ORIGINAL: eldeguello


Well, when describing the armament of the various nations in WWI, it was said that:

The Germans are armed with a hunting rifle (M98 Mauser)
The Americans are armed with a target rifle (M1903 Springfield)
And the British are armed with a fighting rifle!

No-one could think of the words to describe the P.O.S. the French were using!

There is no doubt that the SMLE of the British is the best, most effective combat BOLT ACTION rifle ever. But it leaves alot to be desired as a sporting weapon - you just can't really make a nice sporter out of it.

Both the M98 Mauser and the 1903 Springfield lend themselves very well to being turned into a high-grade sporting arm, and some real big bucks have been spent making one into atrue work of art that bears little resemblance to its military counterparts!

The Mauser is supposedly better than the Springfield as the basis for a sporting arm, (according to many of my custom gunsmith acquaintences, but I have handled some that were made from Springfields which were just superb weapons! Those Springfield sporting rifles built by Griffin & Howe, Paul Jaeger, Adolph Neidner, etc., come to mind.....