BACKGROUND: On June 17TH 1936, Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler was appointed to the newly created position of Chef der Deutschen Polizei im Reichsministerium des Innern, (Chief of the German Police in the National Ministry of the Interior), effectively giving him full control of all police agencies within Germany. As a result of this appointment and the restructuring of all the separate German state police into a single national police force new regulations were instituted on June 25TH 1936 to bring about uniformity in dress for all police through-out the country. One of the new uniform regulations dictated the color of all leather accoutrements according to branch of service with the Ordnungspolizei (Order Police), the Schutzpolizei, (Protection Police), and Gemeindepolizei, (Local Municipal Police), personnel wearing black leather while Gendarmerie, (Rural Police), and Polizeibeamten, (Police Officials), personnel wore brown leather. Of Note: The Ordnungspolizei, Schutzpolizei, and Gemeindepolizei, also utilized white leather accoutrements for special occasions. Regulations also dictated that all ranks wore a pistol on the right side of the waist belt for the standard service dress and a wide variety of pistols and holsters were utilized including the standard P08 Luger. The P08 Luger pistol was developed by George Luger who has served in the Austro-Hungarian army before gaining employment with the Ludwig Löwe & Cie armaments factory in Berlin in 1891. While employed with the Löwe firm Luger examined the Borchardt pistol they manufactured which had proven to be troublesome due to its awkward recoil and bolt return system. Luger redesigned the Borchardt pistol with a cleaner design and systems and in 1899 the first Borchardt-Luger pistol was tested. The Borchardt-Luger pistol underwent minor modifications and was accepted by the Swiss army in 1900. Further modifications in 1902 resulted in the Luger being re-calibered from 7.65mm to the standard 9mm Parabellum cartridge. The new Luger pistol was adopted by the Imperial German Navy in 1904 and by the German army in 1908, which led to its official designation, "P08". The P08 Luger pistol saw service through-out WWI, during the Reichswehr era and on into the Third Reich. Although popular, the pistol was expensive to produce and the design of the toggle breech made it prone to dirt entry after firing which affected its performance. In 1938 the weapons firm of Carl Walther developed the P38 pistol as a replacement for the P08. Although the P38 never fully replaced the P08, manufacture of the Luger was discontinued in 1943.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Molded, smooth, brown leather construction hard-shell holster for the standard 4" barrel P08 Luger pistol. The holster features a scalloped, fold back, top flap with a horizontal stitched hinge to the reverse. The Polizei strap configuration has been converted to an army pattern (front strap and buckle have been re-positioned). The holster has an extra magazine pocket stitched to the forward edge with a semi-circular cut-out to the top edge for ease of accessing the extra magazine. Quick release pull strap has been removed. The reverse of the holster has dual, slightly diagonally angled, belt loops stitched in place. Excellent Polizei markings.