That was known as the Mills Web sling. Nearly an exact but not as good copy of the British Enfield sling. From what I have read it replaced leather slings in use during the Philippine Pacification on both Krag and later 1903 Springfield rifles.Culpeper wrote: ↑Wed Dec 06, 2023 1:26 am Nope. That appears to be one of those slings modeled after a certain British sling. This one is missing its keepers. I forget the name some folks call it. I know it is not a Kerr model. I have one of of these. I also have Kerr slings for the M1903 and the M1917. Mine was marketed back in the day as a Krag tropical sling. I believe Mr. Farmer addressed it in his book.
Mr. Mallory has a paragraph on page 166 and a picture on page 167 about a Tropical Web Sling. The last sentence reads, "Therefore, in the absence of any official procurement record of slings from Orndorff, the association of this sling with the Krag rifle appears dubious".
There should be some patent information stamped in the brass end pieces
You are correct in there should be 2 sheetmetal keepers necessary to keep the webbing from popping out of the end clips. A problen the Endfield sling didn't have so they weren't needed for it.
The Mills wasn't a good design but until the Kerr came along it was all they had. The leather slings would disintegrate from the constant tropical humidity so they had to find an alternative.
