On a sword of probable Crimean War provenance, and the implications it carries for the use of piquet weight swords in warfare
A few months ago, I was lucky enough to get my hands on a sword that passed at auction, having seen it and inquired after it as I recognised the crest on the blade. After a long delay due to the coronavirus lockdown, I was in touch with the seller, and a few days later I had the sword in hand. I was fairly surprised to discover that it was a piquet weight as this was unexpected given the probable details I had pieced together about this sword before the arrival. I now believe that it constitutes strong evidence that piquet weight swords were (at least very rarely) on occasion actively chosen as the primary melee weapon of an officer.
First, the probable owner of the sword.
The crest is that of the Templeman family.
During the period from which the sword most likely comes (1845 – 1855) there were four officers by the name of Templeman in the British army, who shall be detailed as follows:
Thomas Templeman, Gent, Ensign 1st December 1848, 98th Foot, deceased 2nd April 1850 (in Bengal? The 98th Foot was one of the first British regiments to serve on the North West Frontier, spending 1849 – 1851 in and around the Kohat Pass area. The governor-general of India, had instructed Sir Colin Campbell to take the 98th on a series of punitive raids against Pathan tribesmen, in order to force them to pay taxes levied by the East India Company, but Campbell refused and was forced to resign and return to England. By 1851 the regiment had been abroad for a total of nine years and in that time it had suffered over 1,100 deaths, mostly from sickness, with almost 200 invalided home. The last three years of the posting were spent in Calcutta before the regiment returned to England in 1855. Information pulled from the Wikipedia article on the 98th Regiment of Foot)
John Whitmarsh Templeman, Gent, Second Lieutenant, 5th Foot, 17th January 1851. (5th Foot, Second Lieutenant G-. H. J. M. Chapman to be Lieutenant, without purchase, vice Templeman, whose promotion, without purchase, on the 6th June, 1854, has been cancelled. Dated 6th June, 1854. Ensign Joseph Margitson, from half-pay of the27th Foot, to be Ensign, vice Templeman, deceased. Dated 28th July, 1854. Source being the London Gazette)
Alfred Templeman, Gent, Second Lieutenant, 21st Foot , 26th March 1852 (lived, promoted to Captain mid-Crimea, Major General by the end of his career).
Richard Draper Templeman, Gent, Ensign, 62nd Foot, 28th October 1853 (retired 12/1855, died in 1860).
As shown here, one died, probably in Bengal after a very short service with the 98th, one was with the 5th and died during service (possibly in Mauritius) and two were in the Crimean War, both making it home alive. I am inclined to doubt that the beaten up personalised piquet weight sabre of a dead lowest ranking officer in Bengal would have been collected up and shipped home. If he died from disease and not from skirmishes against local tribes, I would not expect the sword to show this level of damage. I feel that a sword from a relatively safe posting in Mauritius would not show this level of damage, along with also being unlikely to return home. Therefore I believe the most likely candidates to be Richard and Alfred. Both were born in the vicinity of the area that the crest originates from and could be the man – but Alfred saw the most action, being on the front lines of multiple engagements and even being injured at Inkerman. This service lines up with the overall condition of the sword. Now, everyone is familiar with the fish stories of every nick in a blade being ‘authentic battle damage’ and every dent in a scabbard being ‘proof’ of daring charges, but I think this particular sword bears signs that at least some of the damage may be the real Crimean deal, even if the subsequent years have not been kind to it.
Secondly, the condition of the sabre and some construction details.
The maker is Mole – not anything conclusive in and of itself, but a high quality maker of very much combat ready blades, as shown by his respected supply of arms to the War Department. This is a small indication of the potential combat quality of the sword (The retailer is a London one, for reference).
The guard has signs of what looks rather like incorporated reinforcement metal – if I am right in this (and I have consulted a second and third opinion, both of whom agree that it appears to be so), it would further indicate the intention and expectation of the manufacturer that this sword was to be used in combat.
The guard of the sword has been bashed inwards, the quillon broken off, and the folding guard almost entirely broken off, although interestingly the hinge mechanism itself remains intact.
The blade has been quite extensively service sharpened, which is not considered the norm for a piquet weight, and in my opinion lends credence to the idea that this was not a dress item, but a weapon.
The tip further adds to this idea having been broken, reprofiled, and then broken again. If it had simply been broken that would be one thing, but it has been very clearly reprofiled (somewhat roughly) back into a spear tip before being broken again. The roughness of the reprofiling suggests to me that it may have been done in the field to a certain extent.
The blade has lost a not inconsiderable amount of length via this damage. It currently measures approximately 30 inches long tip to guard, and a pipeback piquet weight that I currently own of otherwise similar dimensions is 32 inches long.
Of course, another explanation is that someone has been fooling around with this sword sometime after the fact, but the heavy wear and patination on the tip would indicate that messing around like this must have happened a very long time ago and taken with the service sharpening, probable owner and other damage sustained a picture does begin to form, and I believe it to be a very legitimate picture.
With these two points (probable provenance and blade condition/construction) taken into consideration, I believe that this sword is quite strong evidence that the commonly held belief in the sword collecting community that no piquet weight weapon was ever intended to be used in combat needs to be reevaluated. I now think that whilst it would have been a rare and unusual choice, it was a choice that was occasionally made by an officer.
I’d like to take a moment to thank Matthew Forde of Forde Military Antiques and Thierry Flekier-Wathen of Thierry The Sword Guy for their second opinions on some of the details given in this article. Both are great to deal with in the antique sword field, and their websites are here: