Beretta M1935

The Beretta M1935 is a modified version of the Beretta M1934, which was designed in the late 30s by the famous Armi Beretta SpA of Gardone Val Trompia to contend with other compact handguns like the Walther PP. The Beretta M1934, which was issued to the Italian Army in 1934, fired .380 ACP rounds. The Beretta M1935, which was manufactured between 1934 and 1937, is a single-action semiautomatic pistol that incorporates the innovative 'blowback' technology and it fires .32 ACP caliber rounds. It was primarily meant for Italian Armed Forces personnel and was issued to navy and air force. However, it found its way into the civilian market too. The Beretta M1935 was not produced on at Beretta's plants.

The USP of this neat little handgun is its highly user-friendly feeding and extraction mechanism. It features the standard open slide system that is no specific to Beretta. It is also extremely durable and can withstand a significant amount of use without much wear and tear. Apart from the Italian Army, it was also issued to the Germans in 1945. Large numbers of it were 'liberated' by the Allied Forces during World War II, and it became extremely popular for its handiness and extremely advanced construction features. They were also enamored by the fact that it is very easy to maintain, and that it allows for interchange of parts. To this day, it remains a favorite handgun because of it is so easy to use, conceal and obtain ammunition for.

The Beretta M1935 accommodates a magazine for eight rounds and this is often looked upon as a limitation in situations requiring extended firing. This is compounded by the fact that the magazine itself is not exactly easy to change once its contents are fully spent. Moreover, the .32 caliber is far from being the most powerful round ever made and lacks stopping power and accuracy over longer ranges. However, as a close-combat, last-resort weapon of concealment, the Beretta M1935 remains hard to beat to the present day. It was also made famous by the fact that it was the fictional super agent James Bond's weapon of choice until he replaced it with the Walther PPK.

The Beretta M1935 was considered a top-grade gun at the time of its introduction, and in its own functional category, it remained unrivalled. It was also cheap to procure and the limitations of range and lack of long-range accuracy did not impact its popularity. These drawbacks could not be made an issue of unless the Beretta M1935 was compared with heavier, costlier, more complicated and less wieldy handguns. Though production was stopped and many of the Beretta M1935 were even withdrawn from the armed forces, the ones that remained were quickly snapped up in the civilian market. Altogether, about 525,000 Beretta M1935s were manufactured

The fact that it is of inherently simple design and construction means that the Beretta M1935 does not suffer internal damage in the manner that more complex handguns do. The only wear of any significance happens on the outside without affecting the integrity of the internal mechanism, or the overall safety of the Beretta M1935. Most examples to be found are, in fact, quite battle-scarred and look decidedly worse for wear. However, experts in the field are aware of the fact that a Beretta M1935 cannot be judged on external appearances alone.

The fact that the Beretta M1935 was assigned vastly different and constantly changing serial; numbers by the various armies it found its way into makes the tracking of surviving pieces rather difficult. Considering the popularity of this nifty little workhorse, there were obviously a number of spinoff models made since production of the Beretta M1935 was stopped. While purchasing one, it pays to inform oneself about the parameters applied for serial numbering by the different countries in which the Beretta M1935 was used. One should also be very wary of brand-new looking pieces. The chances of finding an authentic Beretta M1935 in mint condition outside an extremely wealthy gun enthusiast's collection are about as slim as those of finding the Kohinoor diamond for sale at Wal-Mart.