Customer Reviews

Tommy Gun: How General Thompson's Submachine Gun Wrote History

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Except for collecting war stories about Thompson users, there is no reason for this book. 'The Gun that Made the Twenties Roar,' etc. cover the same ground.

There are howling errors throughout which show that the author lacks enough knowledge to appreciate the significance of his subject.

E.g.: He thinks the Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR) operated on the blowback system. No one-man portable gun can fire rifle ammunition by blowback. The Thompson--and the 1918 Bergmann--were innovative in using pistol ammunition, which CAN be handled by blowback. The BAR is gas-operated, as 10 seconds of research would show.

He thinks that the WWI stop-gap rifle issued by the US Army (the M1917, or 'American Enfield') was a new design and/or an improvement on the M1903A3. The production of this gun, involving General Thompson, is an amazing story of an abandoned British prototype frantically put into production for an army that could not be equipped in time.

The Thompson submachine gun has a unique place in history and this book brings its story alive. The weapon was designed by a former Army ordnance officer for use by the troops in WWI... but it was too late for that war. The weapon was refined to re-equip the American peacetime Army... but budget cuts and bureacratic confusion prevented its adoption. It was marketed to police forces for the purpose of law and order... but its best-known owners were the gangsters of the 1920s and 1930s.

Bill Yenne's writing brings this topic alive and the illustrations gives the reader a good idea of what the weapon was, and still is. A fascinating book, it is great reading not just for what happened with the Tommy Gun but what might have been. He even looks at the Tommy Gun in popular culture and talks about groups who get together and shoot these classic weapons.

This book is between a "1" and a "2," in my opinion. I'm giving it a "2," only because it has some WWII accounts of Thompson use. It's a weak effort, and the author does not appear to fully grasp the subject. You can see by the low price that these are now available for purchase on the used (and new) market that the book does not hold much dollar value, which is representative of what you'll find inside. The book references listed within appear to have been cut and pasted from Wikipedia. Don't waste your time with this book, unless you are such a Thompson fanatic that you have to have every book on the subject. I include it in my library for that reason.

Tommy Gun, Bill Yenne

Bill Yenne wrote more than two dozen books on military and historical topics. The "tommy gun" is the most famous American firearm of the 20th century. It was invented for the military but found notoriety in the Roaring Twenties. It was a preferred GI weapon in WW II because of its firepower. Most have heard of the tommy gun, but few have ever fired one (p.4). Trench warfare in the Great War led to deadlocks. What if a portable machine gun could quickly capture an enemy's trench or machine gun nest and defend your own? This is a very readable, interesting, and educational book. It has business history, popular culture, and military history.

Chapter 2 tells of General John T. Thompson who helped to modernize American small arms. A machine gun had many complicated parts (p.29). Commodore John B. Blish invented a simple breech lock. Trolley millionaire Thomas F. Ryan provided financing (p.32). Theodore Eichhoff was a skilled designer and engineer (p.35). The finished product was not desired by the peace-time Army (Chapter 5). A solution in search of a problem? The Post Office and Coast Guard ordered them (close combat).

'Part Two' tells about the sales of Thompson guns to customers during the many conflicts of the 1920s (p.58). Reading a book about Prohibition would tell you that it started in 1850s Maine (later rescinded) and 1890 South Carolina (ignored). I read that the Treasury Agents who gathered the evidence to convict Al Capone have their identities kept secret to this day (p.89). The economic downturn began years before October 1929 (the Fall River textile mills went bankrupt in 1927). The Great Depression caused the October 1929 Stock Market Crash, not the reverse. Then there was a new owner of Auto-Ordnance (p.130).

'Part Four' tells about the military use of the Tommy Gun in WW II. Production was greatly increased by 1941 (p.151). The gun was redesigned to cut costs and improve production (p.158). The tommy gun was favored for jungle warfare and close combat (p.177). It was successful in the Mediterranean (Chapter 25) and in the Pacific (Chapter 26). The M3 "grease gun" was a simpler, cheaper design (Chapter 28). The tommy gun was successful in Europe (Chapter 29). The production of Thompsons ended in 1945, they were replaced by M3s (Chapter 31).

The submachine gun was dropped by the military in the 1950s. Its replacement was the "assault rifle". This carbine lacks the long-range accuracy of a rifle and the short-range firepower of a Thompson (p.260). But the M16 fails in any long-range combat (p.263). The modern replacements are the "Uzi" and the Heckler & Koch MP5 (p.264). But the M16 and M4 are preferred by law enforcement for accuracy and firepower (p.265). Special Forces favor the MP5 (p.266). The remaining chapters are on varied subjects. The `Epilogue' tells about firing a vintage Thompson in Arizona.

The 1934 National Firearms Act limited the sale of submachine guns to the public. This meant an end to development because of a limited market. Since then modern weapons were only found overseas through government funding (Suomi Lahti). Yet the "US v. Miller" decision ruled that civilians were allowed to keep and bear military arms. This book explains why an assembled tommy gun would not fit in a violin case. A golf club bag is more practical.

Looking for a good book on the history of the Thompson submachine gun? If so keep looking, this isn't one of them. Fine example of someone writing a book on a topic they know absolutely nothing about. The author and Amazon both should be ashamed for charging people good money for such a worthless book. Too many mistakes, too many myths retold.

From reading this book I have the impresson the author has never heard of the fine Thompson books by Tracie Hill.

Quite a few of these reviews are coming down very hard on Mr. Yenne's book regarding the Tommy Gun. I thought the book was well written. I thought that it flowed very well. I thought of the main character being the actual gun and then you get to see how this gun appeared at famous moments throughout history all over the world. It similar to Forrest Gump in that respect. If you like books about business hisotry, world history, guns, wars, crime, law enforcement, and conspiracy, then this would be a great book to read.
Just to press the point a little more, let's play out the following scenario. You're walking in Borders and you see a Romance novel with a long-haired, weight lifter type dressed as some sort of sex pirate, but then you turn around and behold a book that has a submachine gun on the dustcover. Then you look below the gun and a guy with a sweet mustache is looking back at you. Which one do you want to carry out of the store?