Napoleonic saber-Naval ?

[Radboud]

On reflection, I think it is telling just how few presentation or exceptionally high quality swords we see of the 1796 Pattern infantry / heavy cavalry officers (dress) type.

To my thinking it illustrates how popular, sabres were as exotic swords that represented wealth and fashion in that period. Unfortunately, this means that it is difficult to apply rules of thumb to them. Cavalry sabres typically had a blade length of 84 - 86cm while an infantry officer would normally favour 76 to 81cm.

But light cavalry officers often had a dress (and possibly full dress) sword that could be lighter and shorter.

Infantry officers had gilded hilts, while cavalry officers swords had steel hilts. Except there exist steel hilted sabres with province to The Rifles brigades and regulations for heavy cavalry dress swords with gilded hilts.

Mameluke sabres were worn as regimental dress swords before they became officially recognised in 1822 which is another example of British regiments being quite happy to ‘do their own thing’. And then there was the ‘home front’ who invented their own uniforms and ‘regulations’. During that era 1 in 4 men were in ‘military service’, many of them in militia, volunteer and yeomanry units. The yeomanry especially, were men of wealth that had an image to uphold.

To my mind, there can be no doubt that British cavalry officers (including the Yeomanry) of sufficient wealth could have carried a stirrup hilted, 1796 style sabre with an ivory hilt. Such a sword would most likely have been carried as part of their dress or full dress uniform.

Alas without something to tie a specific sword to any one branch of service or unit / troop (such as regimental markings or iconography) there is no way to know for certain.

Here we have a nice picture of British cavalry officers from 1806 showing a large variety of different swords and scabbards. We see 1796 types with various curvature and length, mamelukes, steel and leather scabbards with steel or gilt fittings. Unfortunately not all hilts are shown and the only ivory I can spot is on the mamelukes.

[Jim McDougall]

Well said, those dress swords of the infantry and cavalry for officers, which were more of a 'heavy' version of civilian small sword type hilts, were not held in particularly high esteem by officers.

As you note, the saber was seen in the flamboyant (=exotic) hues of the 'hussar phenomenon' of Europe with the introduction of the 1796 pattern stirrup hilt for light cavalry. While this was the first 'regulation' pattern , however the so called M1788 had been in use already by light cavalry.

With this being the case, the saber was of course more attractive as carrying the highly fashionable 'hussar' image. The 'exotic' flair of these sabers, as previously noted, was not lost on naval officers, who though not cavalry, still had their own image to embellish.

With the British M1796 light cavalry stirrup hilt saber, there seem to have been numbers of variations overall. With those for troopers it seems that in some degree there were slight deviations with makers, possibly by their own takes on certain elements but still in the general image of the form.
I recall in my early days of collecting British patterns, there were a number of us trying to assemble the variant exemplars on the British M1796 light cavalry
sabers, as there was distinctly a spectrum of them.
It was obviously far more so with officers sabers, as we have noted.

As can be seen in this great illustration, it was all quite a fashion show, so as you say, without distinct provenance or markings, what officers whim and what military, yeomanry or other unit he was in....it is anybodys guess, but clearly a Georgian or Regency period example.

[Radboud]

Unfortunately, I don't have any ivory hilted 1796 style sabres in my collection, but here are some examples I've previously come across on the web:

Probable Light Cavalry Officers frock (dress) sabre. Overall length 92cm blade length 78cm.


1796 Style sabre, this one is etched with cavalryman on the blade:



Another like it with an 82.5cm blade:


Another probable Frock sword with 71cm blade:


Another, overall length is 93cm, the palm frond engraving on the grip is interesting as it's also seen on Hussar Mamelukes. A possible connection?



Another, possible Yeomanry sabre with 83cm blade:



As you can see, the type isn't that uncommon. Plus I've deliberately left out the ones with lions head pommels and embellished langets....

[Jim McDougall]

As they say here in Texas, 'well,....there ya go!" !!
Stunning examples, and perfectly illustrating cavalry examples with ivory hilts.

The one with the deeply curved blade, rifle company?

[Radboud]

Originally Posted by Jim McDougall

The one with the deeply curved blade, rifle company?

This is one of those grey areas. The steel scabbard would be more typical for a cavalry officer as it is harder wearing for when mounted. Leather is lighter and makes less noise when walking about. The blade is short at 71cm (28 inches), not suited to mounted combat. But I've seen dress swords with steel scabbards as well.

But then an officer that could afford an ivory-hilted sword is equally likely to be mounted regardless of service, it's anyone's guess really.

Given that the British had only three (four?) Rifles Regiments in the regular army at the time, I would say on the balance of probabilities that it belonged to a Cavalry Officer.

[Jim McDougall]

So with that example with dramatic curved blade, then this one which is of course not with ivory grip etc, I have always thought was an officers, is likely cavalry ?
I got this back in those days trying to assemble M1796 anomalies, and it was actually included in an article by the Danish Arms & Armor Society on that topic over 20 years ago. I need to find that article in old notes.

I had seen rifle company or flank company M1803 sabers with these kinds of dramatically curved blades so thought perhaps this was one of that category.
I'd rather it was cavalry per my own fields of 'collecting' though.
But again....who knows?

What was interesting with this one is the pipe back on what is essentially a Persian 'shamshir' type blade. I know that when Osborn was considering options in developing the M1796, he was looking at various types of swords and features which included Indian tulwars and others according to some references. Also what I thought was odd, is the strangely canted hilt, a feature which brought to mind certain Caucasian sabers, to add to the 'exotic' features that seem to have been applied to the sabers of this period.

In the latter 18th into 19th c. it seems there were a number of anomalous British cavalry swords, if I recall one had a yataghan type blade; and some (which I think were East India Company associated) had a blade with stepped point (yelman) as seen on Indian tulwars often.