diff --git a/Documentation/git-svn.txt b/Documentation/git-svn.txt
index 10af599b44..068aa58a5b 100644
--- a/Documentation/git-svn.txt
+++ b/Documentation/git-svn.txt
@@ -338,6 +338,10 @@ Any other arguments are passed directly to 'git log'
 	Shows the Subversion externals.  Use -r/--revision to specify a
 	specific revision.
 
+'gc'::
+	Compress $GIT_DIR/svn/<refname>/unhandled.log files in .git/svn
+	and remove $GIT_DIR/svn/<refname>index files in .git/svn.
+
 'reset'::
 	Undoes the effects of 'fetch' back to the specified revision.
 	This allows you to re-'fetch' an SVN revision.  Normally the
diff --git a/git-svn.perl b/git-svn.perl
index 9369acc4dc..70159204ce 100755
--- a/git-svn.perl
+++ b/git-svn.perl
@@ -31,6 +31,7 @@ require SVN::Delta;
 if ($SVN::Core::VERSION lt '1.1.0') {
 	fatal "Need SVN::Core 1.1.0 or better (got $SVN::Core::VERSION)";
 }
+my $can_compress = eval { require Compress::Zlib; 1};
 push @Git::SVN::Ra::ISA, 'SVN::Ra';
 push @SVN::Git::Editor::ISA, 'SVN::Delta::Editor';
 push @SVN::Git::Fetcher::ISA, 'SVN::Delta::Editor';
@@ -40,6 +41,7 @@ use IO::File qw//;
 use File::Basename qw/dirname basename/;
 use File::Path qw/mkpath/;
 use File::Spec;
+use File::Find;
 use Getopt::Long qw/:config gnu_getopt no_ignore_case auto_abbrev/;
 use IPC::Open3;
 use Git;
@@ -217,6 +219,10 @@ my %cmd = (
 		     "Undo fetches back to the specified SVN revision",
 		     { 'revision|r=s' => \$_revision,
 		       'parent|p' => \$_fetch_parent } ],
+	'gc' => [ \&cmd_gc,
+		  "Compress unhandled.log files in .git/svn and remove " .
+		  "index files in .git/svn",
+		{} ],
 );
 
 my $cmd;
@@ -1107,6 +1113,14 @@ sub cmd_reset {
 	print "r$r = $c ($gs->{ref_id})\n";
 }
 
+sub cmd_gc {
+	if (!$can_compress) {
+		warn "Compress::Zlib could not be found; unhandled.log " .
+		     "files will not be compressed.\n";
+	}
+	find({ wanted => \&gc_directory, no_chdir => 1}, "$ENV{GIT_DIR}/svn");
+}
+
 ########################### utility functions #########################
 
 sub rebase_cmd {
@@ -1527,6 +1541,25 @@ sub md5sum {
 	return $md5->hexdigest();
 }
 
+sub gc_directory {
+	if ($can_compress && -f $_ && basename($_) eq "unhandled.log") {
+		my $out_filename = $_ . ".gz";
+		open my $in_fh, "<", $_ or die "Unable to open $_: $!\n";
+		binmode $in_fh;
+		my $gz = Compress::Zlib::gzopen($out_filename, "ab") or
+				die "Unable to open $out_filename: $!\n";
+
+		my $res;
+		while ($res = sysread($in_fh, my $str, 1024)) {
+			$gz->gzwrite($str) or
+				die "Unable to write: ".$gz->gzerror()."!\n";
+		}
+		unlink $_ or die "unlink $File::Find::name: $!\n";
+	} elsif (-f $_ && basename($_) eq "index") {
+		unlink $_ or die "unlink $_: $!\n";
+	}
+}
+
 package Git::SVN;
 use strict;
 use warnings;
diff --git a/t/t9143-git-svn-gc.sh b/t/t9143-git-svn-gc.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000000..aaa3af014c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/t/t9143-git-svn-gc.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,44 @@
+#!/bin/sh
+#
+# Copyright (c) 2009 Robert Allan Zeh
+
+test_description='git svn gc basic tests'
+
+. ./lib-git-svn.sh
+
+test_expect_success 'setup directories and test repo' '
+	mkdir import &&
+	mkdir tmp &&
+	echo "Sample text for Subversion repository." > import/test.txt &&
+	svn_cmd import -m "import for git svn" import "$svnrepo" > /dev/null
+	'
+
+test_expect_success 'checkout working copy from svn' \
+	'svn_cmd co "$svnrepo" test_wc'
+
+test_expect_success 'set some properties to create an unhandled.log file' '
+	(
+		cd test_wc &&
+		svn_cmd propset foo bar test.txt &&
+		svn_cmd commit -m "property set"
+	)'
+
+test_expect_success 'Setup repo' 'git svn init "$svnrepo"'
+
+test_expect_success 'Fetch repo' 'git svn fetch'
+
+test_expect_success 'make backup copy of unhandled.log' '
+	 cp .git/svn/git-svn/unhandled.log tmp
+	'
+
+test_expect_success 'git svn gc runs' 'git svn gc'
+
+test_expect_success 'git svn gc produces a valid gzip file' '
+	 gunzip .git/svn/git-svn/unhandled.log.gz
+	'
+
+test_expect_success 'git svn gc does not change unhandled.log files' '
+	 test_cmp .git/svn/git-svn/unhandled.log tmp/unhandled.log
+	'
+
+test_done