M1861 NAVY PATTERN ARMY CUTLASS

M1861 NAVY PATTERN ARMY CUTLASS

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$1,700.00 ON HOLD

Quantity Available: 1

Item Code: 1306-10

This is a rare Army cutlass.  Ames received a contract from the Army on 18 January 1864 for 300 Navy 1861-pattern cutlasses.  They were delivered on 10 February1864 and issued Col. William A. Howard’s New York Volunteer Artillery Regiment’s “marine artillery” units manning gun boats used on the James River and other streams. In Charles Pate’s article on these swords in the December 2014 issue of “Man-at-Arms”, he gave the history of these rare swords.  Col Howard had lobbied the Ordinance Department to buy these swords to fit the nautical mission of his “marine artillery”.  At the time of his article’s publication, Mr. Pate was only aware of five examples of this sword, since then several others have surfaced but they are still quite rare.  See also Ron Hickox “Collector's Guide to Ames U. S. Contract Military Edged Weapons: 1832-1906”, p28 for a description.  The cutlass is essentially the same as the Navy M1861 cutlass except the obverse ricasso of the blade is stamped “U.S./A.D.K./1864” and the top rim of the pommel is stamped “A.D.K.”.  “A.D.K.” are the initials of the Army inspector A. D. King.

The brass hilt is in good shape with nice even patina, but with one shallow dent near middle rim of basket guard. The grip has lost most of its original leather covering which had had its wire wrap removed and the leather coated with a black, tar-based preservative solution.  The obverse ricasso marking, “U.S./A.D.K./1864”, is well struck and clear.  The reverse ricasso is stamped with straight line block letters “AMES MFg Co/CHICOPEE/(MASS)”.  The top two lines are clearly struck, but the third is hardly visible.  The blade is in good cleaned condition with some staining and light pin-prick pitting from cleaned corrosion. [ph:L]

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