An interesting camera which certainly comes from a late NKVD 1d (1941) or a 1e (1941-1946).

It was found with a rare lens. This Summar like comes in fact from a 2/50mm Fed lens (#21488 at the back, so made in 1938). The Leitz serial number corresponds to a 1949 Elmar, so it's probably at that date that the lens was transformed.

There was a piece of "Plus X" cardboard inside the inner pocket of the (true!) Leica bag with the name of a great Australian architect and his londonian address. Also a date: january 1952 as filling the camera. Perhaps not for the first time!

So the body and the lens were probably assembled in 1949 or 1950. Unhappily impossible to say when the body was reengraved.

(Jacques M. collection).