My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres.

Uhlan
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 2, 2016 19:56:26 GMT

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Post by Uhlan on Jul 2, 2016 19:56:26 GMT

That's what the M1852 sabres were officially called. Kriegs Sabel 52 or KS52 for short.
This model came after the M1849 Garde Husaren sabel, see:
sbg-sword-forum.forums.net/thread/48154/elusive-prussian-m1849-garde-edited
The KS took some of the design cues from the 1849, like the spear pointed blade and the basket, this time with more bars.
Let's compare the two:

.................M1849 Gardereiter. ..............................................................................................................The KS 52.

Blade length: 88.5 cm.................................................................................................................................... 87.5 cm.
Blade width: 32.5 mm...................................................................................................................................... 30 mm.
Blade thickness: 8 -5 -4.5 mm............................................................................................................... 8.5 -5 -3 mm.
POB: 16.5 cm....................................................................................................................................................14 cm.
L. O : 102.5 cm.............................................................................................................................................101.5 cm.
G. L : 14 cm...................................................................................................................................................... 14 cm.
Weight: 1200 grams.................................................................................................................................1051 grams.

The M1849 Gardereiter is on top.

I left the M1879 pipe back out. It is of a totally different design.
As much as there is to say in favour of the KS52, the M1849 stole my heart.
It is the last of the real sabres, a last true descendant of the old steppe way.
The KS52 got a nice name and though it is a very nifty sabre, it is much more ,,civilized''. It is a first example of the declining importance of the sabre as the weapon of first choise and the changing and dimishing role of the Cavalry. This phenomenon can be observed not only in Germany but all over Europe and the US. Times change.

The KS52 hilt with fresh counter polish, a new finger loop and a new M52 sword knot.

As you can see here, the KS52 ricasso bears the manufacturers stamp, but also a G.
The G stands for ,, Guss Stahl '' or cast steel. The production of cast steel on an industrial scale made its first infant steps in Germany around the year 1850 and was by 1870 fully developed and concentrated in the Ruhr Gebiet. ( See notes )
So, where my M1849 was an experimental model in the sense that is was the first Prussian sabre design with a full basket, this particular M1852 was experimental also, as it has this cast steel blade dated 1857, so very early in the development of the industrial scale steel casting process. I dare to say it is a trial sabre.

As such, it is no wonder that the blade shows the flaws I referred to here:
sbg-sword-forum.forums.net/thread/48091/sabre-measles
Upon reflection the flaws may not have come from the tempering process as was suggested above, but from the yet to be fully understood casting process. It carries the Army acceptance stamp, so at the time the inspectors did not find anything wrong with it and it was issued to the 10th Uhlanen, where it was in service at least until the M1879 came on the market.

The 10th Uhlanen, as part of 5 Army Corps, were integrated into the 3 Army during the Prussian - Franco War of 1870 and might have seen battle at Weissenburg, Wörth, the Battle of Sedan and the Siege of Paris and before that, in their own V AK, during the Austrian - Prussian War of 1866 in the battle of Königgrätz. ( See notes )

The Battle at Königgrätz. Yeah, I know these guys are Gardereiter. It is still a nice picture.

That said, the Cavalry had already lost the position it had during the Napoleonic wars and was downgraded to do mainly scouting and screening, at least by the time of the Franco - Prussian war of 1870. Long before that, the Infantry and Artillery were slowly but steady taking over the number one position, though you would not say that when looking at the charts. In 1813 - 3 Regiments and 2 Squadrons. In 1816 - 16 Regiments. In 1914 - 26 Regiments! (See notes)

This picture was taken in 1941. The beautiful old gate was still there. At the end of WWII the Red Army flattened 60% of the small town.

The 10 Uhlanen was established in 1860 and had their barracks or Kaserne in the little town of Zullichau, Posen. ( See notes )

The old barracks.

Bertius Petrus. Map from the Commentariorum Rerum Germanicarum, Amsterdam 1616.
Zullichau is Merides 38 up and Oriens 53 to the left.

The full name is: ,, 10 Uhlanen Regiment Prinz August von Wurttemberg ( Posensches ). It's Commanders were ao Freiherr von Richthofen in 1878 and von Blucher in 1886. ( See notes ). Since my sabre was accepted in 1857, it must have been in storage for 3 years. There is nothing to suggest it was issued to another Regiment before 1860.

The KS52 is the upper one.

So, flaws or not and whether it is not clear how far the cavalry was actually involved in the above battles, my sabre survived all those years of what must have been hard service in one piece, which tells us something about the quality of the German steel casting process even in its infancy and the soundness of my blade.

The upper ring holder shows lots of wear.

The regimental colours. 10th Uhlanen is the second row from the bottom and to the left.

The M1879 - 85 Cavalry Enlisted pipe back sabre.

Army acceptance stamps for 1885. The H 85 might be a re issue inspection stamp.

I have already posted this sabre here: sbg-sword-forum.forums.net/thread/42564/prussian-m1852-85-cavalry-sabre and there is not much interesting to add.
Although it's state was quite good, it still took me two weeks to get it up to spec.

The M1879 hilt with the new finger loop and the new M52 sword knot.

This is a nice sabre and it has some good things going for it, for a pipe back that is, but it is quite heavy in the nose and does not handle anything like the KS52. Though this exemplar has all the stamps in place, the scabbard has no marks, which is odd.
The main question I am left with is this: Why did the german Command find it a good idea to demand a pipe back sabre when it was obviously made clear, by trail and error, that the design did not really work?
The French did not bother, at least not for the Cavalry. The British did a run of it, but Prosser was the only one who could make it work, sort of. So, they dumped it too after a while and went with the Wilkinson spear point blade. I cannot find an answer as to why the Germans went into reverse here.

The sabre has stamps from the Field Artillery, not the Foot Artillery, like pinotte thinks and the Horse depot units. A not very exciting end of service.

And so they disappear into the mist.

I'd like to conclude with something that happened today and has nothing to do with sabres. I confiscated this very endearing little First Communion Bible from 1888 for my book collection. It meassures 11.5 x 7.5 cm.

Stuff like this makes me wonder whether little Joseph was maybe the kid of one of the Uhlanen pictured above. You know, this old fart likes such sentimental thoughts. It makes history more human.

About the sword knots.
I came across this picture of an M52 knot.

You may try, but you will have a hard time finding one and than you pay big $$, so, I made my own.
They come quite close, though they seem to be a tad less bulky. All in all I had much fun making these.

Cheers.

This Uhlan is holding an Extra sabre with the new M1880 sword knot.

Notes:
This is a jumble of links that I think are interesting.
You must sort out yourself where the links fit the text.
If you have trouble reading German, just run the link through Google Translate.
Yes, I am a lazy bum. Get over it.

wiki-de.genealogy.net/UR_10

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Kavallerieregimenter_der_neupreu%C3%9Fischen_Armee

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/1._Garde-Ulanen-Regiment

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steel

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_steel_industry_%281850%E2%80%931970%29#Germany

www.grosser-generalstab.de/regiment/

www.kaisersbunker.com/ht/farben/farben4.htm

wiki-de.genealogy.net/UR_1

www.preussenweb.de/kavregt4.htm

www.reitverein-guenzburg.de/geschichte_1__bayr__ulanenregiment.htm

www.pickelhauben.net/articles/Master%20Cavalry.htm

www.preussische-kavallerie-arensberg.de/Regimenter.html

www.germandaggers.com/Gallery/CT0W.php

www.david-h-hunter.com.au/roehr/prussianscenes.htm

www.ostbrandenburg.com/zullichau.htm

www.kronoskaf.com/syw/index.php?title=1759_-_Russian_campaign_in_Brandenburg

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uhlan

www.kaisersbunker.com/ht/farben/ur14.htm

www.kaisersbunker.com/gtp/waffenrock.htm

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Imperial_German_Uhlan_regiments

10th Uhlanen ROLL OF THE DEAD: www.denkmalprojekt.org/2016/ulanen-rgt_prinz-august-von-wuerttemberg%28posensches%29-nr10.html

onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/browse?type=lcsubc&key=Armed%20Forces%20--%20Germany%20--%20Brandenburg%20--%20Regimental%20histories&c=x

catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/008598377

www.2empire.de/index.php/krieg-von-1870-71/6-ordre-de-bataille-deutsche-armeen-1870?showall=1&limitstart=

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V_Corps_%28German_Empire%29

francoprussianwar.com/armies.htm

battlefieldanomalies.com/the-battle-of-koniggratz-revisited/

www.napolun.com/mirror/napoleonistyka.atspace.com/Prussian_cavalry_Napoleon.htm

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulanen-Regiment_%E2%80%9EKaiser_Wilhelm_II.,_K%C3%B6nig_von_Preu%C3%9Fen%E2%80%9C_%283._K%C3%B6niglich_S%C3%A4chsisches%29_Nr._21

Last Edit: Jul 3, 2016 7:32:50 GMT by Uhlan

Dave Kelly
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 2, 2016 20:20:28 GMT

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Post by Dave Kelly on Jul 2, 2016 20:20:28 GMT

Wunderschoene!! Ach, you bring a tear to mein eye for der gut ole days.

Fur zis effort ve gif you two, TWO, mind you, gold stars, a purple hippopatomus, with cords, a bick blutwurst und brotschen and a piece of apfelstrudel. No bier! Back to der salt mines for you.

Fantastic job on this. You are getting to good at this stuff. Shame it doesn't pay.

Very jealous of that KS. I don't like Imperial stuff much. The pre '74 is grand.

Thank you for you prodigeous efforts.

Last Edit: Jul 2, 2016 23:28:47 GMT by Dave Kelly

Introduc harioli. Praeterea oportet esse harioli. Et quidam etiam arbustis.

( Bring in the clowns. There ought to be clowns. And some Shrubbery too. )

darth
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Posts: 226

My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 2, 2016 20:39:34 GMT

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Post by darth on Jul 2, 2016 20:39:34 GMT

I wonder about all the negatives associated with pipebacks? If they were so bad, how comes such asskickers used them for a good number of years?

The famous story is of the Crimea war, but Russians wore coats like gambusons, with a lot stuff underneath, so is it really the sword's fault? Did other swords in the same situations perform so much better than pipebacks there? Maybe a good few British cavalrymen sucked as fencers too boot? Maybe too simple to get it after 1 or 2 cuts that their jackets make that a no winner, so thrust it in his mouth or rip through his skull with it? Improvise, adapt, overcome.

I'd love to hear some illumination on the subject? But generally Germans are not known for substandard weapons and there has to be more to it, maybe in real combat and what it does to an enemy soldier, not how it looks. Don't need to hack off a limb to make it useless, don;t have to cut off a head or run a sword all the way through someone. Cut tendons, broken bones, open throats and 3" deep stab wounds do just fine if for some reason you are not shooting them.

Stand,Men of the West!

darth Member Posts: 226	My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 2, 2016 20:40:17 GMT Quote Select Post Deselect Post Link to Post Back to Top Post by darth on Jul 2, 2016 20:40:17 GMT Sword porn of the day for sure. Oh and here you go, your girl is in there. :-)
	Last Edit: Jul 2, 2016 21:41:16 GMT by darth Stand,Men of the West!

Uhlan
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 2, 2016 21:32:48 GMT

Quote

Post by Uhlan on Jul 2, 2016 21:32:48 GMT

Thank you both for the nice comments.
Darth, maybe you should have a look at Dave's piece here:

sbg-sword-forum.forums.net/thread/27616/pipeback-saber

For me it is, just as I stated above, an enigma too.
The only thing I know for sure is that all parties involved were looking for the Holy Grail of a sabre that was good at stabbing and at cutting. This sabre does not and will never exist. It will always be a result of compromise.
I think that starting in the 17th century the ways of doing battle evolved slowly away from the old ways
of the steppe folk. The old Polish Hussars were the last of that bunch.
Then somewhere someone tabled the question: Which is better? Stabbing or thrusting? And finding an answer led to two opposing trains of thought, which in turn influenced the developpement of sabre design until WWI.
Personally I think the pipe back a very un German sabre. I find it very British.On the other hand Queen Victoria was the aunt of Kaiser Wilhelm. Maybe he wanted to be nice to her or something. Who knows.
I cannot find anything on the net, but that does not mean the answer to why Germany introduced that pipe back again, is not laying around somewhere, hidden in some archive.

Cheers.

irondog
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Posts: 45

My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 2, 2016 23:16:22 GMT

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Post by irondog on Jul 2, 2016 23:16:22 GMT

Just a thought on my end. Regaurding the pipeback blades I must admit that I find it odd that the Germans appear to have adopted it so long after the British disregaurded it. The 1889 I have appears to be a rather sturdy weapon and while I do not see it slashing though a Russian greatcoat I do believe it would stab through. I am not 100% certain but I think the Germans used thicker blades than the British did. Seeing as The Germans keept the blade design for as long as they did My thinking is that there must have been some logical reason. I hope that helps at least some.

Uhlan
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 3, 2016 7:27:54 GMT

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Post by Uhlan on Jul 3, 2016 7:27:54 GMT

Edited: Forgot the M1879 picture with the Army acceptance stamps, so added that and made the 10th Uhlanen Death Roll link to work again. Studying this Death Roll, one can find interesting things:

1. Germans like to make lists of....well....everything:

Thanks darth for the video of my girl. Great find!

Irondog:

I do not have a British pipe back, so I cannot compare. Dave could I think, so you better ask him.
Word is however that the pipe back, speaking in general terms, is not very effective as a stabber because it is too flexible. Also, the pipe on the back of the blade did not allow for deep cuts. That bulge hindered deep penetration.
Matt Easton did a good video on them:

Cheers.

Last Edit: Jul 3, 2016 17:12:08 GMT by Uhlan

Croccifixio
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 3, 2016 8:34:34 GMT via mobile

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Post by Croccifixio on Jul 3, 2016 8:34:34 GMT

Godamn that is a pair of dreamy sabres.

About the casting process, cast steel has more chances of inclusions and voids within the steel, but has no difference to forged steel IF well cast (except aesthetics). I have to think that the Germans were pretty much the best (or at least most experienced) swordmakers of the time and wouldn't use low quality cast for an important weapon.

And I like that bible too. A nice slice of history.

Uhlan
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 3, 2016 10:11:18 GMT

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Post by Uhlan on Jul 3, 2016 10:11:18 GMT

Thank you for your appriciation of the sabres. The KS took me weeks of hard work to get done, but it has the really fine polish back.
As for the aesthetics of cast steel: If you mean that cast steel blades somehow would look inferior to forged blades, that is not true. After 1870 all German blades were made of cast steel ( British blades too at some point around that date, while the French cast steel industry never took off, due to reasons explained in the cast steel links), there were so many stages involved in the manufacturing of the blades, that in the end nobody can see any difference. Heck, even the German Army had the blades marked with a big G, so they could tell what was what.
If you refer to aestheticks in the sence of the forging process against the new casting process, well, it seems to me that there was still some forging done to get the kinks out and lots of tempering of course. I think the main difference is that the cast steel ingots were very clean to begin with, when done right, and the process allowed for the inclusion of other kinds of metals, chromium or whatever, lots of carbon additives, or whatever, in a simple and very controlled way. Hence the enormous variation in steel products we see today. That the figuring out of formulas and ways to produce them took some learning is attested too, I think, with my sabre.
In the mean time they set up the Ruhr Gebiet too. I worked there once for a couple of weeks, when it was still very much up and running like it must have been in the 19th C. It was a universe all by itself. Gigantic does not cover it. Galactic comes close. I have seen only a small fraction of course and only because I got lost many a time. On purpose too, I might add. Once I stumbled into a dark hall the size of a Boeing Dreamliner hangar, full of coal smoke, hot steel vapours, screaming men, clouds of I do not know what, when some hundred meters from my position an iron trap door opened and out shot an enormous slab of white hot steel, over rollers, with a speed you do not want to believe, to be hacked to bars in an off hand way by giant blades coming all of a sudden from the dark voids somewhere under the roof. I stood there in pant pissing awe, believe me. I loved the place. When travelling with my parents on the way to the sunny south as a 6 year old kid, we had to pass through the Ruhr Gebiet and I remember clearly the smell of burned coal, even though we were miles from any action. Everything smelled of coal. Everything was grimy and black. The rain was black.The steam of locomotives was black. If I could I would go back right away. My kind of scene totally. Now it is all gone. Wiped out. Clean and plastic and dull and safe. Very ,,Green '' and filled with people writing memo's that go nowhere. I hate that with a passion.

Cheers.

Last Edit: Jul 3, 2016 10:17:26 GMT by Uhlan

darth Member Posts: 226	My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 3, 2016 14:05:16 GMT Quote Select Post Deselect Post Link to Post Back to Top Post by darth on Jul 3, 2016 14:05:16 GMT Yes, someone is in love with steel. :-)
	Stand,Men of the West!

pgandy
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 3, 2016 14:53:37 GMT

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Post by pgandy on Jul 3, 2016 14:53:37 GMT

As usually I enjoyed seeing your work and learned much. I was unaware of cast blades. In addition from the links involved I got a better perspective on pipe backs. Easton’s video also had a link to maille that I almost past up having seen so many I thought it would be redundant. On the contrary he present some unknowns to me. All in all everything proved interesting and beneficial. Thanks.

Uhlan
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 3, 2016 17:10:08 GMT

Quote

Post by Uhlan on Jul 3, 2016 17:10:08 GMT

Thank you pgandy.
I hope the many video links do not give you trouble with your slow connection?
The beauty of the internet. Start with a given set of links and before you know it, you find much new stuff on new links to think about. On and on it goes.

Cheers.

Dave Kelly
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 3, 2016 21:29:14 GMT

Quote

Post by Dave Kelly on Jul 3, 2016 21:29:14 GMT

Jul 2, 2016 23:16:22 GMT irondog said:

Just a thought on my end. Regaurding the pipeback blades I must admit that I find it odd that the Germans appear to have adopted it so long after the British disregaurded it. The 1889 I have appears to be a rather sturdy weapon and while I do not see it slashing though a Russian greatcoat I do believe it would stab through. I am not 100% certain but I think the Germans used thicker blades than the British did. Seeing as The Germans keept the blade design for as long as they did My thinking is that there must have been some logical reason. I hope that helps at least some.

Keep in mind that the Imperial Army had only one official pipeback and a medley of retro simple hilt light duelling sabres. Remarkable how many books on the subject describe German weapons but provide no explanation of why they were chosen or evolved. I think there are two key reasons:

1. Although pipebacks tended to die in their earliest proponencies that didn't stop other states from trying their hands with them. The notion that the pipeback/quillback might provide a lighter but sound weapon enticed users, but for a few instances dynamic balance on these experiments failed. Then along came the Italians. 1868-1874 Saw Italian swordsmen once again become intellectual leaders in sword theory. Along with the theory they developed the 1871 ergonomic long saber with a new high control hilt. Over the next decade Italian instructors spread to all the Eoropean military centers, preaching the new system.

2. The theory reached Berlin. I don't think the Germans got it right. They modified it to their own preferences in cut oriented fence and produced a rather percussive weapon that isn't terribly dynamic. Didn't matter. Wilhelm II took the throne in 1888 and dictated the fate of the cavalry. He said the lance was the primary weapon of the cavalry and the sword may have become tertiary to the rifle. ( The supply folks were luckier than many cavalrymen: they got reissued older models of 1852s and Bluchers ;).

FWIW

Last Edit: Jul 4, 2016 0:36:25 GMT by Dave Kelly

Introduc harioli. Praeterea oportet esse harioli. Et quidam etiam arbustis.

( Bring in the clowns. There ought to be clowns. And some Shrubbery too. )

Uhlan
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Posts: 3,121

My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 4, 2016 5:22:28 GMT

Quote

Post by Uhlan on Jul 4, 2016 5:22:28 GMT

Thanks you Dave for your taking the time to inlighten us.
Never saw the Italian angle in this context. Clears things up quite a bit.

Cheers.

Edit: About the re issue of old models to the second line: That is why the Prussian Artillery sabres make such a wonderful hunting ground for refitted old Blucher blades.

Last Edit: Jul 4, 2016 5:26:05 GMT by Uhlan

Scott
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 4, 2016 7:25:24 GMT

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Post by Scott on Jul 4, 2016 7:25:24 GMT

Thanks Ulahn, interesting read as always. Were the cast blades you mention actually cast, or made of crucible cast steel? I know what you mean about that burned coal smell, I work in an old mining town and there's a few people who still burn coal in their fires. The smell is there as you come down into the town.
As for the British swords not cutting well, maybe they weren't that sharp? I remember reading about an incident on the north west frontier, where the Afghan fighters became proficient with captured British swords very quickly. When asked how they trained them to fence so quickly, the reply was along the lines of "we don't. We just sharpen the swords, any idiot can cut with a sharp blade." I can hunt up the reference if you want.

The shore gives way to the sea.
And the sea, my friends, does not dream of you.

Uhlan
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Posts: 3,121

My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 4, 2016 12:12:02 GMT

Quote

Post by Uhlan on Jul 4, 2016 12:12:02 GMT

To be honest, I do not really know, as in, I did not come upon a publication that describes the goings on in a 19th C. sword blade plant, if we want to call them that way.
Publications about sabres usually are those very nice books with lots of pictures and text about the items in question. Those seem to sell. Until now I have yet to find an academic study of the technical part, or how the things were forged, cast, or whatever. That does not mean those texts aren't there of course.
Than again, in all the time i have had 19th C. books going through my hands and believe me, those were a lot of books, I never saw anything refering to the inner workings of a blade manufacturing plant.
About guns yes, but than those were the shining examples of modern technology back then and there was rapid development and that alone made it interesting for the tech minded of the time. Sabres were not that interesting anymore. I have seen some pictures from 18th C. books describing the way things like blades were polished.In France that is. L'Hoste has a few in his books.
Trouble with that is that those 18th C. books about this rather specialist subject are not readily available on the market and are very expensive. It is waiting for a reprint or print on demand, but with the target market so small, I would not hold my breath. At least, the above is my take on things.
So, to get back to your question: I have quite a few French M1822 sabres. This, at one time, got me thinking: How on earth could they have made thousands of blades within a rather narrow frame of tolerance, a modern forge would have difficulty with to achieve? My answer was: They must have been using some kind of molds. It is either hammering the hot steel into a mold so the base model is conform to the specifications the patron is looking for and after a standard grinding and fullering stage and the extensive polishing stages, is absolutely within the specifications the patron demanded. Either this, or they cast the blades into molds. The French, like the Germans and the Brits were also looking into cast steel.
I have several French blades that are marked on the spine after the usual Manufacture Klingenthal blah blah blah, with the letters AF, standing for Acier Fondu, or cast steel. The trouble with France through the ages, or up until now as many French think, ( I wanted to write ,, the usual trouble with France is that there live many French there, but that is going a wee bit too far ), that it is 1. Inhabited not with a French people with a feeling for a nation state, but with many different autonome small tribes, each inhabiting a portion of a landscape, so variated, that it has no equal in the whole of Europe and 2. that said tribes will absolutely piss on any central government and especially on the representatives thereoff. These people have a great big F4%k You! written on their foreheads and practise said motto 24/7 and 365 days a year. The many different landscapes made it very difficult to get to remote parts, ask any poor tax collector from the time. Remote regions there were very many and the welcome offered to said poor creatures was very often let's say ,, below freezing point''. Any and all kings tried, Napoleon tried and went weeping to Moskau, modern politicians try and all failed.
If you want to read up on this very interesting topic I may recommend the many books by Le Roy Ladurie:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmanuel_Le_Roy_Ladurie.
His writing does not make for easy reading, even in translation. It is rather dry, but IF one wants to know about the inner workings of that collection of tribes some joker called ,,La Douce France'', he's the one to go to. Another writer and much easier to read is Simon Schama, a Brit with a very Dutch name: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Schama. I can recommend his book: Landscape and Memory (1995), in five parts. A real eye opener.
Now I see you sitting there, glassy eyed, muttering ,, what is this guy blabbering on about? I asked about steel, WTF?, but bare with me. Everything mentioned above, in my usual crude way, has to do with the failure of the French governments to get a steel casting industry off the ground. Up to this day there is no such thing, no French Ruhr Gebiet. At a time where real nations were developing their cast steel industry in some more or less centralised way, in France there were many regional outfits, all privately owned, with bad connections to the outside world and set up by a people who, even at the slightest suggestion of a fictional unity, would cut the promotors of such idiot thoughts to ribbons.
To make this more clear: If you think the glorious French Revolution was a binding factor and played out all over the ,,Nation'', like the propaganda wants you to believe, you are dead wrong. Entire regions never had a taste for that circus. Entire regions did not know what was going on, mainly in Marseille and Paris by the way, until considerable time later on. A beautiful story, I think, is the story of le Chevallier d'Espinasse. I have one of the many drawings he did, totally out of reach and undisturbed, during the times he was forced to flee Paris and had to move to his country house at Espinasse. Of course the scum in Paris knew about this and send a small army to flush him out and punish his people. They went and met with such a furious crowd of battle ready farmers and what not, all connected in some way to the Chevallier and all loyal to their boss, that many of the revolutionary scum were cut up stone dead and what was left of them scurried back to their masters in Paris with tales of utter horror. After that Paris never bothered the Chevallier again. And I am glad to be able to say that such instances of furious emotional affection and loyalty for their lords happened all over France. Those people were connected with the local House for many generations. He knew the names of their children and helped out with the old, the sick and the poor. There were very, very close ties in the country. The ,, let them eat cake'' mentallity was for the most part propaganda from Paris based on the Courtiers, fops and parasites at Versailles. Country gentry were for the most part just a kind of farmers with a title.
Where were we? Cast steel. Cast blades.
So. Again. It is not clear to me whether the cast ingots were hammered out, with or without the help of molds to get the basic shape, or that the steel was cast directly into said molds and then grinded and polished.
I can speculate my socks off, but that does no good. I have no proof, no factual texts, no nothing to go on.
Sorry about that. And I apologise if I caused some people to have giant headaches by now.

Cheers.

PS.
Scott, I totally forgot to say that if you have info on anything sabre related, I and I am sure many others, would be delighted to partake of it.
The more, the better.

Last Edit: Jul 4, 2016 17:36:46 GMT by Uhlan

pgandy
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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 4, 2016 15:17:16 GMT

Quote

Post by pgandy on Jul 4, 2016 15:17:16 GMT

Jul 3, 2016 17:10:08 GMT Uhlan said:

Thank you pgandy.
I hope the many video links do not give you trouble with your slow connection?
The beauty of the internet. Start with a given set of links and before you know it, you find much new stuff on new links to think about. On and on it goes.

Cheers.

Nothing of consequence. Your photos take time to download trying my patience at times. Not complaining only stating a fact. Please do not stop, I love them. It took from about 0130 hrs to 0330 hours with your post and links to see all. A large part of this time was due to the IP going down. The only thing one can count on here is something is going to stop working.

Uhlan
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Posts: 3,121

My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 4, 2016 17:55:27 GMT

Quote

Post by Uhlan on Jul 4, 2016 17:55:27 GMT

Well, I'd better make it worthwhile for you then.
Are you quite sure not all of the neighbours are surfing on your connection?
If you have WI-FI and your stream is not secured with a good password, everybody with a little savvy can break in and watch some tv show, while you are waiting for a picture to load and are paying for their fun.
Ah, the times in Mexico, were the village had just one small and portable black and white tv.
In the evening the entire population would gather around the little screen and watch ,,Futball'' or some god awfull Spanish soap opera, with much enthousiasm and delight.

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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 4, 2016 19:58:40 GMT

Quote

Post by Deleted on Jul 4, 2016 19:58:40 GMT

Early modern cast steel in crucibles began in fashion during the 18th century. There are pictures about showing spent crucibles stacked up likes so many logs of wood. Basically refining blister steel. It is Bessemer in the 1850 that produced his furnaces and large crucibles. Scandinavia was doing this on a lesser scale than what England started up. One way to spot the early blades is a very frosty look. Cast steel was also developing in the USA (see Pettibone, cast steel and patent). My Woolley-Deakin eagle pommel has one such blade.

I kind of hate Wiki but there are pictures there
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crucible_steel

A good read relating to large scale industrial steel production during the 19th century is entitled "The Arms of Krupp"

Modern steel is a continuation of massive crucible steelworks.

Re: Pipe backs and quills, it is pipe back and quill point (the quill a result of the pipe ending at the point below a yelman/back edge).

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My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres. Jul 4, 2016 20:14:27 GMT

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Post by Deleted on Jul 4, 2016 20:14:27 GMT

Today's image files are troublesome for dial-up and even the slower broadband services. Your images shown are often more than 1mb. Lump together many in a thread and it can take a long time for some. The forum also has to resize the image to fit (open in a different tab for the full size picture).

There are many image sizer/compression tools to allow even large (dimensionally) images to be of much less data. This one can run full time on a desktop.
www.shrinkpictures.com/

With even cell phone cameras capturing plus 1mb pictures, more and more upload sites also offer image sizing and compression for email/forums/etc.

Last Edit: Jul 4, 2016 20:15:19 GMT by Deleted

My Imperial Prussian KS52 and M1879 Cavalry Sabres.

Post by Uhlan on Jul 2, 2016 19:56:26 GMT

Post by Dave Kelly on Jul 2, 2016 20:20:28 GMT

Post by darth on Jul 2, 2016 20:39:34 GMT

Post by darth on Jul 2, 2016 20:40:17 GMT

Post by Uhlan on Jul 2, 2016 21:32:48 GMT

Post by irondog on Jul 2, 2016 23:16:22 GMT

Post by Uhlan on Jul 3, 2016 7:27:54 GMT

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Post by Uhlan on Jul 3, 2016 10:11:18 GMT

Post by darth on Jul 3, 2016 14:05:16 GMT

Post by pgandy on Jul 3, 2016 14:53:37 GMT

Post by Uhlan on Jul 3, 2016 17:10:08 GMT

Post by Dave Kelly on Jul 3, 2016 21:29:14 GMT

Post by Uhlan on Jul 4, 2016 5:22:28 GMT

Post by Scott on Jul 4, 2016 7:25:24 GMT

Post by Uhlan on Jul 4, 2016 12:12:02 GMT

Post by pgandy on Jul 4, 2016 15:17:16 GMT

Post by Uhlan on Jul 4, 2016 17:55:27 GMT

Post by Deleted on Jul 4, 2016 19:58:40 GMT

Post by Deleted on Jul 4, 2016 20:14:27 GMT

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