The newest BOOK available on the Wilkinson Fairbairn / Sykes knife bares all and explodes many long standing myths. A must have for the Military Knife Collector. This fully illustrated 2nd edition, packed with all new additional facts, illustrations, drawings, photographs and original documents is a must for the collector who prefers fact rather then fiction!
We are the exclusive distributor for the Americas. Click on the blue link below and purchase your copy right here.
Size - 9" x 6" (228 x 152 mm)
Over 170 Black and White photos and Illustrations 207 pages.History of the F-S Fighting Knife
November 2009
Quote
Luke 22:36 - Then said he unto them, He that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.Jesus of Nazareth
RIP Marbles
"September 23, 2009; Due to extremely poor sales in the cutlery consumer market and acute downturn
in the general economy Marble’s Cutlery LLC has filed Chapter 7 Bankruptcy. Every effort was made to sell or recapitalize the company but failed. Marble Arms Inc., manufacturer of gun sights and gun related products, is a separate entity and is in no way affected by the bankruptcy.
Kennedy Knives
Fellow collector Gene Moisey sent me some photos awhile back of the tang and guard of a Kennedy knife he has with the grips off of it. There are strange markings on the tang, it appears to be punch marks. On the leather washer on the guard there are also numbers stamped in it. The numbers are a 4 and a 2 so we surmise this could very well be the year made, as in 1942. I don’t know what these mean, if they are some sort of code or what. I show them here in case someone does or even has a guess on it. Do you?
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Mess Knives Again
Our good friend Dick Boyd noticed on an ebay auction a write up showing a display board, the type in factories showing models and incomplete work, that listed the board came from the Oneida plant. They were large makers of mess cutlery so that is not a surprise, what is though is the markings on the knives on the board, and M in a circle. So the M in a circle knives from WW II are connected to Oneida or so it seems. This is the first connection I know of that places the marking with that company. We have long suspected that the OM marked knives were Oneida Manufacturing but do not know that as fact. The M sure draws us closer to that conclusion for now. Not a solid fact but a very good clue to continue the search. As it turns out we discovered a listing of the Forging Industry Association trade marks. The M in a circle is a mark made by Moore Drop Forging Co. Inc. Now the search for the connection to Moore and possibly Oneida or was Moore a stand alone maker. I could not find a Moore Drop Forge Co. in the War Supply Contract book so the possibility of them being a subcontractor for Oneida is a distinct possibility. Or it may have been a very small contract under the $50,000.00 limit to put them in the book. More searching required…
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Quote...
"One of the reasons for conspiracy theories is an assumption that people in high places always know what they are doing. When they do something that makes no sense, devious reasons are imagined by conspiracy theorists, when in fact it may be due to plain old ignorance and incompetence."
Thomas Sowell
Signal Corps Rebel…
Good friend Tommy Knox sent us a vintage photo of an Hispanic looking Confederate rebel soldier wearing a leather stacked handle machete, it appears to be of the standard Collins type. While we think of Civil War soldiers romantically wearing large Bowie knives with fancy handles and etched blades the common Collins machete sure does make sense as it was affordable and available to any farmer which the South had many of. Tommy looked into the date line of leather stacked handles as I have before and we can see that many were made prior to the Civil War era and the machetes may have been the first to use them in this style. Very Cool Photo!
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Camillus M1A1 Bayonet Prototype
While doing some research Bryan and Denise LaTourette happened across our website here. They sent me a few photos of a bayonet they have, the Camillus M1A1. The scabbard is marked with large printing 6-25-06 / Prototype. Notice the scabbard is all one color and the soft inserts are the same color as the body, something not done on the production pieces. I have not seen this marking before and show it here for historical purposes. Thanks guys for sending the photos, neat scabbard.
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Microtech Mini UDT knives
We were contacted by Paul Hodgson a Microtech collector looking for any information on the Mini UDT knives sent for testing by the government. While we do hear of many items tested and submitted these days, many we do not. Newer information is also the hardest to trace as the trail we leave today does not include a lot of paper to follow up with. In the advent of Freedom of Information as well as National Security the maze just gets tougher. In any case Paul asks if we know anything about them he writes… "I know that they had made some knives for military contract trials, back in the mid 1990's, 1994 to be exact. I have been searching for these knives for more then 6+7 years. One I know that was made is a Sterile Green handle & lanyard, it is a mini UDT, blade length is 2 1/4" overall size is 5 1/2". Another which I believe was also a military trials knife, made in September of 1994 possibly has the lettering of SOF inscribed on the blade. It also is a "mini UDT" blade length is 2 1/4" overall length is also 5 1/2"." Well I can tell you I do not have any information on them but surely would love to know, does anyone??
Geneva Forge
I recently heard that Geneva Cutlery, known later as Geneva Forge closed the plant and moved to Holland when the labor union pushed them too hard on labor rules, pay and time off. Seems drastic and again is only hearsay but I have seen it happen before, can anyone document that story? Might be in some of the local papers from the 1950’s when it was actually news!
The Legendary V42 Story
We have heard several stories over the years of how someone came into a knife, gun, canteen, uniform, etc something of value just by dumb luck. I have done it myself on a few occasions and have written about a few of them. In fact some of my best discoveries have been by luck when looking for something completely different. How does the old saying go, I would rather be lucky then good… well there is some fact to that as well. Well this V42 story is documented here and now as actually taking place and just may stand for some time as THE BEST V42 STORY out there. It ranks right up with possibly the luckiest find as well. The story goes…
A friend of my brother-in-law's was getting rid of the "junk" her late husband had accumulated. He was in the U.S. Navy and stationed aboard the USS Omaha from 1940 to the end of the War. She came upon some knives he obtained during WW2 and wanted to get rid of them so no one would get hurt with them. The police told her to just "bury them in the desert". She threw them in the trash, expecting them to go the landfill. She mentioned them to by brother-in-law who told her I was interested in WW2 knives and asked her if I could have them. She agreed and he sent them to me. Included in the collection were a mint condition Marine Kabar, an unissued 1905/42 bayonet with sheath and four Case V-42 knives and sheaths. One knife had the handle replaced with a plastic one (done by one of the sailors on the ship) but the other three were still original in unissued condition. One sheath still had "USS Omaha" and the serial number "R-30" stamped on the sheath. The other two sheaths had never been stamped. It seems that her husband was in charge of the arms locker and he liked the knives and thought they would make great war souvenirs. The Omaha sailors name was John Martin and his rank was Bosun's Mate 2nd Class. His rating was "Sailmaker's Mate". Sailmaker was established 1893; disestablished 1900. Sailmaker's Mate - Established 1797; changed to Sailmaker's Mate 1c, 2c, and 3c 1921; included in Boatswain's Mate or Coxswain 1939. The B/Ms were in charge of deck parties, cargo handling and all rope and knot work. They were also in charge of the small arms locker.
One knife has "JEM" stamped on the ricasso and one other has his social security number etched in it. Two of the sheaths are plain (not stamped with "USS OMAHA" while the third one still has the USS OMAHA and serial number on it. The fourth sheath has his name, rank, USS OMAHA and nickname (SAILS) stamped on it. Attached are a couple of pictures so you can see their condition.
To think, these knives nearly ended up in a landfill and would have been lost forever. Now is that like hitting the lottery or what…. Go ahead top that story!
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Good Ole Boys...
Some old photos I discovered while moving around my filing cabinet. Sometime in the mid 1990's taken at Roger Ballard's House after the Birmingham Gun Show.
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Quote
"If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you, it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun."
The Dalai Lama, May 15, 2001
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