The .30 Kiraly-Cristóbal Carbine, also known as the San Cristóbal or Cristóbal Automatic Rifle was manufactured by the

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares with ...

’s Armería San Cristóbal Weapon Factory.

History and development

Although called a carbine, the gun may be termed a

submachine gun A submachine gun (SMG) is a magazine-fed, automatic carbine designed to fire handgun cartridges. The term "submachine gun" was coined by John T. Thompson, the inventor of the Thompson submachine gun, to describe its design concept as an autom ...

since it is identical to the Hungarian

Danuvia 43M submachine gun The Danuvia 39M/43M was a Hungarian submachine gun designed by Pál Király in the late 1930s. History The 9×25mm Danuvia submachine gun was designed by Hungarian engineer Pál Király in the late 1930s, and was produced by the titular Dan ...

. Both

weapon A weapon, arm or armament is any implement or device that can be used to deter, threaten, inflict physical damage, harm, or kill. Weapons are used to increase the efficacy and efficiency of activities such as hunting, crime, law enforcement, s ...

s were designed by Hungarian engineer

Pál Király Pál Király (1880–1965) was a Hungarian engineer and weapons designer. Work & designs He is best known for development of lever-delayed blowback firearms, and being employed by the Danuvia company in the 1930s and 1940s to design and pr ...

, who came to the Dominican Republic as an expatriate in 1948. The gun's name is a reference to the San Cristóbal Province, which is the birthplace of the late Dominican dictator, Generalissimo

Rafael Trujillo Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina ( , ; 24 October 189130 May 1961), nicknamed ''El Jefe'' (, "The Chief" or "The Boss"), was a Dominican dictator who ruled the Dominican Republic from February 1930 until his assassination in May 1961. He ser ...

. The Dominican Republic's military was the main user of this weapon although it was also exported to

Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribb ...

prior to the

Cuban Revolution The Cuban Revolution ( es, Revolución Cubana) was carried out after the 1952 Cuban coup d'état which placed Fulgencio Batista as head of state and the failed mass strike in opposition that followed. After failing to contest Batista in co ...

Description

The Cristóbal had a wooden stock, 30-round bottom-mounted box magazine, and tubular receiver with a fixed cocking handle on the right-hand side. It used

lever-delayed blowback Blowback is a system of operation for self-loading firearms that obtains energy from the motion of the cartridge case as it is pushed to the rear by expanding gas created by the ignition of the propellant charge. Several blowback systems exist wit ...

for its operation. The original version was produced in

9×19mm Parabellum The 9×19mm Parabellum (also known as 9mm Parabellum or 9mm Luger or simply 9mm) is a rimless, tapered firearms cartridge. Originally designed by Austrian firearm designer Georg Luger in 1901, it is widely considered the most popular handgun ...

. The most typical version of the Cristóbal was made in

.30 Carbine The .30 Carbine (7.62×33mm) is a rimless carbine/rifle cartridge used in the M1 carbine introduced in the 1940s. It is a light rifle round designed to be fired from the M1 carbine's 18-inch (458 mm) barrel. History Shortly before World W ...

. Over 200,000 Cristóbals were made by the Armeria San Cristóbal from 1950 to 1966. After Trujillo’s assassination on May 31, 1961, the Dominican government decided not to maintain a local military industry and production was slowly wound down. By 1990, the Cristóbal was no longer a standard Dominican firearm, but continues to be used for basic training in the Dominican Republic's military schools. This carbine was used by

Che Guevara Ernesto Che Guevara (; 14 June 1928The date of birth recorded on /upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/Ernesto_Guevara_Acta_de_Nacimiento.jpg his birth certificatewas 14 June 1928, although one tertiary source, (Julia Constenla, quoted ...

during the

Users

* *

References

* Rifles and Pistols, Jeremy Flack, Sunburst Books 1995

External links

San Cristóbal carbine at Manowar's Hungarian Weapons

San Cristóbal carbine

Image of a Cristóbal Carbine field stripped

right side of receiver

detail view of triggers

detail view of safety switch

top detail view of receiver

full view right side

angled view right side
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cristobal (Carbine) .30 Carbine firearms Assault rifles Carbines Lever-delayed blowback firearms History of the Dominican Republic Weapons of the Dominican Republic Hungarian inventions