This is a very interesting rifle. In the beginning of the "Great War" (there was no WW1 until WW2 came along). Both sides were being cut to pieces with machine guns and a German officer, that was also a hunter, brought his scoped hunting rifle to the battlefield and had a lot of success shooting British machine gunners through the opening in the machine gun carriage's armor plate. Because of his success, the government asked the hunting associations to volunteer rifles that were chambered for 8x57I or IS and scoped to help with the war effort, until enough military sniper rifles could be manufactured. Because telescopes were in "short supply" the government kept the scopes and mounted them on the military rifles when they no longer needed the hunting rifles. I have a model 98 Mauser chambered in 8x57I that had unusual markings that turned out to be one of these rifles (Axel Eichendorff wrote an article about these rifles for WAIDMANNSHEIL). Now it seems the British may have also depended on hunters to arm their snipers.
Mike
