The Mossberg Brownie was an American pocket pistol designed by Oscar Mossberg in 1905 and produced by O.F. Mossberg & Sons from 1920 to 1932. The Brownie was Mossberg's first product after the company was started by Oscar Mossberg and his sons in 1919.
History[]
The developmental roots of the pistol can be traced back to 1906, where Oscar Mossberg, a Swedish immigrant, would patent a design for a compact four-barrel striker-fired pistol. The patent rights were sold to the C.S. Shattuck company of Hatfield, where it was produced as the Shattuck Unique.[1]
Shattuck's company would eventually go bust in 1915, with the rights for the patent going back to Mossberg. Mossberg would work with a number of companies afterwards and was left unemployed when Marlin-Rockwell went bankrupt in 1919. At this stage, Mossberg and his two sons, Harold and Iver, started their own company; having started a new company, Mossberg needed to sell something that would be easy to manufacture and quick to turn a profit.[2]
With the patent for his pistol having been reverted to him, Mossberg reworked his pistol design to fire the longer .22 Long Rifle cartridge and did a number of other modifications before patenting it in 1919[3] and christening it the Brownie. The pistol went on sale in 1920, retailing for $5 and marketed as a cheap compact pistol "to finish trapped animals"; with it being more compact than Colt or Browning Arms Company offerings and having double the firepower than that of the traditional derringer at the time, the weapon found a niche market and sold fairly well.[2]
Production of the pistol ended in 1932 with some 33,000 to 37,000 produced. After production of the Brownie ended, Mossberg switched to producing shotguns;[2] they would not produce another pistol until 2019, with the introduction of the MC1sc.[4]
Design Details[]
The Brownie is a simple and compact four-barrel break-open pistol. The weapon is double-action only. The pistol has a rotating striker.
Ammunition[]
The pistol is able to fire .22 Short, .22 Long and .22 Long Rifle ammunition.[2]
References[]
- ā https://www.forgottenweapons.com/shattuck-unique-hideout-squeeze-pistol/
- ā 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 https://www.guns.com/news/2013/04/16/the-mossberg-brownie-they-used-to-make-pistols
- ā https://patents.google.com/patent/US1348035A
- ā https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/breaking-mossberg-announces-the-new-mc1sc-subcompact-9mm-pistol/