The French M1829 Mounted Artillery Sabre. Part 1: Troopers.
Feb 14, 2016 17:38:32 GMT
Post by Uhlan on Feb 14, 2016 17:38:32 GMT
The M1829 is one of my favourites of the French 19th C. sabre line.
Although it does not have the reach of the M1822 Artillery, it is by far the most nimble and well balanced of the two.
The blade is still 80.5 cm long, with a width of 33 mm and a thickness of 10 mm under the guard, going to 4 mm at the end of the fuller and with the foible going from 4 mm to 2 mm at 1" from the tip. That is what I call distal taper done right. The POB is 7 cm from the guard and the Montmorency blade has a curve of 5.5 cm. The weight is 945 grams without the scabbard.
This is what Mr. Bottet said about it: ,, The Mounted Artillery men were dissatisfied with the M1822 Mounted Artillery sabre. It hindered the manouvring of the pieces, so a special sabre was designed for them by the Firm of Manceaux, who fabricated the new sabre in collaboration with Chatellerault''.
Of course the men were quite right. The job of the Mounted Artillery was to lay supporting fire for any action, whether by Infantry or Cavalry. So they had to be able to move in quickly, do their thing and move out again as the situation changed and all of that while being able to fight off enemy troops too. In hectic environments like that, one needs the cumbersome M1822 like the plague.
The first generation of the M1829 has a capped peen, with a Fleur de Lys on the cap. On some sabres the cap was decorated with the cockerell of Louis Philippe, standing on two crossed cannon. The scabbard was made of leather at first, but soon changed to a 1.5 mm thick steel plate one.
The capped sabres with the leather scabbards are extremely rare, but the latter even more so.
The first blades were signed ,,Manufacture d'Armes de St. Etienne and have the stamp of Mr. Dubocq, who was Director from 1823 to begin 1830.
Later the production switched to Chatellerault and those sabres were marked thus: Manufacture Royale de Chatellerault with the date of issue.
The works at Chatellerault started production early 1830 and ended the production in 1857. 74.956 sabres were produced.
My specimen does not have the capped peen. It dates from 1838. My Officers sabre, dated 1830, which will be presented in Part 2, has the capped peen. The decoration is two crossed cannon under a granade. Here is another example.
What it does have though, are two rather new devellopements. The leather washer sits in an inlet in the guard. Both my Troopers and my Officers sabres have this feature. I would like to know whether other, later, sabres have it too. Mr. Dave Kelly says that his sabre does not have the inletted washer, but he forgot to tell me the date of issue.
The other one is the new blade guide. This feature makes it possible to use the entire scabbard opening to insert the blade. It holds the blade at the spine and re enforces the scabbard mouth with 1.5 mm extra steel, so the scabbard wall at that point is 3 mm thick. The pommel is larger and wider than on the M1822 and is a perfect stop to the hand. The designers really did their best!
Therefore it is rather dissapointing to know that the Powers That Be decided to take away this most excellent weapon and replace it with the old and cumbersome M1822 Artillery again, around 1852. Why? If you look at pictures of the Mounted Artillery in action, like the one at the head of this post, you will see the M1822. It is like the M1829 never existed. Very strange indeed.
This sabre is marked with the stamps of Directeur de Pontcharra: 1837 - 1839 ( P under star in oval ) and Controleur / Reviseur S. Wiedman: 1836 - 1843 ( W under star in a shield ).
The hilt and the scabbard have the same weapon number stamped upon them: 1522. There are more stamps, but they are not important for this post.
As I said above, this is the most easy and satisfactory to use sabre of the French sabres I have thus far. Due to its length it can be used indoors too, so I would recommend it for cutting, but also to any one who is looking for something effective and nimble to have standing next to the bed.
Cheers.