Finding it has turned into somewhat of an obsession:
As a young freedom fighter, Nelson Mandela stepped out of a farmhouse hideout in South Africa, took 20 strides and dug a hole on the sprawling land. He leaned over, put in a semiautomatic pistol and 200 rounds of ammunition, and carefully put a khaki uniform over them. After covering them with heaps of soil, he sauntered back into his rural hideout in northern Johannesburg — hoping to retrieve them soon.
He never got a chance to fire a shot with the Makarov pistol. A few weeks after he buried it at the farm in Rivonia, he was hurled into prison for the next 27 years. That was in 1962, and the whereabouts of the gun — now estimated at $3 million — remain a mystery, said Nicholas Wolpe, the chief executive of Liliesleaf Farm, the former hideout now converted into a museum.
Full Story – HERE
50 years in the ground, with only a khaki uniform wrapped around it? Yea I’d say that’s pretty much rust-dust by now.
Comments
9 responses to “Nelson Mandela’s Makarov Pistol”
A glock? Nah. It’d be nothing but a pile of dust.
A 1911 though, you find ones that are of ww2 vintage in the ground sometimes. 1911’s and unexploded bombs :3
You best be joking. OH wait you’re the silver-tipped bullets guy from the marine shooting article. GTFO.
Are you really telling me unexploded bombs dont exist in the ground? Along with other weapons and equipment that are of ww2 vintage? I bet you think that tanks and planes dont lay at the bottom of lakes and rivers either. Oh wait, all of these things have been recovered before, from rivers, lakes and excavation sites before!
You’d be suprised what survives in the ground. But it seems more or less up to chance as to what does and what does not. Whatshisface’s pistol could still be buried somewhere lol.
And you think the 1911 would work after sitting in the ground for 66 years?
Maybe :3
Heck, depending on where you found it, it could be practically rust-free!
Well, there are pre-1899 mosin nagants they found buried that are submerged in cosmoline that are in pristine condition so anything is possible =P
Considering that there are viking swords found in semi-working order after a thousand years in saline soil, I think a Glock slide would live quite comfortably underground in working order for a decade or more. Considering that South Africa doesn’t have a frost-thaw cycle, chances are even better that the internals would be ok. Even a shoe box would help stretch out this timeline.
Don’t forget that in England, metal detector people have found old Roman coins in clay jars buried in farm fields.
On TV, they had a show about researchers digging up the old tunnels in Franch from WW1. They are still there. Many have equipment still in them. The farmers didn’t even know that they were there. A lot of stuff can survive being buried a long time.
One of these days’ i’m going to haul ass to germany and find me some of them buried crates full o nazi guns. A crate of Mg131Z’s has got to be worth, what, at least a hundred grand? :D
I will risk life and limb for a box full of three double-machineguns lol.