BACKGROUND: Among other restrictions, the Treaty of Versailles banned Germany from developing any type of general purpose machine gun. To circumvent this, German development of an all purpose machine gun was secretly being done in Switzerland in the early 1930's. By 1934 designer Louis Stange of the Rheinmetall armaments factory had made improvements to the secret machine gun developed in Switzerland and the MG34 was introduced as an all purpose selective fire weapon. In spite of the relatively high production cost the MG34 was accepted by the Wehrmacht Ordnance department and deliveries of the MG34 began in 1936. In 1937 due to the high cost and manufacturing time of the MG34 development began on another general purpose machine gun which utilized stamped and pressed components making it cheaper and quicker to produce. Further developments resulted in the introduction of the MG42 general purpose machine gun in late 1941. Both the MG34 and the MG42 came equipped with a wide variety of accessories including assorted optical enhancement devices of which the most common were the Zielfernrohr 34 and the improved Zielfernrohr 40 optical sights. Both of these sights came with assorted accessories including an attachable light for use at night. The attachable light came with a specific battery box and cable. The box would contain three small batteries which would attach to the sight by a cable, allowing for enhanced night vision.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Natural tan leather construction battery box with steel, brass and bakelite fittings for use with the Zielfernrohr 34 and Zielfernrohr 40 optical sights. The box has a fold back top lid with a stitched leather hinge to the reverse and a stitched on vertical closure strap to the obverse. The closure strap attaches to a leather reinforced, pronged steel roller buckle which is positioned on the front of the box’s body. The left side of the box has a stitched on horizontal loop designed to attach it to the tripod of the machine gun. The right hand side of the box has dual, stitched on vertical belt loops with two corresponding horizontal retaining loops. The belt loops each have a cut-out eyelet which secures to brass studs on the bottom of the box. The reverse of the box has a small screwed on tan bakelite panel with two prong holes for attaching the light cable. The interior of the box has a tan bakelite insert with brass terminals and a tan web HBT battery removal strap. Complete with original optics cable. Nice!