work to create that specific item.  We had C3 sniper rifles that could also mount target rifle sights complete with inserts all the way up to and past the Small Arms Replacement Project in the early 1980's and beyond that into the 1990's.  So where the Lee Enfields left off being used for competition, the C3 in the hands of the military in target rifle picked up.  

But the numbers of competitors and rifles were not all that much; most in the regimental rifle teams shot with the issue FN, the Inglis, and the Sterling in the military matches.  Which suggests this was a one-off product by an individual in one Service Battalion who probably made a couple, not just one, and then marked them DND for when they went to matches with the regiment's team.

A few of the Canadian Rangers were competitive shooters BTW, and a few still are including a friend who just went straight from RSM at retirement to recruit Canadian Ranger. He and a few others are often former and retired military who continued to serve in the Rangers afterwards for the access it gave them to continue military shooting.  An Internet Lee Enfield personality, "Riflechair", wrote a bit about getting the best out of Lee Enfields along with some YouTube presentations - he was a DCRA competitor as well as a Canadian Ranger.

I met at least one of them at an annual PWT that I was sent to provide SAI/RSO who showed up with his bog standard Long Branch and his personal purchase No. 4 complete with vernier rear and tunnel front sight.

That piece of kit you have there has a very nice individual military artisan look to it, versus something manufactured for the CAF by contract (almost always either Quebec or Ontario, like the useless bush hats of the time that we loathed).  The complete opposite of things like our KFS in the 1980's that had "Made in China" stamped on it.

That's a very nice find that more than a few active competitors will wish they were the ones who found and purchased it.  I probably would have walked blindly past it if I saw it on a table at a local gun show...

Strangely Brown wrote: Rick, I've enjoyed his videos apart from the one where he suggests the mad Minute record was a lie.

I've spoken to him on the phone back in my last years when we were providing SAI/RSO support to Ranger patrols in Luftwaffe (infantry-speak for 'Land Forces Western Area'), where his Ranger Patrol was located.  When he was at his most active, he was a very dedicated guy attempting to improve rifle training within the Rangers.  If I had to characterize him, I would call him very informative and willingly helpful, but definitely not always authoritative.  

I am a very long stretch from being able to claim I have above average technical expertise or collector/historical knowledge, but I know that some of what he presents is incorrect.  My specific example would be the Range Instructions he developed for the Canadian Rangers regarding how to properly zero their No. 4 Lee Enfield rifles.  

The instructions are somewhat in error - not enough to make a real difference in the world, but are still floating around the Web as being authoritative Canadian military zeroing instructions for the Lee Enfield. I also think he got some of what he put together from some hoary old DCRA competitors still kicking around.

To be fair to him, I searched high and low while I still had full access to the CAF's DWAN to find anything in the way of zeroing instructions for the No. 4 rifles beyond the last instructions in 1945's first version of Canada's "Shoot To Live" pam for teaching infantry the issue rifle.  

I was unable to find anything newer than 1945 on zeroing the rifle, including the closest Canada has to Hyanth: Gag-town, The Center Of Pestilence.  There is an enormous library there, both paper and electronic.  If it isn't there, it probably doesn't exist as a reference for either military or researchers.

So I am not surprised he had to wing it and develop and distribute his own version of the zeroing instructions for the Rangers still issued the No. 4 rifle.  The zero he developed was in error, but that was somewhat irrelevant when compared to the fact he actually went to the effort of both developing Range Instructions.  And after that promoting and spreading them through the Ranger program while the Ranger patrols were all making it up as they went, with practices changing year to year as people came and went.  

The Canadian regular force that is supposed to supply that technical expertise and support for the Rangers pretty much ignored the weapons component of the Ranger Patrols.  I know at one time he was also doing basic repairs on Rangers' rifles using parts he sourced himself while I saw the gun plumbers' bins at ASU were crammed full of stock parts and assorted other bits and pieces... sitting there gathering dust.

So, I didn't follow everything he posted or taped, but I would not be surprised if he formed and broadcast his belief that it was a lie that Snoxall and other NCO's at Hyanth could not have possibly done what they did.  I imagine the only research he did was attempting to do it himself a couple of times - he was a target shooter who never spent a day being trained as even a modern infantryman when he enlisted in the Rangers after 9/11.

However, related to the Cool Unit you got your hands on, he is an example of an enthusiastic and pretty competent Ranger DCRA competitor with the Lee Enfield in modern times.  And he's one in particular among the Rangers making the annual pilgrimage to Connaught who did a lot to advance competitive shooting with the Rangers' Lee Enfields.  

Some of those Rangers were and are also deeply into fullbore competition, not just primary military range practices based on the rifle as issued, whether Lee Enfield, then C1 FN FAL, C7, and now C7A2.

So back to the subject, I think there's a pretty good chance that nifty little case you have there is an example military artisan creativity, crafted perhaps by one of the gun bunnies within the Service Battalion/REMEs who support regimental competitive shooting.  

It could have been crafted well into the 50's, 60's, 70's long after the regular infantry adopted the C1 A1 FAL to replace the Long Branch Lee Enfield.  Military members, the Rangers, and DCRA competitors were still enthusiastically showing up for the DCRA and Connaught matches that featured the Lee Enfield.

I never hit the craftsmen up for any of those shooting related jobs that usually entailed payment of a bottle of preferred booze, but I regularly hit on the packers and riggers over at the parachute shop to put their heavy duty sewing machines and skills to use creating custom bits and pieces for my webbing and battle rattle.

That's probably been a standard practice within militaries of the world going back to before the days when the infantry was first equipped with black powder rifles.

You're probably also aware of "British Muzzleloaders", Rob Deans.  I taught on both his ISCC course and then later soldiered with him on deployment.  He is not only a fine man and a fine soldier, but somebody who puts an incredible amount of time doing research to ensure what he presents related to the rifles and the associated kit and practices is as factually accurate as possible.

He would be the opposite of Riflechair as an example: I don't think Rob ever competed on the Seaforth team (he may well have, I just don't know) much less jumped into DCRA.  But when it comes to the history and facts concerning a military rifle, Rob really, really knows his stuff.  Rob went down the rabbit hole about the P35 Enfield rifle about fifteen years ago and has never slowed down..  

The detailed research he does into each Enfield rifle, the issue kit of the infantry who carried them into war, firing the range practices developed for each rifle, etc is just plain incredible.

And perhaps the best free entertainment enthusiasts of the Lee Enfield rifle can find off the range and with their clothes on.  Related to musketry with these weapons of the Empire's infantry, he has researched and replicated those range practices i.e.: