The most famous submachine gun to place the magazine in the grip would be the Uzi. The Uzi is known around the world and has seen combat in dozens of conflicts. The least known submachine gun with the magazine in the grip is the Kokoda. The Kokoda is an Australian design that first came to be in 1947, and boy, do I wish it had worked out.
From a personal perspective, I like weird stuff. When a weird gun works, I like it a lot. If the Kokoda had ever been more than a few prototypes, I bet someone would make a semi-auto version somewhere. Sadly, the coolness of the Kokoda was never appreciated, largely because the gun fell apart.
Literally.
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The Kokoda: Ask the Troops
There were a lot of lessons learned in the Second World War. We saw firearms technology and tactics change rapidly in the postwar world. Before the war even ended, the world was taking notice of lessons learned. Australia went directly to the source: the combat-experienced troops.
A questionnaire was passed out to the combat veterans regarding small arms design. The government wanted to know what its troops thought of their weaponry. A lot of this revolved around where to put cocking handles, whether bayonets are still necessary, sights, magazine placement, and more.
It’s important to realize that the Australian submachine gun of choice for this era was the Owen gun, but it had barely been in service when the questionnaire went out.
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The Owen is a bit odd, namely due to it being one of the few SMGs that featured a top-mounted magazine. The Owen gun was already an extremely reliable submachine gun and was seemingly well-liked by troops for the most part.
A total of 1,500 soldiers were each asked 24 questions. Sadly, I cannot seem to find any record of the specific questions from the questionnaire. There are some scant details around the internet. According to one source, 1,293 soldiers wanted the magazine below the body, while 163 preferred a top-mounted magazine.
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The Top-Mounted Magazines
Top-mounted magazines are a bit odd. The benefit is a lower prone position and the ability for an assistant gunner to load the gun with greater ease. That makes sense with an automatic rifle designed for suppressive fire, but it makes less sense with a submachine gun.
SMGs aren’t crew-served guns and seem less likely to be used in the prone position than other firearms. In a defensive position, sure, but for an assault where the SMG shines, it seems less useful.
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The Owen guns required offset sights, which aren’t all that fun to use, and I imagine reloading the Owen while standing was awkward. Albeit I’ve never had to reload an Owen gun, so that’s just speculation.
The Kokoda
Major Eric Hall reviewed the questionnaires and set about designing the Kokoda. The Kokoda was essentially a tube gun. Tube guns were a common design for SMGs of the era and gained the name due to the tube-shaped receiver. The Sten gun is likely the most famous of the tube guns. They are basic, blowback-operated, open-bolt weapons designed to be fairly cheap.
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The Kokoda was largely based on the Owen gun. As you’d imagine based on the answers to the questionnaire, the Kokoda featured a bottom-loading magazine. In fact, they placed it in the pistol grip, which reduced the Kokoda’s length. The barrel was trimmed to 8 inches compared to the Owen’s 9.84 inches.
The gun was about five inches shorter than the Owen and more than a pound lighter. The large fixed stock was replaced with a telescoping wire stock, which likely helped shave weight and cost. The gun maintained the forward grip of the Owen in lieu of a Thompson-style forend.
The name Kokoda was chosen to immortalize the 1942 Kokoda Trail Campaign. This was a brutal battle in New Guinea and was the first time Australia was directly threatened by an enemy force. It became known as Australia’s Thermopylae.
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The End of the Kokoda
It wasn’t until after the war that the Kokoda premiered. It was sent to Britain to participate in the trials to replace the Sten gun. The Kokoda faced competition from the BSA Machine Carbine and the Patchett Machine Carbine.
During testing, the welds that held the gun together failed after getting extremely hot. This failure resulted in the end of the testing. A second model was produced with a bayonet, a new cocking handle, and a flash suppressor. This model proved to be unreliable and was rejected from the contest.
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This was the end of the Kokoda. The Australians kept the Owen gun in service until 1971, and the Kokoda became largely forgotten. While the Kokoda seemed to have a few modern ticks, it was never produced well enough to survive.
The top-loading magazine of the Owen may have helped with reliability. Springs wear out, but gravity is constant. Additionally, the Owen gun’s design allowed for dirt and debris in the magazine to fall down and out of the gun rather than be absorbed by it. Still, the Kokoda crawled so the Uzi could run.
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