| FP-45 Liberator | |
|---|---|
  The FP-45/M1942 | |
| Type | Single-shothandgun,derringer |
| Place of origin | United States |
| Service history | |
| In service | 1942–1945 |
| Used by | Dropped into occupied territories for use by insurgents |
| Wars | World War II |
| Production history | |
| Designer | George Hyde[1] |
| Designed | May 1942[1] |
| Manufacturer | Guide Lamp Division ofGeneral Motors Corporation[1] |
| Unit cost | $2.10 (1942)[1] ($37.70 in 2022) |
| Produced | June 1942 – August 1942[1] |
| No. built | 1,000,000 |
| Specifications | |
| Mass | 1 lb (450 g) |
| Length | 5.55 in (141 mm) |
| Barrel length | 4 in (100 mm) |
| Cartridge | .45 ACP |
| Action | Single-shot |
| Muzzle velocity | 820 ft/s (250 m/s) |
| Effective firing range | 8 yd (7.3 m) |
| Feed system | Single-shot |
TheFP-45 Liberator is ahandgun manufactured by the United States military duringWorld War II for use by resistance forces in occupied territories. TheLiberator was never issued to American or other Allied troops, and there are few documented instances of the weapon being used for its intended purpose; this was compounded by the intended recipients – irregulars and resistance fighters – rarely keeping detailed records due to the inherent risks if the records were captured by the enemy. Few FP-45 pistols were distributed as intended, and most were destroyed by Allied forces after the war.[1]
The concept was suggested by a Polish military attaché in March 1942. The project was assigned to the US Army Joint Psychological Warfare Committee and was designed for theUnited States Army two months later byGeorge Hyde of the Inland Manufacturing Division of theGeneral Motors Corporation inDayton, Ohio. Production was undertaken by General Motors Guide Lamp Division to avoid conflicting priorities with Inland Division production of theM1 carbine.[1] The army designated the weapon theFlare Projector Caliber .45 hence the designation FP-45. This was done to disguise the fact that a pistol was being mass-produced. The original engineering drawings labeled thebarrel as "tube", the trigger as "yoke", thefiring pin as "control rod", and the trigger guard as "spanner". The Guide Lamp Division plant inAnderson, Indiana assembled a million of these guns.[2] TheLiberator project took about six months from conception to the end of production with about 11 weeks of actual manufacturing time, done by 300 workers.
The FP-45 was a crude,single-shot pistol designed to be cheaply and quicklymass-produced. It had just 23 largely stamped and turnedsteel parts that were cheap and easy to manufacture. It fired the.45 ACP pistolcartridge from anunrifled barrel. Due to this limitation, it was intended for short-range use, 1–4 yards (0.91–3.66 m). Its maximum effective range was only about 25 ft (7.6 m). At longer range, the bullet would begin to tumble and stray off course. The original delivered cost for the FP-45 was USD$2.10/unit (equivalent to $40 in 2024[3]), lending it the nickname "Woolworth pistol".[4] Five rounds of ammunition could be stored in the pistol grip.
TheLiberator was shipped in a cardboard box with 10 rounds of .45 ACP ammunition, a woodendowel to remove the empty cartridge case, and an instruction sheet in comic strip form[5] showing how to load and fire the weapon. TheLiberator was a crude and clumsy weapon, never intended for front-line service. It was originally intended as aninsurgency weapon to be mass-dropped behind enemy lines to resistance fighters in occupied territory. A resistance fighter was to recover the gun, sneak up on anAxis occupier, kill or incapacitate him, and retrieve his weapons.
It was manufactured under the "FP" prefix and referred to in official documentation as a "Flare pistol".[6] The pistol was valued as much for itspsychological warfare effect as its actual field performance. It was believed that if vast quantities of these handguns could be delivered into Axis-occupied territory, it would have a devastating effect on themorale of occupying troops. The plan was to drop them in such great quantities that occupying forces could never capture or recover all of them. It was hoped that the thought of thousands of these unrecovered weapons potentially in the hands of the citizens of occupied countries would have a deleterious effect on enemy morale.[7]
GeneralDwight D. Eisenhower's staff never saw the practicality in mass dropping theLiberator over occupied Europe, and authorized distribution of fewer than 25,000 of the half million FP-45 pistols shipped to Great Britain for the French resistance. GeneralsJoseph Stilwell andDouglas MacArthur were similarly unenthusiastic about the other half of the pistols scheduled for shipment to the Pacific. The Army then turned 450,000Liberators over to theOffice of Strategic Services (OSS), which preferred to supply Resistance fighters in both theatres with more effective weapons whenever possible.
French use of the FP-45 remains undocumented, however, a first-hand account of an assassination with an FP-45 exists from German military policeman Niklaus Lange. He claimed that there were thousands in circulation in occupied France.[8] The OSS did distribute a few to Greek resistance forces in 1944. Most of the pistols shipped to Britain were undistributed, and later dumped at sea or melted for scrap metal.[9]
One hundred thousand FP-45 pistols were shipped to China in 1943, but the number actually distributed remains unknown. A few were distributed to the PhilippineCommonwealth Army,Philippine Constabulary, and resistance fighters.[1][10]
