george trotter

Hi Mike, From memory it looks like you have a stainless steel showato blade, made for the Navy by INABA. The little stamp on top is his and the three "script" characters say I- Na - Ba. I think his full swordsmith name was Inaba Kaneyoshi? members here know more than me on these swords so they will correct me if I am mistaken. Regards,

Thanks for that info Brian...if you learn any more about the Smutts numbers, please pass it on to me. Great stuff, very helpful. Thanks.

Thanks Brian, that is helpful. Jan Smuts was certainly in positions of power during the acquisition of this revolver by Ida (nee Hornby) who is said to have carried it in SA as a young woman when she was 'out and about' on horseback or in a trap. She brought it with her when she came to WA in 1907 and it was her personal/house revolver while on the land c.1910-1938. Just one more favour if you can manage it...can you ask your SA gun mates if they have any more detail about the the Z number?...reason...province/district etc/ date? I have seen half a dozen of these, and ALL have been 'Z'...all from one province? Interesting, regards,

Yes, that is correct Brian. There were still a lot of these cadet rifles around when I was a kid. Just a South Africa question Brian... That little revolver has a serial number, but (like some other South African owned firearms I have seen), has an extra number punched on the frame (in photo this is Z7325). Do you know what these "Z' numbers are Brian? Maybe Z = Zuid Afrika?. Maybe you have seen them also? Just wondering... Regards,

Hi Chris, Yes, amazing indeed. I know this is a nihonto board, but I couldn't resist adding to Dave's post....in fact, the same family gave me their mother's settler revolver also. Women back then often carried arms when driving wagons or were passengers in coaches...this is a little Belgian Francotte revolver cal 297/230 which is about 22 cal but with a more powerful charge. (this was a common cadet rifle round in the British Empire 1890-1930). The owner was Ida Borstel, married to the soldier Sgt Dick Borstel in the pic (standing rear middle). She was born Natal South Africa 1881 and came to Western Australia 1907. She married Mr Borstel in 1923 and they were rural settlers. The Hood and Borstel families intermarried. (sorry for this Brian)... Regards,

Ah Dave...memories eh. Here is my own little kukri that was given to me by a local family. The kukri was a gift to this Aussie soldier (ambulanceman in pic) from a wounded Nepalese Gurkha whom he saved after their attack on the Turkish lines on Sari Bair hill, Gallipoli, Aug. 1915. The 6th Gurkhas were the only allies who reached the top of the hill (the Aussies and Kiwis being shot to pieces) and when the RN warships out at sea saw movement on the hilltop, thinking they were Turks, shelled them off again. Thus our Aussie medics had to go in and bring out the wounded. This Gurkha gave this kukri to Staff/Sgt Alex Hood (standing rear left) as a "thank you" for getting him out. This is probably the only identified kukri to come back from Gallipoli? Regards,

Maybe if you showed us a pic of the mei we could determine the smith and his date of working, then we could help more with the date

Hi Phil, WWII Sowato blade. 2 character mei is TAKEHISA 6 character date is SHOWA JU HACHI NEN HARU = Spring, 18th year of Showa =1943 probably same guy signed/dated blade. If there a smal W stamped on the tang somewhere it usually is a arsenal / workshop stamp...not sure which. Regards,

The signature says "Seki Taniguchi Yoshikane saku" Seki (town), Taniguchi (family name) Yoshikane (smith's art name) made (translation) Resident of Seki town, Mr Taniguchi Yoshikane, made this. As said, a nice example. Regards,

Oh, good. Thanks for that clarification Bruce. I've been busy elsewhere for a few days, so nice to come back to your up-date. I agree with Stephen, the quotes (without clarification) could lead to confusion. While Kuniie was certainly an inspector, there must have been others - an RJT study Gunto Kumia Shimatsu (Gunto Assoc. Management) Rikugun Jumei Tosho no Shuen (The World of the RJT) pub. 1994 by Aizu Bunkazai Chosa Kenkyu Kai in Fukushima shows that the average RJT smith made an average of 10 swords per month (...that means c.370 RJT smiths would make 3700 per month...you would need more than one inspector to check these out to RJT standards.).. Over the years we have accumulated evidence of the stringent rules for making, signing, dating, testing,, stamping etc, etc. While it is possible to come across a RJT blade with the odd 'quirk' in one of these rules, (and I think Bazza has said he's seen RJT with kizu), I think we are pretty sure of the high standards of the RJT system to feel comfortable that an RJT blade is high standard gendaito....whether we like that particular blade or not is a personal taste matter. So, I think we are safe to say that RJT blades were made to high requirements out of tamahagane, pine charcoal and water quenching and are in fact the upper level of the last nihonto made for battlefield use (i.e. not art...although some are very high quality artistic pieces). What we really need is for some of our upper level members to pester the Japanese sword authors to write the "book" on RJT swords/smiths/history......we who respect and collect RJT work really need a good archive sourced, un-arguable book on the actual history of RJT. (Brian...please get our people on to this...Stephen and I are getting older...). Regards,

Gawd...imagine if CNN gets hold of this quote....it will mean the end of RJT collecting! I think this is something we should investigate. Maybe Chris Bowen and some others who knew some of these smiths and how the system worked etc should be asked about it. My keyboard finger is trembling, I think I will have to go out on the verandah for a nerve-settling rum and Coke!!!

Thank you for that Bruce. Are you saying that Leon Kapp polished this sword or that this is a correspondence between his polisher and Leon Kapp? I thank you for sharing...very interesting. Speaking as a RJT collector this is very satisfying. A nice piece of work. Firstly, it verifies the quality of RJT swords, RJT tamahagane and RJT smith's talent. Secondly, that there are still some polishers out there that can polish in sashikomi. Great stuff Bruce.

Might be my old eyes, but those pics seem to show Naomasa number Ma 554? (but yes, might also be 664?

You beat me to it Bruce. So Rob. These kana are usually used to make the sounds of foreign words....kanji and hiragana being used for Japanese. RJT and other military tangs and mounting fittings are often seen with various marks and numbers and the Type 3 I've seen have often had a katakana and a number. Yours has what I think is "a"1435 (as in A number, B number, C number etc., for us). Regards,

Bruce, I must have missed this conversation, but maybe I can add to it now....not sure if this will help. Here are two post - 1942 blades by the Tsukamoto brothers Both RJT. 1. is Okimasa, worked in Tokyo. 1943 made,. No star but definitely nihonto (papered). 2. is Masakazu, worked in Fukushima. I think this once belonged to Chris Bowen...made 1945, no star but definitely nihonto (Chris wouldn't buy showato). I think that the main point about RJT smith work post 1942 but no star is just that these are private order blades IMO. Hope this helps.

That is a logo with the character SHI (city) at the top.(can also be read ICHI (market place)). The written character on the wood near the hole is MIGI (right). There seems to be another box with characters inside on the 'door'...want to zoom in on that?

The characters above the handle look like the name Ozawa. The others I can't see properly. Regards,

Bruceie boy...look at post #39 above....we were talking about vajo's post of "Informations about Rjt' - ref your post #11 where you quote Chris Bowen quoting Enomoto Sadayoshi about travelling inspectors and work outside and inside arsenals. It's OK mate, we all have "memory" days. Regards, Edit to add: Speaking of Enomoto Sadayoshi --- on the matter of RJT production statistics, there is a mention in Tsuchiko "New Generation of Japanese S/smiths" p.161 that quotes RJT smith Enomoto Sadayoshi as saying that under the RJT quota scheme a swordsmith had to to supply "more than ten swords every month". This seems to fit the statistics I have for my RJT smith Tsukamoto Masakazu who supplied 62 swords to the RJT scheme for the 6 months 14/8/1944 - 25/2/1945 and his brother (Tsukamoto) Kasama Kiyokazu supplied 59 for the same period. Hope this is useful info...

Small world indeed...

that character looks like the katakana (phonetic) sound 'a' as in Australia

Update on Koriyama. Hi Moriyama san, Using your 1946-1952 Koriyama-shi map I did some searching with google maps and have found the Amidacho 1 and Yatsuhashi 6 and 10 sites. The trouble is that towards the end of the wat there were 3 major air-raids against Koriyama and much damage was done by fire, Searching at street level using google I have to say that none of these buildings survived, they are all modern...bad luck. Also, about your question of which was the house and which was the workshop, I can say this...reading my 1942 book on the Tsukamoto RJT brothers Masakazu and Kiyokazu of Koriyama, the book of 1942 shows both brothers at both addresses, both at Amidacho 1 and both at Yatsuhashi 6. My Fukushima RJT study book of 1994 shows that in March 1944 Masakazu is in Yatsuhashi 10 and Kiyoakazu is still in Yatsuhashi 6. From this, it is hard to say which is a house and which is the workshop...maybe all were workshops?, but I "think" Yatsuhashi was the workshop/railway/industrial zone then, not houses. As we can no longer see the original buildings, we just cannot know. I did discover that Masakazu, when he died in 1969 had his memorial service at the Shinto Shrine Shimizudai cho (or machi?) Zendotera (or dera?), and he was "buried" there (Shimizudai is a few miles SW from Yatsuhashi, in the countryside). Regards,

Great, thank you. I promise that if I find any new info, I will post it here. You are a great help to us in the Gendaito world. Regards,

That map is a great find! I checked your old map against a modern one and and can see the places match up well, even the area names are thye same looks like the main street called Motomachi is how the suburb name got changed). Just a couple of things: I can find Yatsuhashi 6 and 10, but for Amidachio I can see several 1s....which one is it (can you mark the map)? Also, can I ask you to post a copy of that old map but without the blue circles please? I would love that map for my Masakazu file. As for your question about living at Yatsuya 6 and 10 and working at Amidacho 1...you could be right...it does not make it clear in the 3 books I have...I just thought that because Masakazu had #6 and then #10 (and his brother Kiyokazu moved into #6 when Masakazu moved into #10), that 6 and 10 were workshops in that Yatshashi railway workshop building. I suppose I am just thinking this...no proof really. Now that you have found "old" evidence...I will have to re-think My facts. Thank you for your help here Moriyama san, I really am pleased.

Maybe. I sold it about 1982...and I know that the collection it went into was later dispersed "all over the world". They do look very close don't they...The old oshigata has: Machi okuri, blade length 66.0 cm, nakago length 19.0 cm - one ana. I noted then: Kaneharu was a tudent of Miyamoto Kanenori and Kasama Shigetsugu.. Just for the owner I can add what I had noted about the inscription - can be pronounced: Zo Fukui Kei or Fukui Kei o okuru Feel free to correct me (it was 40 years ago...)

Here is one I had about 40 years ago. Maybe these two are 2 of 3 he made for a private order? Minamoto Kaneharu saku Zo Fukui Kei Mine was in Kyu fittings that had been crudely altered to become Type 37 Navy. Regards