Naval Caribbean rapier

[midelburgo]

9pm

Originally Posted by Jim McDougall

This really is an interesting topic, and in support of what Midelburgo suggests, toward the case of Spanish naval fleets, from William Gilkerson (1991, "Boarders Away" p.19) ,
"...fleets were commanded largely by soldiers, and its ships were equipped largely with land service small arms right into the 19th c. Hence, while the Spanish navy was hugely important to the geopolitics of the period and to the maintenance of the Spanish colonial empire, its weaponry was as obsolete as its organization. Indeed in all the vast chambers of Madrid's Museo Navale, it is difficult to find a small arm of specifically naval origin from the period of our study".

An example of the form of French hanger is found in "Swords and Blades of the American Revolution", George Neumann, 1973, p.79, 54.S.
It is captioned as c. 1725-50 brass hilt, blade 27 3/4" single or double edge straight, and for French grenadiers.

As noted, with lack of foundries for brass work and of course munitions grade arms, during the War of Spanish Succession with France allied with Castilian Spain it seems reasonable that St.Etienne weapons would be supplied.
While Nuemann suggests the 1725 as the terminus post quem for the 'pattern' it is likely these were around notably prior.

With Spanish soldiers aboard vessels, these munitions grade weapons as seen were certainly not unusual though not specifically 'naval'. The examples of rapiers typically deemed 'Caribbean; versions of the more refined Spanish cuphilts, were probably used by officers in command of these military units which were aboard these vessels. They may have been produced in the colonial ports or by armorers in the ports in the Peninsula.

I am currently discovering many a publication that has taken place from the academic side in recent years. All the burocratic account are there, but very few used them until now. This is giving a new image.

Spain had a huge utilitarian small weapon production. It is similar to what happened with the iron cannon from La Cavada ironworks. Those guns are everywhere across America fortifications. They were cheap, ugly and unmarked. And functioned well when their carriages were not rotten and their crews were paid.

In relation with the ARRIVILLAGA cavalry sword. Tolosa produced 1500-2000 swords a month for a century. We are used (I was at least) to think of a dominating Toledo production that declined in the second half of XVII century, then was substituted by Solingen production, until the new Toledo factory restarted in 1761. But now it seems it was more complex.

A Royal Factory was stablished in 1596 in Eugui, near Pamplona with a couple of dozens of Milan armourers, swordsmiths and cannonball founders.

Armour making and swordsmithy, (and the surviving milanese and their descendance) were moved to Tolosa in 1630. Nearby Plasencia made some 20000 muskets a year. With the Louis XIV wars their activity increased.

In the war of the Spanish succession (1700-1714) a weaponry conglomerate was expanded in Cataluña for the archiduke Charles side, swords were made in Barcelona, using Austrian models (and know-how, I suppose), and this included brass foundry. Probably brass use was already foundry in place for pieces of fireweapons.

For the Felipe V faction about 25-30% of the weapon needs were suplied by the French (those solid brass hilts were made up to 1730).

In 1715, just after the war finished, Felipe V started planning the recovery of the lost possesions in Italy, so the Barcelona weapon making center was expanded.

For a while both centers continued producing weaponry at full speed. Swords could have their blades made in Tolosa or Barcelona. If the hilts were iron they were made in Durango. If brass, in Barcelona. The French weapons from the war, were slowly recicled.

Somehow, Tolosa stopped working as a Royal Factory in 1721. Then they had the asiento system for a while. I suspect the ARRIVILLAGA swords belong to a contract from 1734. But this did not worked well.

Solingen contracts filled the gaps when Barcelona of Tolosa were not enough.

Toledo started producing blades in 1761, but it was secondary to Barcelona, at least until the new building was made in 1781. Brass hilts were made in Barcelona and moved to Toledo. Iron hilts continued being made in Durango.

As the Toledo Royal Factory started winning track, Barcelona was given less and less asiento contracts. Tolosa was completely forgotten by then, although Eibar started making hilts (brass and iron) in the 1790s and blades in 1815.

To give you an idea of the mess that has arrived to us, take swords 168, 170, 193 and 194 from Brinckerhof's book. Currently I believe, they started life as dragon sabers before 1767. They had brass hilts and both, hilt and blade were made in Barcelona. When a new model of dragoon swords became straight, the hilts were repurposed for infantry swords and many blades were shortened, and others were sent to America. The next dragoon model had a straight, one edge blade (from Toledo and dated between 1769 and 1777). It seems these blades were also sent to America with the adoption of another dragoon model with two edges. Brinckerhof also shows one with date 1776. You can find them often with XIXth century hilts (In Peru, Mexico, Argentina, USA) but they are rare in Spain. I have only seen once, in relic condition, one with its original (Barcelona) hilt. No museum has them. Although the hilts can be found in grenadier swords, still in Spain, and the blades in many places in America.

In plate 166, Brinckerhof shows some of the 44 unmounted cavalry blades found as a hoard in Louisiana. They had become outdated by a new line cavalry model in 1803, and a little later, Spain gave Louisiana to France. So they did no have the time to put hilts to them!