www.firearmsguide.com/ - 24,200 Printable Gun Manuals, Schematics, Blueprints & Antique Gun Catalogs + Searchable Guns & Ammo Tech Reference Guide + Gun Values Guide (like Blue Book)
The Hotchkiss M1909 machine gun was a light machine gun of the early 20th century, developed and built by Hotchkiss et Cie. It was also known as the Hotchkiss Mark I, Hotchkiss Portative and M1909 Benét-Mercié.
Production began at the Hotchkiss factory in Saint-Denis, Paris, but in 1914, with the invading German army threatening the city, the French military authorities ordered the factory to be moved to Lyon. The following year, the British government invited Hotchkiss to set up a factory in Coventry. By the end of the war, this factory had manufactured over 40,000 M1909s.
The U.S. version was made by Springfield Armory and by Colt's Manufacturing Company. Total production for the United States was 670. This was small compared to the huge production runs of firearms later in the 20th century, but this was a significant number for the size of the contemporary U.S. Army. The M1909's adoption coincided with the withdrawal of the .30-06 manually operated Gatling guns from the U.S. Army's arsenals.