Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post - The lowly (?) briquet, a story of resolution

Jim McDougall · 5th October 2020, 05:28 PM

LOL, well Fernando, you know we have had a stubbornness for many, many years now and quite complete

But thats how we learn. If everybody agreed on everything, how much testing would get done?

Thank you for this translation, which surely does eliminate this 'briquet' from being French. Could it be British ????

I found another book by Wilkinson-Latham, "British Cut & Thrust Weapons", 1971. In this (plate 28), there is another photo of the 'foot artillery hanger' but here it is captioned c.1830.
In this book, there is little text (p.27) but here the descriptions are deeply flawed, "...foot artillery privates, later to be known as 'gunners' were armed with a brass hilted hanger (but here is the rub, it notes plate 27 and 28.....plate 27 is an 1751 infantry hanger!!! nothing to do with artillery!).........which remained their defensive weapon until 1853".

The photo of the 'briquet' in this 1971 book seems virtually identical to the example he shows in his 1966 book (as plate 66) and which has the same identification as foot artillery gunners sword, but states c. 1814.

I then thought to check photo credits, and while in the 1966 book none are shown, but 1971 does, and states 'authors collection'. In the 1971 photo, there is no mention of the possible 'Trotter' affiliation but the sword appears to be the same one.

Going back to the 1966 "British Military Swords" introduction, I felt a most familiar and personally connected description in many ways like my own beginning in collecting which began with British swords as well, and ironically in the year this book was published.

He describes his being fourth generation of the family of Wilkinson Sword Co. and how he acquired a copy of "Sword, Lance and Bayonet" (Ffoulkes & Hopkinson), in the late 1930s just after it was published. He describes his difficulties in collecting as there were many anomalies not covered in this book, which began his own book decades later from his research.

Here he makes a key observation, " ...I would sound a cautionary note on the subject of military effigies, paintings and prints, where I have noticed a tendency to present the subject with the sword hilt not visible. When the hilt is seen, however, full use is made of 'artistic license'".

In his acknowledgements he thanks A. Kennard and W. Reid of the Tower of London; Col. Appleby of the National Army Museum; Capt. Laing of United Services Institution and Commander W.E. May of the National Maritime Museum. He also relied greatly on the huge corpus of notes and records of his father and grandfather's.

While these findings from my original sources for my classification of my briquet clearly present concerns, I wanted to present them here in good faith for the benefit of all of us participating in this discussion.

Obviously Wilkinson'Latham's first and subsequent books are the result of him cataloguing his own collection and trying to present sound references for future collectors and scholars. The eminent panel listed as his consultants are but a few of those he was in touch with on a regular basis, so we must believe that the identification of this sword was soundly familiar.

Wilkinson-Latham, as an ardent collector and research his entire life, would seem likely to have abridged any error or misidentification of the weapons he spent his life researching. The fact that he presented the 'briquet' shown in his first book of 1966 (compiled in over 30 years of research) and then again in 1971, suggests that he felt the classification was correct. It is interesting that his dating moved from 1814 to 1830, which suggests these had remained is use for some time.

His reluctance to place high value on paintings and art work make me wonder if perhaps he knew the Dighton and Hamilton-Smith paintings but did not accept the 'Spanish pattern' type artillery swords as necessarily valid.

There remains the illustration of the briquet as British artillery gunners sword in the late Claude Blair's "European and American Arms" (1962), which was certainly well known to Wilkinson-Latham as well as the author himself. If there would have been disagreement on this, it surely would have been corrected after the publication of the 1966 book. All of these men who were among a very close community of arms scholars and authors were constantly in communication together, as I learned in many years as a member of the Arms & Armour Society in London .

Now, the business with the PS marking and Paul Storr is a much deeper well, and of course, to be continued.

5th October 2020, 05:28 PM	#65
Jim McDougall Arms Historian Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Route 66 Posts: 9,739	LOL, well Fernando, you know we have had a stubbornness for many, many years now and quite complete But thats how we learn. If everybody agreed on everything, how much testing would get done? Thank you for this translation, which surely does eliminate this 'briquet' from being French. Could it be British ???? I found another book by Wilkinson-Latham, "British Cut & Thrust Weapons", 1971. In this (plate 28), there is another photo of the 'foot artillery hanger' but here it is captioned c.1830. In this book, there is little text (p.27) but here the descriptions are deeply flawed, "...foot artillery privates, later to be known as 'gunners' were armed with a brass hilted hanger (but here is the rub, it notes plate 27 and 28.....plate 27 is an 1751 infantry hanger!!! nothing to do with artillery!).........which remained their defensive weapon until 1853". The photo of the 'briquet' in this 1971 book seems virtually identical to the example he shows in his 1966 book (as plate 66) and which has the same identification as foot artillery gunners sword, but states c. 1814. I then thought to check photo credits, and while in the 1966 book none are shown, but 1971 does, and states 'authors collection'. In the 1971 photo, there is no mention of the possible 'Trotter' affiliation but the sword appears to be the same one. Going back to the 1966 "British Military Swords" introduction, I felt a most familiar and personally connected description in many ways like my own beginning in collecting which began with British swords as well, and ironically in the year this book was published. He describes his being fourth generation of the family of Wilkinson Sword Co. and how he acquired a copy of "Sword, Lance and Bayonet" (Ffoulkes & Hopkinson), in the late 1930s just after it was published. He describes his difficulties in collecting as there were many anomalies not covered in this book, which began his own book decades later from his research. Here he makes a key observation, " ...I would sound a cautionary note on the subject of military effigies, paintings and prints, where I have noticed a tendency to present the subject with the sword hilt not visible. When the hilt is seen, however, full use is made of 'artistic license'". In his acknowledgements he thanks A. Kennard and W. Reid of the Tower of London; Col. Appleby of the National Army Museum; Capt. Laing of United Services Institution and Commander W.E. May of the National Maritime Museum. He also relied greatly on the huge corpus of notes and records of his father and grandfather's. While these findings from my original sources for my classification of my briquet clearly present concerns, I wanted to present them here in good faith for the benefit of all of us participating in this discussion. Obviously Wilkinson'Latham's first and subsequent books are the result of him cataloguing his own collection and trying to present sound references for future collectors and scholars. The eminent panel listed as his consultants are but a few of those he was in touch with on a regular basis, so we must believe that the identification of this sword was soundly familiar. Wilkinson-Latham, as an ardent collector and research his entire life, would seem likely to have abridged any error or misidentification of the weapons he spent his life researching. The fact that he presented the 'briquet' shown in his first book of 1966 (compiled in over 30 years of research) and then again in 1971, suggests that he felt the classification was correct. It is interesting that his dating moved from 1814 to 1830, which suggests these had remained is use for some time. His reluctance to place high value on paintings and art work make me wonder if perhaps he knew the Dighton and Hamilton-Smith paintings but did not accept the 'Spanish pattern' type artillery swords as necessarily valid. There remains the illustration of the briquet as British artillery gunners sword in the late Claude Blair's "European and American Arms" (1962), which was certainly well known to Wilkinson-Latham as well as the author himself. If there would have been disagreement on this, it surely would have been corrected after the publication of the 1966 book. All of these men who were among a very close community of arms scholars and authors were constantly in communication together, as I learned in many years as a member of the Arms & Armour Society in London . Now, the business with the PS marking and Paul Storr is a much deeper well, and of course, to be continued.