If you take a glance at most modern military firearms, you’re bound to come across a few themes. Most military handguns are 9mm semi-automatics. There is currently a mix of hammer-fired DA/SA designs and striker-fired designs in the space, but that’s about the biggest variance. That wasn’t always the case. There are plenty of weird military sidearms that defy expectations.

Today, we will go through history and pull out five weird military sidearms. There are lots and lots of weird guns out there, so I kept it to firearms I can confirm to have been carried by military forces in one way or another. These represent either interesting ideas, innovative options, or specialty weapons that were very niche.

1 – Duck’s Foot Pistol

The Duck’s Foot Pistol design came from Henry Nock. Mr. Nock liked multiple-barrel firearms, and he created the multibarrel Nock gun, which he’s most famous for. The Duck’s Foot pistol was a multi-barreled handgun named for the orientation of the barrels. They were splayed out at a variety of angles that made the gun look like a Duck’s foot.

The Duck’s foot originated in the 1700s and was produced until the early 1800s. The gun featured four rifled barrels that often unscrewed from the gun for loading, much like Queen Anne pistols.

Numerous manufacturers produced Duck’s foot pistols, but they were mostly percussion pistols with some flintlock designs.

These weird military sidearms were issued to British Naval Officers. The intent seemed to be to deal with mutinies and pirates. The four splayed barrels made it easy to fire four rounds at once, potentially striking men in a tightly packed crowd. On a ship it’s all close quarters so while weird it might have been useful.

2 – LeMat Revolver

The LeMat revolver comes from our friends in France. The revolver was weird for several reasons but also innovative. The gun came in .42 and .36 caliber variants, offering nine rounds per cylinder. For the 1860s, that was three more rounds than normal. This nine-round cylinder made the gun quite large, and so did the shotgun barrel. Oh, did I forget to mention the shotgun barrel?

Underneath the main barrel sits a 16- or 20-gauge shotgun barrel. The muzzle-loaded shotgun offered a single shot of close-range devastation. Users just had to flip a lever on the hammer to swap from cylinder to shotgun.

This gave you a total of ten rounds in one revolver. That makes this gun qualified for the weird military sidearms list.

American Confederate forces used the LeMat during the U.S. Civil War, and the French used it in the Franco-Prussian War. The percussion cap design quickly went out of service after the Civil War with the advent of the metallic cartridge. Pinfire LeMats exist, but they were never popular.

3 – Remington Rolling Block Pistol

Lots and lots of people recognize the Rolling Block rifles. But would you be surprised to know they produced handguns? There was a big scramble to obtain cartridge-based firearms after the Civil War. So, why would Remington not try their hand at producing rifles and pistols? The Remington Rolling Block pistols were massive guns, and Remington simply shortened their rifles and used less powerful cartridges.

The Remington Rolling Block pistols were cartridge-based firearms, but as expected, they were only single-shot pistols. Revolvers of the era offered six shots, even if they were percussion cap pistols.

Sure, the Rolling Block pistols were cartridge-based firearms, but single-shot guns aren’t great for close-range combat.

That didn’t stop the US Navy from purchasing 5,000 .50 caliber rimfire Rolling Block pistols. The Army purchased small numbers of the pistols, but the main sale went to the US Navy. Revolvers fairly quickly replaced these guns as centerfire cartridge revolvers became the norm.

4 – Gyrojet Pistol

The Gyrojet rifles and pistols might be the most fascinating firearm designs ever. These guns were produced by two men, Robert Mainhardt and Art Biehl. They formed a company to produce rifles and pistol designs that didn’t fire normal bullets but Gyrojets. Gyrojet weapons fire micro-sized rockets called Microjets.

These Microjets left the gun at a low speed but picked up speed as they left the barrel. They were rocket-powered, and the acceleration continued as long as there was fuel to burn. The design has problems, lots and lots of problems.

First, the pistol’s accuracy is about 17 MOA at 25 yards. That’s absurd. Second, humidity could affect the rocket’s fuel and the gun’s reliability.

The guns made their way to Vietnam. A Marine Recon officer carried one of these weird military sidearms, and the guys at MACVSOG had at least one in country. As you’d expect, the guns weren’t popular, and they faded away. The Gyrojet guns are rare and somewhat obscure these days. A single round of ammo can cost up to 200 dollars if you can find one.

5 – HK P11

Our last weird military sidearm is the HK P11 series. The Cold War was an interesting time, and there seemed to be this idea that frogmen would have small-arm fights underwater. Both the US and Russian forces produced underwater projectile weapons. The United States’ underwater option was the HK P11. The HK P11 is a large handgun designed to arm SEALs in case they run into Russian frogmen.

The HK P11 provided a five-barreled pistol, each holding one round. Each round was a 7.62x36mm long miniature rocket with fins. The guns were fired electrically via an internal battery.

The HK P11 could only be fired five times, and after five shots, the gun had to be sent back to HK to be reloaded.

I’ve already mentioned this, and as you’d assume, it was issued to the US Navy but also spread throughout NATO. Germany, France, Denmark, Norway, the UK, and a few more allied nations. The HK P11 is the most successful gun on this list, and it’s not clear if anyone still uses it or if we’ve gotten away from the idea of close-range frogman fights.

The World of Weird Military Sidearms

I love weird guns, and it always fascinates me when a weird gun makes its way to military forces. Sidearms in the military aren’t used often and tend to be the least important firearm in the arsenal. This gives them room to be weird and not always the most practical option. Sometimes, it gets weird, and weird can be interesting and dynamic.

Do you guys remember that era when piston-driven AR-15s promised to be the next big thing? People were still hooting and hollering about how unreliable ARs were, and the AWB had only recently sunset. So, cultural knowledge of the gun wasn’t nearly as high as it is now. Piston-driven ARs would provide AK-like reliability with AR ergonomics and accuracy!

Most of those designs promptly went nowhere, and a few holdouts still produce piston-driven ARs. However, the piston-driven AR wasn’t just a phenom of the early to mid-2000s. It dates back to 1969 with a gun called the Colt 703.

The AR-15 and later M16’s reputation for poor reliability all come from Vietnam. Whether or not it was purposeful sabotage or government ineptness is up for debate, but the M16 got a helluva start. The rifle was issued without cleaning kits, and soldiers were told it didn’t need to be cleaned. The gun was firing ammo that used the wrong type of propellant, which increased fouling. Oh, and it lacked a chrome chamber, which is great for Vietnam.

The initial failure of the M16 tainted the gun decades later. The immediate aftermath was an investigation by the House Armed Services Committee. This resulted in the Report of the M16 Rifle Review Panel. The report wasn’t kind to the M16 and identified perceived weaknesses of the design. Eugene Stoner and Armalite may have designed the rifle, but Colt was producing it for the Army, and this report got their hands sweaty. They went about producing a replacement for the M16 and called it the Colt 703.

The Colt 703 – What’s In a Name?

Colt had an inconsistent naming arrangement regarding the Colt 703 series. There are two Colt 703s. One is a standard AR-15-style rifle that lacks a long-stroke gas piston system, and the other is this gun. Colt also called the piston-driven 703 the M16A2. That was a tad presumptuous, and the gun clearly has nothing to do with the actual M16A2 adopted well after Vietnam.

Breaking Down the Colt 703

The AR-15 uses a direct-impingement gas system, which has been disliked since its inception. The gun does blow more carbon into the receiver, but if the proper propellant had been used, this wouldn’t have been a major problem, and with proper ammo and a cleaning kit, it’s not a problem at all.

Colt recognized that if they were stuck with the Olin WC 846 ball powder, they’d have to move to another system. The long-stroke gas piston system had already been well-proven to work. The long-stroke system of the AK worked quite well, even with Soviet ammo. Colt decided to implement this system into the M16 design.

This called for a new upper receiver design. Colt kept a lot of M16 components, including the barrel and sight system. The gun required an AK-like gas key tube that sits above the barrel. This creates a larger upper receiver that’s taller. The top portion of the upper receiver sits well above the stock, unlike the inline design of the M16. The Colt 703 utilized the M16-style charging handle, the bolt, and the bolt carrier group. Colt used a different handguard attachment system due to the change in the upper receiver design.

It was tall enough that Colt eliminated the carry handle design. Instead, we had a more standard-looking rear sight design. Colt stuck with the M16’s lower receiver and stock layout. The stock did feature a trapdoor cleaning kit that would be preserved in further M16 rifles.

Clever Design

Colt was clever with the 703. At first glance, it looks radically different from the M16. In reality, it’s more of a Clark Kent/Superman-style disguise. It looks different, but with a close look, it’s pretty close in design to an M16. They clearly designed the gun to mimic the adopted rifle to simplify logistics for everyone. This resulted in a radical change to the upper and handguards, but once you get past that, it’s all M16.

If you had to replace the M16 early in its development, this wouldn’t have been tough to do. The Colt 703 could still likely be produced quickly to replace the M16 without much difficulty. The Colt 703 did weigh 8.7 pounds, which is a pound heavier than the M16. Colt never mass-produced the gun.

The Army issued cleaning kits and comic book-style manuals for the M16. They kept the ball powder for a little longer than necessary, but cleaning kits and chrome chambers drastically increased rifle reliability. Eventually, the ball powder was swapped for stick powder, and the M16 and M4 carbine variants still serve to this day.

The Colt 703 was a novel take on the M16, but it never got off the ground. It does prove that everything old is new again, and you can find much more refined piston-driven ARs from companies like PWS. It’s unfortunate that the Colt 703 never took off, and we might’ve solved the piston-driven AR-15 argument a bit earlier.

Let’s say howdy to the Howdah pistol. If you were to search the time in the modern era, you’d likely find yourself looking at a very expensive double barrel pistol capable of chambering .45 Colt and .410. It’s a sweet, Italian-made gun produced by the famed Italian firm Davide Pedersoli. No offense to Pedersoli, but those aren’t Howdah pistols. They are the equivalent of saying a Umarex MP5 in .22LR is the same as an HK MP5 in 9mm. The .45 Colt and .410 would be absolutely anemic Howdah calibers, and big game hunters in the 1800s would laugh at such small caliber pistols.

The Howdah – From India With Love

The term’ howdah pistol’ is rooted in the howdah baskets that were attached to Indian elephants. These spacious baskets allowed men to ride on the elephants during hunts and military campaigns. They were a symbol of opulence, affordable only to the wealthiest. The howdah was a vital tool for hunters pursuing dangerous game.

Anyone on foot could quickly become a tasty snack for bears, leopards, and other dangerous game in India. This becomes doubly true if you fail to land a stopping shot. A wounded animal kills faster and more viciously than one that can still retreat. If you were sitting atop an elephant, it’s unlikely you’d be attacked. Not only are you high in the air, but elephants are massive creatures and provide their level of intimidation to other animals.

This is true for most animals, but tigers have a different threat level. A wounded tiger proved more resilient and violent than other animals. They could and would climb an elephant and attack the men taking cover in the howdah. A male Bengal tiger has almost 600 pounds of claws, teeth, and fury. The hunters could quickly become the hunted.

When they got that close that fast, your rifle would likely be too big to handle in such close quarters. It might also be empty after you fired two rounds at the tiger. What stops a tiger at a few feet? Rounds like .45 Colt and .455 Webley might tickle it. That’s where the howdah pistols came in.

The Howdah – Meaner Than A Tiger

The Howdah pistols redefine big-bore pistols. The first Howdah pistols were massive muskets that began production in the 1790s and were popularized by the East India Company. The modern and more popular designs were double barrel cartridge firing pistols with rifled bores. The calibers varied widely.

They included the massive .577 Snider and the .577/450 Martini Henry calibers. They also used 20 and 16-bore calibers. To put this into perspective a .45 Colt round weighs 250 grains and is considered large. The .577 Snider fired a 470-grain projectile. It’s an absolutely massive cartridge. These Howdah pistols were more akin to sawn-off rifles than standard handguns.

Twin-barreled pistols were the most common option, but there were four barreled options as well. The four barreled guns were quite the sight and looked like an industrial-sized pepperbox.

Admittedly, the big rifle cartridges gained the same power, speed, and accuracy as a short-barreled pistol. However, the purpose called for a big cartridge at often close ranges, so this wasn’t a big concern.

Many of these pistols featured recesses to mount a stock for a more precise aim and likely for a massive increase in recoil control. Barrel lengths could vary widely from 6 to 12 inches, and likely too many minor variances to catalog the various models. Many different companies produced these guns, so the variances are difficult to catalog.

Beyond the Hunt

The howdah pistols were spread amongst numerous European colonial powers. They were most popular with British men. Many of these well-to-do British men would come home to fight for their country in World War I. They often served as officers, and they came back from their colonies with the howdah pistols they carried. They brought those pistols to the battlefield with them.

Normal Webley revolvers were scant at the time. As always, stores of guns dried up quickly, and conscripted men and fresh officers may not have a sidearm if they didn’t bring one. Thus, the big Howdah pistols went to war.

They went from killing tigers to killing Germans. These guns were very limited in their war use and were likely quickly replaced with standard Webley revolvers when possible.

The howdah pistols were big, massive hand cannons that faded away as more powerful cartridges propelled by smokeless powder became the norm. The big guns faded away, but they left their mark. They are still massive guns that are collectors’ favorites. The Pedersoli might not have been a tiger hunter choice, but its the closest we can get to modern howdah.

Derringers are just kind of cool. Something about a micro-sized handgun with two barrels and a hammer is attractive. Remington didn’t design the first derringer, but the Remington Model 95 more or less set the standard for derringers. The hammer-fired, double-barreled derringers were quite popular and have been imitated extensively. One of the cheapest imitators is the Davis Derringer. 

From the 1960s to the 1990s, the media didn’t just clutch their pearls about assault weapons but about Saturday Night Specials. Saturday Night Specials were a non de guerre given to affordable firearms. They used a sporting purpose test to essentially ban the importation of these affordable firearms, so several companies stepped up to fill that market gap. A company called Raven started it all. 

In 1970, George Jennings founded Raven, a company that quickly gained traction in the firearms industry. Jennings, along with his family and friends, established a network of companies, each offering unique products to avoid direct competition. Jim Davis, who served as Jennings’ office manager at Raven and later became his son-in-law, left to start Davis Industries. 

Davis Industries, under the leadership of Jim Davis, focused on producing affordable derringers. These firearms were priced so attractively that I was able to purchase my Davis Derringer for a mere sixty dollars. 

The Davis Derringer – But Why 

Listen, if I can purchase a functional gun for less than a hundred bucks, I most certainly will. It’s almost like a compulsion. The fact that it was a .22LR derringer sold me because I knew it’d be fun to shoot, at the very least. To be clear, I’m never going to carry the Davis Derringer, but it ought to be a fun gun to shoot at the range. 

These two shot derringers are hammer-fired and single-action. The gun alternates between the top and bottom barrels, so the user does not need to swap between barrels manually. The Davis Derringer folds open to expose the two barrels for loading or clearing. A manual extractor allows you to push the cases out of the chambers to be removed manually. 

The gun has a manual safety that allows you to block the hammer from striking the firing pen. For some reason, the gun has a vent rib. It might not be useful, but it does look nice. The sights are very simple, with a small front and rear sight. Overall, the Davis Derringer is a very simple gun with that Old West look. 

The Davis Derringer is made from pot metal or Zamak. Zamak is a zinc alloy, and Davis used this material to injection mold these guns. This allowed them to produce very cheap guns, which is why they are plentiful. 

Range Toy Time 

I won’t carry this gun for self-defense, but as a range toy, it has charm. The derringer mystique is certainly an American one. These were often referred to as poker table guns and belly guns because of the range in which they were useful. Go to the range, sit down on a chair, and draw and shoot at a target three feet from you. It’s fun. It’s silly, and it’s slow, but it’s fun. 

The little gun isn’t all that easy to shoot accurately. Your hands cover so much of it, and you have so little to grab, which affects accuracy. At 15 yards, I can hit an IPSC target regularly. Where exactly did I hit the IPSC target? Everywhere! Not really, but I’m not making A Zone shots with every trigger pull. I would call it a pattern more than a group. 

The gun has no reocil. Even high-velocity 22LR isn’t going to create an issue. It’s a bit loud but still not intimidating to shoot. That’s why it’s so fun. The Davis Derringer also proved to be reliable. I shot a bit of everything ammo-wise, and it all went bang. A look at the primer revealed a deep hit that showed very positive primer strikes. 

Ultimately, the Davis Derringer isn’t practical for any serious use. It’s fun to shoot, and that’s good enough for me. SASS has some derringer usefulness, so maybe I should shove this thing into a thigh garter and hit up my next match. 

Davis Derringer – Worth the $60 

The Davis Derringers are better than the other guns Raven and the fellow Ring of Fire companies produced. A two-shot derringer can’t jam, but a Raven MP-25 with its semi-auto action can jam. Of all the Ring of Fire companies, the Davis Industries rimfire derringers are the only ones I enjoy. 

They do exactly what they promise, which isn’t much. They are tough to shoot, so it’s smile-inducing when you hit a target. There is almost no recoil, and the guns aren’t loud either. They chew through ammo, and light primer strikes aren’t a problem. I think they are worth 60 bucks and provide at least 60 dollars worth of fun. 

Every time I look hard at a Bren rifle or even a pistol, it seems like the company has released a new model. At this rate, I just need to bite the bullet and buy one. I’ve been a fan of the Czech’s SCAR-inspired AR-18-influenced intermediate cartridge AR alternative. I like CZ’s stuff, and I like SCARs, but I hate the SCAR pricing and availability. The Bren has consistently been available in a couple of calibers and configurations. The Bren 3 seems to aim to take it to the next level.

This rifle series bears the name of the famed machine gun but has nothing in common other than being pretty awesome. The Bren series has gotten a baptism by fire in the Ukraine-Russia war. Czech donated a number of 5.56-caliber Bren rifles, which performed well enough that the Colt CZ group signed an agreement with Ukraine’s Defense industry to assemble the rifles in Ukraine. Those are Bren 2s, and today, we’ve reached the third in the trilogy.

The Bren 3 – What’s New

For the Bren 3 model, CZ has dropped the 7.62×39 chambering and plans to release the Bren 3 as a 5.56 rifle and a .300 Blackout rifle. In fact, it’s a family of rifles with six different models and a ton of barrel lengths. If you have your favorite niche barrel length, you can pick 7, 9, 11, 14.5, and, of course, 16.5 inches.

CZ is even releasing some special versions. For example, the Bren 3 SR will feature a 7-inch barrel and integral A-TEC A-flow silencer that fits nicely under the handguard. The SR model is my personal favorite of the new guns. There will be a 5.56 PDW variant with a 7-inch barrel and a PDW-style stock as well. Each model can integrate whatever stock you want and they swap easily enough. The standard stock is a folding collapsing design.

The Bren 3 now has a semi-heavy barrel profile, which adds about a quarter pound to the gun. The Bren 3’s adjustable gas block has three settings, which are suppressor, standard, and adverse. This ditches the old closed setting entirely.

More New Stuff

The Bren 3 no longer has a monolithic rail. That seems like a downside, but it’s designed to accommodate the various barrel lengths, calibers, and suppressors inside and outside of the gun. This allows the potential to swap rails if the aftermarket chooses to make them.

The old Brens required you to remove the stock to disassemble, but that’s no longer the case. You have to fold the stock, but it can remain attached to the gun for field stripping.

All variants of the Bren 3 will have M-LOK handguards. The Bren 2 had a mix of M-LOK and Picatinny on various models, but with the 3, it’s now the standard. While it doesn’t help most of us, CZ also released a grenade launcher alongside the Bren 3. It can be attached and used separately.

Like every other Bren, the controls will be reversible or ambidextrous. The Bren 3 is a remarkably modern rifle with many different options.

Tough Enough

CZ is touting the gun’s reliability. CZ went with an upper design that allows for easy maintenance to allow the Bren 3 to last forever. The company’s website features a ton of information on the gun’s reliability and the adverse testing they put the Bren 3 through. The gun seems to be designed with a theme of total durability. CZ seems to be marketing the Bren 3 for its reliability and long-term durability in adverse conditions. It’s already passed all of NATO’s standards.

It’s impossible to say if the gun lives up to those claims, but knowing CZ and their testament to quality, I don’t doubt it’s an extremely well-made rifle. Will it be available in the States? Likely, and I can’t wait to get my hands on one. This time, I promise I’ll buy one instead of waiting til to the last minute.