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Ferdinand Ritter von Mannlicher

Ferdinand Mannlicher was born on the 30th of

January 1848 in Mainz (Germany).His father, a

military official (k.k. Ober-Feldkriegskommissr) whooriginated from Brx (Bohemia) was garrisoned at thefederal fortress there at this time. In 1857 Mannlicher wentto Vienna where he studied Maschinenbau (engineering)at the Technical University. In 1869 he was employed atthe k.k. Sdbahngesellschaft (Southern RailwayCompany) and after a short time with the state railwaycompany he again moved to a private railway company,the k.k. Kaiser-Ferdinand-Nordbahngesellschaft, wherehe was employed in their construction department andfinally attained the title of Oberingenieur or seniorengineer. However, for the talented technical constructorthis job was rather boring and he started to think aboutearly retirement when he got in touch with JosefWerndl in1875 who encouraged him to develop a magazine fed rifleand finally offered him a job as a constructor at theOEWG in 1878. Ferdinand Mannlicher hesitated until1886 before finally he left his secure job to join Werndl.During the visit of the Centennial exhibition in the USA in1876 Ing. Mannlicher had the chance to study severalplans and models for small arms at the Patent office ofPhiladelphia for some days, possibly a valuable

inspiration for his first rifle model which was offered to the k.k. technical administration militarycommittee in 1879.

During the following years Ing. Ferdinand Mannlicher developed and improved numerous rifles,pistols and magazine designs for Werndl's company. Together with Otto Schnauer he alsodeveloped a successful rotary system for rifles which was patented in 1900 which became well knownas Mannlicher/Schnauer System. The hunting models of this rifle were successfully produced from1903 to 1972! His first semi-automatic rifle design appeared in 1885 and his automatic pistolachieved great success yet he is most remembered for the bolt action rifles that bear his name. Hispistols became very popular, although not issued to the Austrian Army they were privately bought mymany officers and adopted in many armies from Argentina to South Africa. Mannlicher's rifles, whichuniquely allowed the loading a box magazine in one motion first produced first in 11mm and since1888 in 8mm calibre, were adopted by the Austrian Army in 1886 to replace the Werndl rifles (lastupdated as M.1895), in the German Army as M/88 and in the armies of Italy, Romania, Portugal,Switzerland, Bulgaria, the Netherlands and France (as Karabiner Berthier) as well as in several statesoutside Europe, for instance the first "practical" test of his semi-automatics was the civil war in Chilein 1890!

In 1887 Ferdinand Mannlicher was honored with the award of the 3rd class of the Order of the IronCrown followed by his ennobling with the predicate of "Ritter von" on the 1st of June 1892 - diplomaissued on the 14th of December 1892. His interest in several political questions was crowned with his

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appointment as a lifelong member of the sterreichisches Herrnhaus (Austrian Upper House) in1899. An assortment of his small arms were awarded the first prize at the World Fair in Paris in 1900.

On the 20th of January 1904 Ferdinand Ritter von Mannlicher, probably the most successful firearmconstructor of all times, died suddenly at the early age of 55 in Vienna.