The U.S.-made Thompson Submachine Gun was developed by Gen. John T. Thompson, who envisioned a "one-man, hand-held machine gun" in .45 ACP for use in the ongoing trench warfare of World War I.

The first Model of 1919 was called the “Persuader,” and it was built in November 1917. This Thompson was designed to fire the .45 ACP cartridges from a cloth ammunition belt.

Still, Thompson convinced Colt to produce 15,000 M1921 submachine guns. Early observers of the M1921 test-fired on the range were impressed by how much firepower the “little machine gun ...

But the Thompson submachine gun stuck around for much longer than anyone expected. Richard Cutts designed the muzzle brake, nicknamed the “Cutts Compensator,” that put the Thompson submachine ...

General Thompson's gun was about to face its greatest challenge. After the Fall of France in June 1940, Britain needed every weapon the could get and placed an open order for Thompson submachine guns.

The U.S. Army went into World War II with the M1928A1 Thompson submachine gun, which fired the same .45 ACP round as the M1911A1 pistol. Towards the end of the war the Thompson was supplemented by ...

When the words submachine gun and World War Two are said, the iconic Thompson submachine gun invariably comes up. ... It even used the same powerful .45 ACP handgun round.

The Thompson submachine gun and the M3 submachine gun, two classic submachine guns (SMGs), helped American GIs win World War II. Both fired the same powerful and ever-beloved .45 ACP (Automatic ...

The company behind the venerable Thompson submachine gun, a favorite of both gangsters and GIs, is releasing a deluxe (semi-auto) version of the Tommy gun chambered in 9mm for public consumption.

The Thompson submachine gun was designed for use by soldiers in war, but Chicago gangsters made it famous as the Tommy gun, aka the Chicago typewriter. Skip to content. All Sections.