While they were sold on the idea of an automatic pistol that was just as reliable as a revolver, the Swiss provided constructive criticism, that the pistol was expensive to produce and was unwieldy to handle, due to its almost vertical grip and weight distribution. The Swiss were impressed by the gun, as it had performed well during testing. Luger took the C93 to the Swiss military for testing. During that time, Loewe reorganized into DWM, which had asked its top salesman, Georg Luger, to promote the C93 in both civilian and military channels. It also had the distinction of being the very first semi-automatic pistol to be described by the American press. Loewe was interested in selling the gun to foreign nations, that even the United States had tested it. The Ludwig Loewe factory based in Germany took notice of Borchardt’s work and eventually hired him to put his design into production as the C93.
Taking inspiration from the mechanism of the Maxim machine gun, Hugo Borchardt developed an automatic pistol using the same action in which case operating upwards rather than downwards as with the Maxim. It was one of the first practical self-loading pistols in history.Īlthough not commercially successful in its time, the Borchardt design led directly to the development of the hugely popular Luger pistol. The Borchardt C93 ( 'Construktion 1893') was a German pistol designed by Hugo Borchardt.
