Interesting, but not new.

The Boberg XR-9. I saw the videos and cutaways (see here from NRAhab) and thought "wow, that's incredibly neat".

Well, if I thought in English that's what I would have thought... my thoughts tend to run in images as far as engineering things is concerned, but DIGRESS! DIGRESS!

Anyhow, I was impressed, but something tickled the back of my skull about this gun. Last night, I whipped out my handy (10lb) copy of Boothroyd's "Handguns" and:

Check this out

That's the Gabbett-Fairfax Mars. The book has a cutaway drawing that I can't find in internetland; but essentially you can see what goes on if you note that the end of the chamber on that pistol is well behind the grip. Yes, the GB Mars draws the cartridge rearward from the magazine in a lifter assembly and stuffs it in the barrel.

Now, the Boberg is a USEABLE pistol where the Mars wasn't so much since it's ejector design was severely lacking, tending to toss brass directly rearward. But, it's a culmination of a design tried first over a hundred years ago.