Smallsword hilted Spadroon

[kisak]

Originally Posted by Norman McCormick

Hi,
If anyone has any photographs or illustrations of a similar set up to the one in these photos I would be really interested to see them.

In case it helps, I see infantry officer's swords with "smallsword style" hilts and spadroon blades every now and then here in Sweden. The hilt here doesn't really look like the Swedish fashion though. The earliest example of one with a spadroon blade I could find in Berg's book was from 1830, though there's a cavalry officer's sword (different hilt) with a similar blade from 1810, and the style remains in use to ca 1860. The example in the white-background picture here is ca 1850.

The practice of officer's swords with these "smallsword like" hilts goes back to the late 17th century in Sweden, originally as swords for officer's in general, but it quickly (ca 1720) became somethign just for the infantry, since the cavalry already had their own distinctive hilt. The blades mated with these hilts, and the overall size of the swords, goes from smallswords to full sized cavalry swords. I'm attaching a picture form the Army Museum in Stockholm showing a few examples, the spadroon-bladed one (second form the bottom) is ca 1840.