The Danish musket LMG Madsen

During the First World War, the Austro-Hungarian army took over Madsen light machine guns from the German army and used them in small numbers in the mountain war against Italian troops. Yes, if only he had a musket now, he could even take on the enemy scouting party on his own. This is what the protagonist later reported in his memoirs. But as he did not have such a musket, he changed his mind and refrained from engaging in a firefight with the Italian Alpini. At least that’s what it says in the autobiographical war novel “Sperrfort Rocca Alta”, written by none other than the world-famous mountaineer and film director Luis Trenker. As a young officer candidate and later lieutenant, he had experienced the mountain war between Austria-Hungary and Italy during the First World War. At least he had an idea of the tactical possibilities of a “musket”, whereas the superior services in the Austro-Hungarian army seemed to be much less oriented. Yet the design was not so new. As early as 1883, Captain Vilhelm Hermann Oluf Madsen of the Danish artillery and Rustmester Julius A. Rasmussen of the Royal Danish Arsenal in Copenhagen were working on a self-loading rifle. The result was the Forsøgsrekylgevær M.1888, a weapon that was of the most advanced design, but did not really want to work. The mechanism was improved and the revised model of 1896 was produced in small numbers (50 to 60 units). The Danish navy used it to equip crew members of its coastal forts.

In the meantime, several investors had founded a company, Dansk Rekyl Riffel Syndikat A/S, which bought the patents from Madsen and Rasmussen. Lieutenant Jens Schouboe held a leading position at the company. He continuously improved the gun’s mechanism and applied for patents. One of these related to a light machine gun that combined the design features of the original self-loading rifle with some of Schouboe’s improvements. Despite the extremely complicated self-loading process, which was remotely reminiscent of the Peabody-Martini block breech, the weapon functioned quite well with the standard Danish 8 x 58RD ammunition and also with the Danish-Norwegian 6.5 x 55 cartridge. In 1903, the Danish army procured the light machine gun with the designation Madsen. The Danish Minister of War at the time was none other than Vilhelm Hermann Oluf Madsen, who received royalties for every machine gun produced. A total of 1,250 examples were also supplied to the Russian army from 1902. The Russians equipped their cavalry with them and used them in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904/05. Belgium also equipped its Carabiniers-Mitrailleurs with a small number of Madsen LMGs in the years leading up to the First World War.

In Great Britain, however, the Danish company had little chance of marketing its weapon, as the Empire preferred weapons produced in the country. So a license was granted to the Rexer Company in London, which manufactured the weapon in the standard British calibre .303. It entered the arsenal of the British troops during the “Natal Rebellion” in 1906, when dissatisfied Zulus under the leadership of Bambatha kaMancinza took up arms, angered by high taxes. Around 4,300 men under Colonel Duncan McKenzie put down the rebellion, including almost 3,000 militiamen. One of the militia regiments, the Zululand Mounted Rifles, was commanded by Colonel Friend Addison, who brought eight Rex LMGs with him from London. South Africans from Natal living in London had purchased the weapons for 80 pounds each (until the 1930s, machine guns could be freely purchased in Great Britain without causing chaos and anarchy). As the Rexer company had already been dissolved in 1911 due to patent and other difficulties, its overall sales success was rather meagre: in 1906, exactly the eight Rexer LMGs in .303 mentioned above had been sold to Natal, along with 27 LMGs in 7 x 57 caliber to Mexico. 50 weapons were still in stock.

The weapons of the Natal Militia were later used by Lieutenant J. Arnott’s Machine Gun Section, 1st Battalion, Cape Corps, in German South West Africa, then in German East Africa against the German Schutztruppe. This was during the First World War, which saw the Madsen LMG used on many fronts. Great Britain ordered 200 Madsen in Denmark, and there were even plans for licensed production at Rolls-Royce. However, because the documentation required for production was too imprecise, the plan was dropped in 1916 or 1917. The Russians ordered more machine guns, which they also used to equip their (small) air force. The German Empire procured Madsen LMGs, these weapons – sources speak of 500 of them – were tested and used at the front. The light machine guns presumably ended up in German hands through a stealth purchase. Several hundred Madsen had been sent back from Brazil to the manufacturer for refurbishment. 660 of them were stored in Copenhagen at the outbreak of the First World War. The French government wanted to take over the post, but then resigned and (still) neutral Bulgaria stepped in and bought the weapons, only a few of which were to be used to arm the Bulgarian troops. Most of them ended up in German hands, where they were converted to 8 x 57 rifles. In the summer of 1915, the Rifle Inspection Commission (G.P.K.) was able to report to the War Ministry that the Madsen rifles were ready for use in the war. As a concealment measure, on July 1, 1915, the G.P.K. issued the following order to the War Ministry: “There is reason to call the Madsen rifles ‘muskets’ in the future.” On August 10, 1915, the first “Musket Battalion” was formed, later joined by another. Each company was allocated 30 Madsen LMGs, the first Madsen LMGs issued – still for training purposes – were Russian captured weapons. The first renaming took place on March 10, 1916: the two musket battalions were officially designated IV. and V. Battalion Infantry respectively. The three companies of musket battalion 1 formed the 15th, 16th and 17th companies, the two companies of musket battalion 2 the 18th and 19th companies. After the Madsen LMGs had been used up, both musket battalions received captured Lewis machine guns. However, the MG 08/15 then became the standard LMG of the German army, whereby LMG with a weapon weight of almost 20 kilograms unloaded is probably a trivialization. In contrast, the original version of the Madsen LMG weighed less than half as much, which is why Germany’s ally Austria-Hungary showed interest in the LMG. They tested the weapon and were clearly convinced. Incidentally, the Austrian weapons were equipped for the German 8 x 57IS cartridge.

However, there was probably no clear idea of the possible tactical uses. “Musket patrols” (in addition to the weapons, their German camouflage designation had also been adopted) were set up to simulate the presence of heavy machine guns in mountain warfare. The service regulations strongly recommended only rapid single fire. Snipers were equipped with the Madsen, pardon the musket. The biggest drawback, however, was the fact that there were so few of them. Even Lieutenant Trenker would have liked to have one. Some Madsen LMGs made their way to Bulgaria during the First World War, and more were purchased in the 1920s. During the Second World War, they were used to arm the Bulgarian cavalry. The Madsen had been extensively tested in France and although, as mentioned above, nothing came of the acquisition of the ex-Brazilian weapons, Madsen LMGs were ordered for the air force and infantry in 1915, with 381 still in French stocks at the beginning of 1918. After 1920, 300 new weapons were ordered to equip the Foreign Legion and units of the colonial infantry for deployment in Morocco and Lebanon. The Kingdom of Yugoslavia also ordered a small number of Madsen LMGs, but due to the relatively high price, a Czech MG model was chosen to arm the troops. The Madsen was widely used in Latin America; in addition to Mexico, Brazil also used the weapon (both in 7 x 57). Paraguay and Bolivia used Madsen-LMGs against each other in the Chaco War (7.65 x 53) and Argentina used the weapon in the same caliber.

In 1915, the leadership of the Royal Netherlands Army of the Indies (KNIL) decided to introduce the Madsen. Different variants in the Dutch army caliber 6.5 x 53 were introduced over the years. In 1925 an improved version, the M.25 Karabijnmitrailleur, was introduced. The improved weapon had a shorter barrel and a very high bipod. In 1942, the KNIL was devastatingly defeated by the Japanese invasion forces on the territory of present-day Indonesia. There were only smaller KNIL units that had managed to escape to Australia, as well as KNIL crews in the Netherlands Antilles and Surinam. When the KNIL’s stock of weapons in the Antilles was inventoried in 1942, those responsible counted just four Madsen LMGs. After the end of the Japanese occupation in the Dutch East Indies, a number of Madsen weapons reappeared and were quickly returned to the inventory, which looked very colorful thanks to British and American aid supplies. During an inventory in 1950, 126 were still found at the KNIL in the East Indies. Most of the KNIL’s machine guns were already set up for .303 and .30-06. The Norwegians used the LMG as their standard armament. 278 of the Madsen M/14 model were purchased in Denmark, 179 for the army and 99 for the navy. A total of 704 were manufactured by Kongsberg under license. The successor model M/22 went into production in 1922 and was manufactured until 1932. The weapon was also manufactured by Kongsberg in the Norwegian army caliber 6.5 x 55 in a quantity of 2,595 units and was considered reliable. Norwegian infantry divisions had 192 or 288 LMG Madsen, depending on whether the division consisted of two or three regiments. The Danes had a version officially called the 8mm Madsen Rekylgevær M/24. One Danish infantry division (of which there were two) had the impressive number of 1,248 Madsen LMGs. Both Norwegians and Danes used the Madsen LMG against invading German troops in 1940, after which many weapons were transferred to the Wehrmacht. The Madsen machine guns continued to be manufactured in Denmark under German occupation and played a role in the German occupation forces in the Nordic countries. The Danish Madsens traded under the designations 8mm MG 158 (d) and 8mm MG 159 (d), the Norwegian ones under 6.5mm MG 102 (n) and 6.5mm MG 103 (n).

The armies of the Baltic republics used Madsen and Rexer machine guns in .303, which were supplied from Great Britain together with P-14 rifles and Ross rifles. Estonia bought 612 Madsen LMG model M/20, caliber 7.62 x 53R, from Finland in 1937. Finland had received its first Madsen rifles in 1920: 162 of them. In 1928, the country owned 729 of the weapons, but was never really happy with them. The remaining stocks were no longer used during the Second World War and were sold to Interarmco in 1960. Finland also came into possession of a certain number of another Madsen model in a roundabout way: in 1914, Sweden had introduced the kulsprutegevär m/1914 model for its cavalry, a Madsen model converted to 6.5 x 55 caliber. Many were passed on to Finland during the Winter War of 1939/40, and the Finns used the weapons for coastal defence and anti-aircraft defence. Hungary introduced the Madsen as the Madsen Könnyü Géppuska 24.M in 1924. In 1931, they were replaced by a more modern weapon, and in 1943, after the exorbitant losses of the Hungarian army on the Eastern Front, they were returned to the fighting troops. Examples of the model variants M1908 and M1916 were delivered to China together with Rexer variants from British production and saw widespread use. One variant, which was equipped for belt feed, was manufactured in 8 x 57 caliber and was intended for arming armored vehicles. The armored car squadrons of the Portuguese “Guarda Nacional Republicana” also used this weapon. A few dozen Madsen MGs in .303 were also in service with the Irish Army as vehicle armament before the weapons were replaced by Browning MGs in the 1950s. In the same decade, the Kingdom of Denmark also replaced its last Madsens, and in 1955 the weapon type was officially discontinued, although a functional variant of the weapon was already in production in the form of the M/46 (used by Chile) and M/50 models, which were set up for the common .30-06 caliber (later, weapons from these series were also adapted to the NATO standard 7.62 x 51 cartridge). The career of the light machine gun in Portugal’s overseas territories took off once again: Madsen in .303 had been part of the Portuguese African Army’s inventory since 1930 (Portuguese model designation: m/930), and in 1940 weapons in 8 x 57 (model m/940) were purchased in Germany. In 1941, many of the m/930 weapons were converted to the German caliber, resulting in the m/930-41 model. At least they now had the same caliber as another veteran: the Portuguese army also used the MG Dreyse (MG 13). After the end of the Portuguese colonial empire in Africa in 1974, the last Madsen disappeared from the arsenal of the Portuguese army. In another Portuguese-speaking country, however, they were not yet ready to part with them: the Polícia Militar do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, the paramilitary police force of the federal state of Rio de Janeiro, used the aged Danish veterans against drug gangs right into the 21st century. Originally in 7 x 57 caliber, the weapons were converted to .308 by IMBEL (Indústria de Material Bélico do Brasil).