The first automatic pistol to appear in the English market was the Borchardt (1893). This pistol is the predecessor of the modern German official arm, the Luger-Parabellum, a weapon that retains the same base idea of a toggle joint breech action as the original Borchardt.
        The Borchardt was clumsy, unwieldy, and so large that it was usually equipped with a combination holster stock for conversion into a carbine. The eight shot magazine was set vertically in the handle, and the action was both frail and complicated. When a cartridge was fired the barrel and breech bolt locked together, recoiled until a pair of lugs on the frame lifted the toggle-joint action of the breech and allowed the bolt to continue it s travel independent of the barrel. The bolt thus recoiled still farther, ejected the empty case and cocked the arm, then came forward again, feeding a new cartridge into the chamber, pushed the barrel forward and locked rigidly as the toggle joint fell into line.
        The Borchardt was not a success, and its cartridges badly designed, but nevertheless, it was the ancestor of all the distinguishing characteristics of modern automatics for it used rimless cartridges, smokeless powder, nickel-cased bullets, a clip magazine in the handle and various construction details that still continue.
 
Extracted from --- Automatic Pistols by H.B.Pollard, published 1921