Mauser Model 1895

About the Mauser Model 1895

The Mauser Model 1895 is a 5-round, bolt-action service rifle designed by Paul Mauser as a refined export development of the Model 1893. Chambered in 7x57mm Mauser, it featured Mauser's famed flush staggered-column internal box magazine fed via stripper clip. Adopted by Spain, Chile, the Boer republics, Mexico, and Serbia among others, it built the Mauser company's reputation as the world's premier bolt-action manufacturer. Spanish forces used it against the United States in the Spanish-American War, and Boer commandos used it to devastating effect against British troops in the Second Boer War, where its flat-shooting 7x57mm cartridge consistently outranged the British .303.

At the Battle of San Juan Hill in 1898, Spanish riflemen armed with Mauser 1895s inflicted such heavy casualties on Theodore Roosevelt's Rough Riders that the U.S. Army immediately reverse-engineered the design - producing the Springfield 1903 so closely modeled on the Mauser action that the U.S. government later paid Mauser royalties for patent infringement.

Mauser Model 1895 specifications

The 'Spanish Mauser' is one of several closely related Model 1893/1895 Mausers; the 1895 added cock-on-opening and a refined extractor over the Model 1893.