I'll take your word about the pic.
However, remember that this was taken during WWI, when the exigencies of *massively* increasing the size of the US Army in a short period of time meant that not every unit could be up-to-date.
Consider the famous .45 automatic. It was the standard sidearm but there were not near enough of them avail to equip everyone.
What I would really like to find is a pic of the old sabre & one of the new one.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On Mon, 5/1/17, Fred Kiesche <xxxxxx@gmail.com> wrote:
Subject: Re: Patton's sword & belaying pin, was Re: [TML] What if the cutlass is not a cutlass?
To: xxxxxx@simplelists.com
Date: Monday, May 1, 2017, 2:23 PM
Well, it appears
that my attempt at showing history with a picture dud not
work, so here's my text:
"My
mother has my (paternal) grandfather's US Cav sword,
which we can see him holding (from the front) in a 1918
picture of his unit. It is curved, not straight. I'll
try embedding the image below (not sure if the list will
accept that?) (He is fourth from the
left)."
On Mon, May 1, 2017 at
15:36 Phil Pugliese (via tml list) <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
wrote:
--------------------------------------------
On Mon, 5/1/17, Bruce Johnson <xxxxxx@Pharmacy.Arizona.EDU>
wrote:
Subject: Re: [TML] What if the cutlass is not a
cutlass?
To: "xxxxxx@simplelists.com"
<xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
Date: Monday, May 1, 2017, 9:50 AM
[Lot's of good stuff snipped]
Swords designed to be used
from horseback, for example, tend to all look alike:
curved
blades designed for slashing in an arc without the tip
hanging up to dislodge the rider, long enough to reach
a
foot soldier alongside a horse, short enough to be easy
to
wield from the saddle one handed.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I recall reading somewhere that Patton, while still a jr
officer & after he competed in the Olympics, managed to
get himself assigned to the project to design a new cavalry
sword for the US Army. I also recall it was before WWI.
Anyway, I remember the new sword was described as "a
straight sword intended for chopping instead of
slashing"<sic> which surprised me as I was
accustomed to the sort of saber seen on most old westerns.
Now that I'm thinking about it, I also recall reading an
article about the army that Gustavus Adolphus brought into
the Thirty-Years War. As I remember his cavalry was
distinguished by using a straight 'chopping'
sword.
-------------------------
[More snipping]
--------------------------
Famously the cutlass was
designed to be used by inexperienced sailors in close
quarters; in truth, hatchets and short axes were used
almost
as frequently, as those were very common tools aboard a
wooden ship (thus multiple use devices), and are as easy
to
wield (probably easier, since they get used a lot, so
there’s muscle memory.)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Heck even the good ol' belaying pin would come in handy
during a boarding melee"
As my (retired vet) Dad used to say;
"hit'em on top of his head so hard he'll have
three tongues in his shoes!"
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There isn’t ‘one true sword design’.
Frankly the imperial
'cutlass’ probably looks as much like this <http://www.leevalley.com/us/garden/page.aspx?p=65248&cat=2,45794>
as anything else.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Hey! You've just discovered the KTLSS (commonly referred
to as a 'cutlass').
The standard boarding weapon of the Imperial
Marines.
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F.P. Kiesche
III Husband, Father, Good Cook.
Reader. Keeper of abandoned dogs. Catholic Liberal
Conservative Militarist. Does not fit into a neat box or
category. "Ah Mr. Gibbon, another damned, fat, square
book. Always, scribble, scribble, scribble, eh?" (The
Duke of Gloucester, on being presented with Volume 2 of The
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.) Blogging at Bernal
Alpha. On Twitter as @FredKiesche
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