The Danish shooting movement was a movement in that started in Denmark around the 1860s after inspiration from the

National Rifle Association of the United Kingdom The National Rifle Association (NRA) is the governing body for full bore rifle and pistol shooting sports in the United Kingdom. Registered as a United Kingdom charity, its objectives are to "promote and encourage marksmanship throughout the ...

(NRA UK) which had been founded in 1859 to provide voluntary firearms training for the purpose of national defense. Although having started out as a part of the national defense, the Danish shooting movement in the later years have had a strong focus on sport shooting. The largest sport event Landsstævnet has been held since 1862, and now consists of not only shooting, but also sports like gymnastics, football, badminton, dog agility, lawn bowls, handball and beach volleyball. The Landsstævne is currently held every fourth year, and the last event was set to be held in 2021 at

Svendborg Svendborg () is a town on the island of Funen in south-central Denmark, and the seat of Svendborg Municipality. With a population of 27,300 (1 January 2022), Svendborg is Funen's second largest city.

History

The Danish shooting movement is considered to have started when H. P.V. Mønster, a Danish artillery captain and school officer at the

Royal Danish Military Academy The Royal Danish Military Academy ( da, Hærens Officersskole) educates and commissions all officers for the Royal Danish Army. The Military Academy function was initiated in 1713 by request of King Frederick IV on inspiration from the Naval Aca ...

, wrote an article in the newspaper '' Fedrelandet'' (lit. "The Fatherland") 19 January 1861 where he gave his support to the shooting movement and sparked an interest in the Danish people. His appeal was however first and foremost intended toward landowners, since he found it hard to imagine a nationwide organisation. The article resulted in a committee being appointed, which merely a month after the article had been published gave a recommendation to create shooting associations in all parts of Denmark with the goal of providing the Danish population with rifle shooting training. The ''Centralcomitéen til oprettelse af skytteforeninger'' was established 10 February 1861. The association

De Danske Skytteforeninger De Danske Skytteforeninger DDS (The Danish Shooting Associations) founded in 1862 was Denmark's oldest sports organization until it was merged with Danske Gymnastik- & Idrætsforeninger 1 January 2013. After the merger DDS was split in two with '' ...

was subsequently founded in 1862. During the same time as the so-called ''riffelforeninger'' (rifle clubs) were established in Denmark, similar clubs promoting the shooting cause were also created in Norway as ''folkevæpningssamlag'' and in Sweden as ''skarpskytteföreningar''. The rifle clubs often had a strong connection to the ''folkehøyskolene'' (lit. people colleges). In Denmark, in particularly many rifle clubs were created after 1864 following the defeat in the

Second Schleswig War The Second Schleswig War ( da, Krigen i 1864; german: Deutsch-Dänischer Krieg) also sometimes known as the Dano-Prussian War or Prusso-Danish War was the second military conflict over the Schleswig-Holstein Question of the nineteenth century. T ...

. Danish shooters had participated in the first modern olympics in 1896, but De Danske Skytteforeninger (DDS) was more focused on the national defense and national shooting competitions compared to international sport shooting. The ''Dansk Skytte Union'' (DSU, literally ''Danish Shooting Union'') was therefore established in 1913. Gymnastics became a part of De Danske Skytteforeninger, and DDS therefore in 1919 changed name to ''De Danske Skytte- og Gymnastikforeninger'' (DDSG, literally ''the Danish Shooting and Gymnastics Associations''). By the way, a competing gymnastics association called De Danske Gymnastikforeninger (''the Danish Gymnastics Associations'') was later founded in 1929. In 1930, DDS again changed its name, this time to ''De Danske Skytte-, Gymnastik- og Idrætsforeninger'' (DDSG&I, ''the Danish Shooting, Gymnastics and Sports Associations''). After the German invasion during World War II the rifle clubs were allowed to continue their activities, but only for valid members, and their rifle bolts also had to be stored by the police authorities between matches. In 1943 all firearms were confiscated by the Germans. When the firearms were to be returned in 1945 all long distance firearms were missing. Therefore, shooting activities immediately after the war only consisted of shooting on 15 and 50 meters, until DDSG&I successfully negotiated with Sweden to borrow 10,000 Carl Gustav model 98 Mauser-type rifles. In 1947,

field shooting Field-Shooting or Terrain-Shooting (Danish: ''terrænskydning'', Norwegian: ''feltskyting'', Swedish: ''fältskytte''{{Cite web , url=http://www.sandvikensskyttegille.se/fs_info.php , title=Swedish: Fältskytte gevär förklarat {{! Sandvikens Sk ...

was established as a new discipline under the name ''terrænskydning''.{{Cite web , url=http://www.skyd.dk/oldSite/historie.htm , title=Kjøbenhavns Skytteforening - Skydningens historie , access-date=2019-07-19 , archive-date=2019-07-19 , archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190719062135/http://www.skyd.dk/oldSite/historie.htm , url-status=dead In 1952, DDSG&I celebrated their 90 years anniversary.Skytteforeningens historie - Afsnit 4
/ref> Having started from rifle shooting, DDSG&I in 1972/1973 also established pistol shooting as part of their competition program.
/ref> Their main shooting event of the year, Landsstævnet, was broadcast on TV for the first time in 1971. In 1978 DDSG&I also incorporated field shooting with pistol as a competition program. In November 1992, the new association the

Danish Gymnastics and Sports Associations 'DGI'' (DGI, literally ''Danish Gymnastics and Sports Associations'') is a Danish association of sports clubs which includes 6,600 local sports clubs and 1.6 million athletes. DGI was formed in November 1992 as a merger of "De Danske Gymnastik- o ...

(DGI) was founded by merging De Danske Gymnastik- og Ungdomsforeninger (DDGU) and De Danske Skytte-, Gymnastik- og Idrætsforeninger (DDSG&I). In 2013 De Danske Skytteforeninger (DDS) also became a part of DGI.DGI Skydning – Store norske leksikon
/ref>

References

Military of Denmark Shooting sports in Denmark

History

See also

References