The first smokeless military cartridge: 8mm Lebel

Posted February 10, 2008 in Ammunition by Steve Johnson with 1 Comment
Tags: 8mm, Ammunition, france, Lebel, military, smokeless

The 8 mm Lebel (8x50Rmm French) was and first smokeless powder cartridge adopted by the military of any country. It is also the one of the most bizarre looking cartridges I have seen.

Photo from Wikipedia

It was introduced in 1886 and served through WWI. It was made obsolete in 1929 with the introduction of the 7.5x54mm MAS mod. 1929 (7.5 French) cartridge.

Steve Johnson

I founded TFB in 2007 and over 10 years worked tirelessly, with the help of my team, to build it up into the largest gun blog online. I retired as Editor in Chief in 2017. During my decade at TFB I was fortunate to work with the most amazing talented writers and genuinely good people!