7,65 x 17 mm Browning

7,65 x 17 mm Browning – the cartridge was designed in 1900 by the Belgian company Fabrique Nationale de Herstal for Browning self-loading pistols. It subsequently spread throughout the world and is or has been used for a variety of pistols and submachine guns. The cartridge case you see here is stamped "K DWM K 479A"

DWM – Deutsche Waffen- und Munitionsfabriken is a company that was formed by merging of several munitions factories and munitions plants in 1896. DWM was one of the leading suppliers of arms and ammunition to Imperial Germany and one of the largest exporters of Mauser system weapons. The most famous weapons produced by this company are the Parabellum pistol (known as the Luger P08), the MG08 heavy machine gun (the main German machine gun during World War I), and the MG14/17 machine gun fitted to aircraft during World War I. DWM also used its own system of stampings on the cartridges (as opposed to the unified German markings of other factories), with the "K K" marks indicating the Karlsruhe ammunition plant (Baden, Germany) and the 479A marks indicating just the 7.65 x 17 mm Browning cartridge. During WWII, the Karlsruhe ammunition factory was one of the three largest in Germany. Prisoners of war, forced labourers and concentration camp inmates contributed heavily to the work at the factory. In 1944 there were just over 4,500 people. Even after the end of the war in 1945, around 2,000 interned former forced labourers, mainly from Poland and the USSR, were still housed in the Karsruhe-Durlach area. In the 1950s the company split up. The Berlin branch (still under the name DWM) continued to concentrate on the production of railway vehicles. The Augsburg branch, which also included the Karlsruhe plant, focused on the production of packaging machines and industrial presses instead of the former mainly armaments production. It was called IWK. In the 1970s, the company merged with KUKA to form IWKA (Industriewerke Karlsruhe-Augsburg AG). At that time, industrial production in Karlsruhe had ceased completely and only the company headquarters were still there. Since 1997, the former factory halls have been home to the Centre for Art and Media Technology (ZKM), the City Gallery, the State College of Design and the Museum of Contemporary Art.