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Description
Lee-Enfield, Short Magazine, Rifle Mk III.

Cartridge: .303 British Service
Length o/a: 1.132m
Weight: 3.96kg
Barrel: 640mm
Rifling: 5 grooves, lh
Magazine Capacity: 10 rounds
In Production: 1907-1943

Over three million Short Magazine Lee-Enfield rifles were made in Britain, India and Australia and served in both World Wars. Utterly reliable and with the smoothest bolt-action ever made, the SMLE was a legend in its own time, and can still be found in service on the Indian sub-continent.

________________________________________________

"The Rifle said more than the man.

It was a short magazine Lee-Enfield.Three-oh-three calibre, and its worn brass buttplate and the scars and scratches on its woodwork spoke volumes of the century gone by.

They spoke of Mons, nineteen-fourteen, where cries of 'Ten Rounds Rapid!' convinced the German soldiers that they faced machine-gun fire, and English bowman from the time of Agincourt -so legend has it- appeared in the clouds to cover the retreat. They spoke of Harry and Jack on their way up to Arras, of the morning on the Somme when men of Ulster, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, All the children of the Empire, fixed bayonets as long as swords and went to feed the Earth.

They spoke of Tommies on the beach at Dunkirk, taking hopeful potshots at the Stukas,and of stopping Rommel dead at Alam Halfa. They spoke of Normandy, the sneaking gang-fights in the hedgerows, where a platoon could bleed out faster than its predecessors on the Somme.

Finally they spoke of Afghanistan, the land that swallows Armies, of ancient rifles in the hands of men as hard as mountains, glimpsed on CNN and BBC. Anachronisms next to things of tin and plastic. Of weapons taken by the locals from the Empire that had fought them. An inheritance of iron and gun-oil out on the North-West frontier.

They spoke of History".

Garth Ennis. 303. (Avatar Press. 2004)

Description
Lee-Enfield, Short Magazine, Rifle Mk III.

Cartridge: .303 British Service
Length o/a: 1.132m
Weight: 3.96kg
Barrel: 640mm
Rifling: 5 grooves, lh
Magazine Capacity: 10 rounds
In Production: 1907-1943

Over three million Short Magazine Lee-Enfield rifles were made in Britain, India and Australia and served in both World Wars. Utterly reliable and with the smoothest bolt-action ever made, the SMLE was a legend in its own time, and can still be found in service on the Indian sub-continent.

________________________________________________

"The Rifle said more than the man.

It was a short magazine Lee-Enfield.Three-oh-three calibre, and its worn brass buttplate and the scars and scratches on its woodwork spoke volumes of the century gone by.

They spoke of Mons, nineteen-fourteen, where cries of 'Ten Rounds Rapid!' convinced the German soldiers that they faced machine-gun fire, and English bowman from the time of Agincourt -so legend has it- appeared in the clouds to cover the retreat. They spoke of Harry and Jack on their way up to Arras, of the morning on the Somme when men of Ulster, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, All the children of the Empire, fixed bayonets as long as swords and went to feed the Earth.

They spoke of Tommies on the beach at Dunkirk, taking hopeful potshots at the Stukas,and of stopping Rommel dead at Alam Halfa. They spoke of Normandy, the sneaking gang-fights in the hedgerows, where a platoon could bleed out faster than its predecessors on the Somme.

Finally they spoke of Afghanistan, the land that swallows Armies, of ancient rifles in the hands of men as hard as mountains, glimpsed on CNN and BBC. Anachronisms next to things of tin and plastic. Of weapons taken by the locals from the Empire that had fought them. An inheritance of iron and gun-oil out on the North-West frontier.

They spoke of History".

Garth Ennis. 303. (Avatar Press. 2004)