[kronckew]

the axe & spike on boarding axes was mainly for clearing wooden wreckage from battle damage, the spike being used like a logger's picaroon... also a handy weapon if you were being boarded, or boarding the enemy and needing to break thru doors and barricades. the french used a similar boarding axe, but the langets were not integral, and were mounted fore and aft instead of side to side like the english one shown. the cutlass and pike were preferred weapons tho as the axe took a big man to weild effectively.

these are the forerunners of the fireman's axe, initially very much like these boarding axes, and still used today, but developing into the more mundain fire axe used by most fire crews and found behind glass in public places. the spike used again for hooking debris and breaking thru barriers. UK use a smaller hand axe, more of a hatchet or tomahawk, which leads us back to the americas, where the spike tomahawk was a favoured weapon.

1. french boarding axe. (not mine - yet.
2. maine style picaroon.
3. std. red fire axe.
4. UK fireman's axe (hatchet) - mine.
5. same as 4 in hand for scale.
6. my spike tomahawk made from a railroad spike. the ultimate spike axe.