Friday Gun Pr0n #176

Today's gun pr0n comes to us courtesy of bloggershoot attendee mopar:

Pistola ratón

Here's the stats on the firearm itself:

Bernedo 6.35mm Pocket Pistol
Length 4.5in
Barrel 2.0in
weight 15oz
Caliber 6.35mm (.25acp)
Capacity 6rnds

Vincenzo Bernedo y Cia of Eibar was one of the many small Spanish firms to produce cheap self-loading pistols. During World War I, the company was involved in the manufacture of Ruby pistols (qv), but after the war had ended Bernedo developed a new design, a specimen of which is illustrated here. The weapon was of pocket type and of the usual blowback design. The barrel was almost fully exposed, with the slide to the rear of it. A small catch was situated just below the barrel; when the cylindrical part of this was lifted, it could be pushed out through
a loop on the lower part of the barrel, and the barrel could then be drawn forward. This was facilitated by the fact that the lower part of the loop had flanges which fitted into grooves in the frame of the weapon. This weapon's slide bears many Eibar proofmarks, and the butt-grips are marked V BERNEDO.

(Taken from the "Illustrated Directory of 20th Century Guns" by David Miller)

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And here's the story of this particular gun as it pertains to mopar:

I'm a little fuzzy on all the family history (my sister is the "keeper of the records") but as I understand it my grandfather left Spain sometime in the 1920s (he was born there in 1892) and traveled through South America before settling in the USA. This gun made the trip with him. The outside is well worn, but the bore looks like new. Obviously this was a daily carry gun before it was a safe queen. Don't know if it's ever been fired at all, but if it was it was at least 70-75yrs ago. It's been locked away in a safe for the most part for the last 50yrs at least. Until my father passed it onto me a year or so ago, I had only even seen this gun once as a child. It lived in the big old fashioned safe in my father's office. Because of that safe it was unscathed in a pretty bad fire there about 35yrs ago.

I really wish I had got to know my grandfather better. He was already in his 70's when I was born. All my memories of him are of a kinda scary and grumpy old man with such a strong accent it was hard for me to understand what he was saying. Only later in life, long after he died, did I appreciate the fact that he was born in a time before radio, cars and airplanes, before
electricity and indoor plumbing was common. He lived to see jet aircraft, computers, the atomic bomb, and men on the moon. His life spanned what was arguably one of the most exciting times in human history.

Wish I had gotten his take on it all.

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Amen, brother, amen. This, folks, is one of the single greatest things about this "gun thing". I've got a gun like this, my grandfather's Colt Official Police revolver he carried as a town cop. Every time I pull it out of the safe I think of my grandfather carrying this old wheelgun around town - our town; every time I bring it to the range I think of my grandfather taking an hour to hit the "range" (a dirt pile down by the town dump; back in the 1930s you could still shoot at the dump without calling out the SWAT team, believe it or not). Firearms offer us a tangible link to the past, a bit of engineering made of wood and steel that also functions as a time machine to a different place and time...

Thanks for sharing her with us, mopar.

That is all.