At Sunshine Coast Gun Shop we are on a mission to bring some of the less well known 3rd Reich service pistols to the Australian collecting community.

There are many German WW2 military handgun designs that are popular & well-known, such as the Luger P.08, the Walther P.38 & the Mauser C96 Broomhandle but there are others which have been overlooked by collectors & can still be purchased at very reasonable prices (when they can be found here).

Another of these popular & underappreciated designs is the Mauser HSc which was effectively bought to market by Mauser to compete with the Walther PP & PPK models serving the Wehrmacht & other German government offices.

Chambered in the Nazi military calibre of 7.65mm it was popular with German officers in WW2 & which is becoming increasingly popular with collectors partly because they are significantly less to acquire than other well known 3rd Reich pistols such as Lugers & P.38's.

The HS in HSc stands for “Hahn Selbstspanner,” literally “hammer self-spanning,” but generally translated as “self-cocking hammer.” The “c”, according to August Weiss, means that it is the third production pistol with an external hammer, following the Mauser C96 & the Nickl pistol of 1922.

As with many smaller calibre & sized pistols such as the PP & PPK, these were popular with high ranking Nazi staff officers who really didn't need to carry a full sized 9mm pistol.

There is a saying among historians & collectors in relation to German officers & goes a bit like this…”The higher the rank, the smaller the gun”.

Interestingly, the Mauser HSc was ready for production by the end of 1938 but Mauser was required to certify to the government that the pistol “was an urgent military need.”

Because the pistol was (at the time) intended for police &  civilian rather than military use, the Nazi government withheld permission to begin manufacture. Additionally, the fact that Fritz Walther was a strong Nazi supporter & his company had the contract for the Walther P38, (soon to be the standard military pistol for the Wehrmacht), may have meant that Walther was given preferential treatment. Tooling up & organizing production steps began in 1939 but Mauser was not allowed to actually begin production until late 1940.

Production began in earnest in December 1940 & serial numbers begin at 700001, commencing where the Mauser 10/34 ended. Changes were made over time to the finish & to the slide inscription plus there were some variations in the grips.

Wartime production of the HSc can be generally grouped within four time periods

Early War Production: Dec. 1940 - Aug. 1942
(S/N 700001 - 787445)
Transitional Production: Aug 1942 - Nov. 1942
(S/N 787446 - 800445)
Peak War Production: Nov. 1942 0 Aug. 1943
(S/N 800446 - 852245)
Late War Production: Aug. 1943 - Apr. 1945
(S/N 852246 - 951939)

Jan C. Still, in his 1986 book Axis Pistols Volume II, established a method of categorizing HSc pistols according to the acceptance marks used by the military and police stamped on the left side of the trigger guard. These categories are:

Commercial: By law, all pistols that were produced during the war will typically have the standard government Eagle over N nitro proof mark stamped on frame, slide & barrel. The left side of the trigger guard will typically be blank on commercial pistols whereas all guns provided to the military & police should have the nitro proof, though very late in the war the proof house was closed & some guns may not have been proofed. This pistol has the Eagle over N commercial proofs along with the Wehrmacht acceptance stamp.

Army: HSc pistols used by the German army are marked with a Waffenamt acceptance stamp in the form of an eagle over 655, eagle over 135, or eagle over WaA135 on the rear of the left trigger guard where it meets the frame as this example displays.

Police: HSc pistols used by the German police are marked, on the rear of the left trigger guard where it meets the frame, with an eagle over a circled X, with an L or an F below & to the right.

This actual example is a late war pistol which was sent to the Wehrmacht as indicated by the Waffenamt on the trigger guard which correctly is WaA135, see photos.

It sports the late war Bakelite grips where most were walnut & there is evidence of historical pitting, see the photos.

We are offering this pistol as a collectable piece of military history & acknowledge the grievous atrocities committed by the Nazi regime & some of its military, particularly toward the peoples of occupied territory & the Jewish population in Europe. In no way do we condone or glorify the Nazi regime which must be remembered for the vile stain on human history that it was.

These are the only photos we have until it arrives here from Germany which we expect to be in the early part of 2026.

This can be purchased with a deposit which is refundable if the gun is not as described when it arrives.

A period correct leather holster is available.