British saber believed of Papal Army volunteers

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by fernando

Jim, this is your sword; you sure know it better than anyone else. But, is it my cataract eyes or there are more letters than the three CSA mentioned ? .


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More to my terrible photography, and when the opportunity comes, I will get a more efficient image.
As noted, this dilemma has been discussed and looked into by many authoritarian figures over the years, in one instance this langet and markings published in a well known arms magazine.
There is no doubt, the characters are as described:
CsA
4
43

The Cs...the s is in superscript, small letter above the line.
Castel sant Angelo

The 4 it seems is some sort of perhaps unit denomination, but in a wildly tenuous note, the armory in the Castel sant Angelo is on the 4th floor.
Admittedly probably not anything, but noted just the same.

In some research years ago, there seemed some possibility of this having to do with a segment of the units in the volunteer battalions. Again, pure speculation with research wanting.

The 43 then is most likely of course a rack number.

British military markings on swords often followed similar configurations in early 19th century.

The fact that this is what was then an obsolete pattern, these were sold off in huge numbers, as well as distributed to yeomanry units, so in either case may have ended up as sold off supply, or acquired by the volunteers who elected to go to protect the Vatican. From what I have understood, these were Catholic veterans not only from Ireland, but other countries as well.