# Weapons and evidence Canonical: https://mobfiles.org/weapons/ Weapons, ballistics and evidence of the 1920s and 1930s from open federal records: Thompson submachine guns in museum collections, Bureau of Investigation letters on stolen National Guard rifles, FBI artifacts, and the National Firearms Act of 1934. This section files forty records on the weapons and the evidence of the Prohibition and Depression years: museum objects, Bureau of Investigation correspondence, FBI artifacts, and the federal law of 1934. Each record says what it states and what it does not. A museum caption gives maker, model, date and provenance only where the record gives them. An object that appears with a gangster's name in popular memory is not given one here unless a filed record does so. ## Submachine guns The Library of Congress portrait of [John Taliaferro Thompson](/items/loc-2014647521-john-t-thompson-portrait-1915/) names him as the founder of the Auto-Ordnance Corporation and the inventor of the weapon. The Smithsonian's [Colt-made Model 1921 record](/items/si-nmah-af-69053ma-thompson-m1921/) gives two dates of manufacture, about 1922 and about 1926. The Springfield Armory catalog dates the manufacture of [one example](/items/nps-spar-1546-thompson-m1921/) to 1 to 4 April 1922, and separately quotes the Armory's 1922 annual report: "The Thompson Sub-Machine Gun was tested." The [National Postal Museum](/items/si-npm-2013-2011-158-thompson-postal-inspectors/) says Postal Inspectors were the first law enforcement agency to use it against criminals, and a [1930 Signal Corps photograph](/items/nara-405231070-thompson-camp-perry-1930/) shows an Army captain demonstrating the weapon to a Hartford police captain. The Bureau itself was short of such arms: eight days after the Kansas City Union Station shootings, an Oklahoma City agent [asked for one Thompson](/items/fbi-vault-kcm-colvin-arms-request-1933-06-25/), and the Director [replied](/items/fbi-vault-kcm-hoover-reply-1933-06-27/) that steps were being taken to equip all field offices. The FBI says agents found [a Thompson with the stock removed](/items/fbi-history-dillinger-lincoln-court-weapons/) at the Lincoln Court Apartments in March 1934. The [1918 police parade photograph](/items/loc-2014706981-police-machine-gun-1918/) and the [1942 Fort Knox photograph](/items/loc-2017695486-thompson-fort-knox-1942/) are military and police context, not crime records. ## Rifles, pistols and shotguns In the summer of 1933 the Bureau traced Browning automatic rifles and Colt .45 pistols recovered from the Barrow gang to National Guard units. Dallas's [letter of 29 August](/items/fbi-vault-barrow-bar-armories-letter-1933-08-29/) reports four rifles recovered, some traced to Government armories; the [report of 1 September](/items/fbi-vault-barrow-weapon-trace-1933-09-01/) gives the serial numbers and names Company E, 129th Infantry, Illinois National Guard, Chicago, and Company A, 180th Infantry, Oklahoma National Guard, Wagoner; and the Director's [reply of 8 September](/items/fbi-vault-barrow-hoover-reply-1933-09-08/) restates the Dallas suggestion and says it would be inappropriate for the Division itself to make a recommendation to the War Department. The Springfield Armory records show the [Model 1918 rifle](/items/nps-spar-3565-bar-m1918/) and a police variant, the [Colt Monitor](/items/nps-spar-7213-colt-monitor/), as types; neither object has a crime history. Special Agent Winstead's [memorandum](/items/fbi-vault-dillinger-winstead-memo-1934-07-25/) names a .45 automatic carried by the Division and a .380 Colt automatic. NARA describes a [wooden handgun](/items/nara-231363203-dillinger-case-file-crown-point-1934/) in the 1934 Crown Point escape, a claim the FBI words more cautiously. The FBI's photograph of the [Barker weapons cache](/items/fbi-barker-weapons-cache-1935/) does not itemize the weapons, and [Special Agent Shanahan's revolver](/items/fbi-artifact-shanahan-duty-weapon/) is a Bureau duty weapon of 1925. Shotguns appear only in passing: Colvin's request for "a sawed-off shotgun or two" and the barrel-length definition in the 1934 statute. ## Evidence and ballistics On 23 December 1929 the [Evening Star](/clippings/clip-evening-star-1929-12-23-p1/) reported, in an Associated Press story, that Maj. Calvin H. Goddard testified before the reconvened coroner's jury in Chicago that markings on bullets from the seven victims of the 14 February killings were identical with markings on test bullets fired from machine guns found in Fred Burke's home. The United Press report of the same session in the [Indianapolis Times](/clippings/clip-indianapolis-times-1929-12-23-p1/) says "very similar" instead. Those two newspaper pages are the records this archive holds for the ballistic testimony; no inquest record is filed. Goddard's own 1930 article has not been filed. In June 1933 Kansas City asked Oklahoma City for [a slug and shell](/items/fbi-vault-kcm-ballistics-request-1933-06-27/) for comparison by its ballistic expert; the request is filed, and the result is not. The Bureau's methods and equipment appear in the [fingerprint kit](/items/fbi-artifact-fingerprint-kit-1930s/) and the [1932 booklet](/items/fbi-artifact-how-to-take-fingerprints-1932/). Objects the FBI holds include a [notebook with a bullet hole](/items/fbi-artifact-gibson-notebook/), [body armor](/items/fbi-artifact-nelson-body-armor/) recovered in November 1934, and a [brick from the Palace Chop House](/items/fbi-artifact-palace-chop-house-brick/). A [1923 demonstration](/items/loc-2016892634-bulletproof-vest-demo-1923/) of a bullet-proof vest predates them. Two photographs of Prohibition-era seizures, [one](/items/loc-89706121-confiscated-still-treasury/) at the Treasury and [one from 1922](/items/loc-91796643-largest-still-1922/), show the contraband side of enforcement. Four National Archives photographs add to the record of the period's weapons. Two frames of 11 December 1935 from J. Edgar Hoover's photograph files show the Director, the magazine editor Sumner Blossom and the author Courtney Ryley Cooper [aiming long guns](/items/nara-505632199-hoover-blossom-cooper-aiming-guns-1935-a/) and [aiming handguns](/items/nara-505632202-hoover-blossom-cooper-aiming-guns-1935-b/), in posed publicity pictures. The same files hold an undated photograph of [two sets of brass knuckles](/items/nara-141225374-fbi-brass-knuckles/), one engraved with Hoover's name and title, with no case named. A Coast Guard photograph of 30 September 1941 shows an airman [aiming a "Tommy" gun](/items/nara-205576693-coast-guard-tommy-gun-1941/) from an aircraft, captioned for the aviation arm's work against smuggling vessels and escaped convicts. ## The 1934 law President Roosevelt's [statement of 18 May 1934](/items/nara-122180225-fdr-crime-bill-statement-1934/) on the crime bills calls them "a renewed challenge on the part of the Federal government to interstate crime." The [National Firearms Act](/items/govinfo-national-firearms-act-1934/) was approved on 26 June 1934. It defines "firearm" and "machine gun," sets occupational taxes of $500, $200 and $300, and levies $200 on each firearm transferred. Attorney General Cummings's [1937 address](/items/nara-179028714-cummings-firearms-crime-1937/) says it was patterned upon the Harrison Narcotic Act and that registrations in three years were 9,316 submachine guns, 11,520 machine guns and machine rifles, 16,456 miscellaneous weapons and 769 silencers. His [1938 interview](/items/nara-179028728-cummings-firearms-control-1938/) argues for extending the law to pistols. Two ATF retrospectives, the [timeline](/items/atf-timeline-nfa-1934/) and the [Alcohol Tax Unit article](/items/atf-alcohol-tax-unit-1934-1951/), tell the later enforcement story. ## What is not here - Goddard's 1930 article, "The Valentine Day Massacre: A Study in Ammunition-Tracing" (*American Journal of Police Science*), has not been filed; no free full text was opened. - The Smithsonian searches for the Colt 1911, the Browning Automatic Rifle, sawed-off shotguns, brass knuckles, badges, bulletproof vests, Dillinger, Capone and Prohibition were not run, and the Smithsonian object pages are behind a bot check. Four National Museum of American History Thompson records have CC0 metadata but no online image. - The weapons list from the 23 May 1934 ambush of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow was not found; most of the Vault's Bonnie and Clyde parts have no usable text. - The result of the Kansas City ballistic comparison and any Bureau laboratory report are not filed. The serialized Dillinger gang inventories in the Vault, the Barker cache inventory, and Little Bohemia and Barrington evidence were not located. - The 1946 Alcatraz evidence, the 1934 House hearings on the firearms act, and Secret Service and Prohibition Bureau seized-weapon photographs at the National Archives were not found online. - No 1932 document on the founding of the FBI Laboratory, and no full text of the 1932 fingerprint booklet, is filed. - The Springfield Armory records for SPAR 17, 1545 and 1546 refer to a "STOLEN WEAPON ALERT" that has not been read.