This is from a collection of bayonets we recently acquired. This Model 1816 was carefully cleaned and is, correctly, in the bright, with some gray near the socket and at the tip. It shows a small ”3” or “5” over “US” on the face of the blade at the base. The neck bears an alpha-numeric code for numbering bayonets in batches of 2,400. In this case “M / 59” signifying #1159.

The model 1816 bayonet is a collecting category of its own. Nominally measuring 19 inches overall with a 3-inch socket and 16-inch blade generally with a blunt “slash” point (in Reilly’s words,) its production extended into the 1840s and its use extended well into the Civil War with some replacements being made even then. There were some variations in the face flute and the shape of the point up to about 1822, but the pattern is readily recognizable by the T-shaped bayonet lug mortise (which may have started about 1813) and integral bridge, that would keep the bayonet on the muzzle of the musket even if pulled forward when withdrawing the blade from a target or jarred by the recoil of discharge. They were generally finished in the bright, with some possible browned exceptions from 1822 to 1831, and a few tinned examples. Careful inspection resulted in high degree of uniformity, but there is a lot of variety in blade markings, where in addition to a “US,” the initials of an inspector, maker, or state may be found. Reilly felt the presence of an alpha-numeric code indicated arsenal production at Springfield or Harpers Ferry.  [SR] [ph:m]

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