Double Trouble...

What's this, you ask? Why it's none other than an Allen & Thurber double barreled, single trigger pistol, made in the 1850's. According to Flayderman, only an estimated 500 - 1000 were made...
...at the Ethan Allen factory in my favorite little city, Worcester, MA.

This one is marked "Allen & Thurber Worcester" on the top between the barrels. It's a percussion weapon, meaning that it was made with technologies post-flintlock but pre-cartridge (if you don't know what that means, use Wikipedia or go read something geared more toward your intellect). Even though it's double barreled, it would have been loaded with balls (like a pistol) rather than shot (like a shotgun).

The caliber is .36, and the rifled barrels are 6" long. The hammers can fire one at a time, or together, depending upon the order in which they are cocked. The so-called bag handle is surprisingly comfortable to hold, and the "ergonomics" of this piece seem well-designed. Modern manufacturers of small pistols would do well to take another look at some of these old sidearms.

This would have been a nice, concealable handgun for use as a primary self-defense weapon, or as a last-ditch back-up.


By the way, I friggin' love Worcester, MA. I know this is probably anathema to those who actually live there, but Worcester has seen me through some of my best and worst of times. Someday, I'll regale you about the time I drunkenly improvised some "free jazz" on a borrowed guitar at "open mic" night at the now-defunct Zara jazz club. But not tonight...

It's Fish Knife Friday #1!

What the hell is Fish Knife Friday? Glad you asked.

On Fish Knife Friday, I am going to post an image of one (or two, we'll see how things go) of my fish knives!

What the hell is a Fish Knife? Glad you asked.

I don't know.

Here's what I think I know. They are small, folding, hand held knives. The don't open fully (usually about 3/4 fully opened). Some are wood and are often carved to look like fish, but sometimes they are made from buffalo (?) horn, giving them a distinctly squid-like appearance (I'll show you next week). All have a lanyard and/or loop for hanging.

They are probably not weapons in the true sense, but they are knives, so I'm including them here in this blog. If you don't like it, I make you talk to the missus. Mine, that is...

I've heard them called Shad Knives, Herring Knives, Fisherman's knives, etc., and that they are Chinese in origin. They are allegedly for gutting fish. You know know all that I know about them, and I've been obsessively collecting them every time I find one.

I'd love to know more (like why are they often so decorative if they are so utilitarian?), so if you know anything at all about them, I'd love to hear from you!

Boom boom boom boom...

This old thing is a bronze lantanka.

It's only about 12 inches long (don't you wish you could say that), and was probably used more as currency than as any serious weapon, although it may have fired charges (no ball or shot) for salutes, signaling, or ceremony aboard a ship.


Regardless, this is a piece reportedly recovered from a shipwreck in Southeast Asia. It has calcification around the dolphins, touch hole, and cascabel, so it may have been. It has a "certificate of provenance", but pretty much everybody has a laser printer these days, so who knows its real origin.

I have nothing left to say on this one.

Look at this chopper!

This machete-looking thing is a klewang. These were/are used as tools and as weapons in Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. I don't know where this particular one hails from, but the carved wooden handle sure is decorative.

This piece may be old (i.e. WWII), or it may be more recent but used. The leather bindings on the two-piece scabbard are not original - I understand that these scabbards were usually bound with vegetable fiber rather than leather.

I've never struck anyone or anything with this, but the heft is almost perfect for a light-duty machete. And I've swung a few machetes in my day making trails for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. I'd have loved something like this instead of cheap government issue junk or worse yet, the stupid Sandvik Axes they made us use (supposedly in the interest of safety).

The only better chopper I've ever come across is...well, let's save that for another post.

Honey, go play with that outside...

Actually, don't.


This funny guy is a late 19th century "parlor pistol", chambered in .22 caliber "caps". These cartridges were even shorter than the diminutive .22 short, and were basically the bullet propelled by the fulminate primer in the rimfire cartridge.

Believe it or not, pistols like this were very popular in Victorian times and were used indoors as part of "parlor games", knocking over tiny metal targets or making holes in paper. This activity was probably less dangerous than darts, although chronic lead and mercury poisoning may have resulted in long term health issues.

Imagine: it's the late 1800's - you and your closest friends get together in the living room after supper and drink brandy, play charades, smoke cigars, play cards, have a seance, and then bust out the parlor pistols for a friendly target competition with the fireplace as your backstop. Of course, this was long before "Twister", or even "Naked Baby Oil Twister" was invented...

And to think, nowadays you yobs sit around watching "American Idol" and eating "Hot Pockets".

So much for modern conveniences...

Don't worry, it's INERT

This old thing is exactly what it looks like. It's a hand grenade. It's from WWII. It's Japanese. It's a Type 97 fragmentation grenade. It's unused (duh!). It's also inert.

There is a sticker with Kanji on the bottom, but I can't read it. Can you?

Anyway, I always flash back to that scene in that old movie Private Benjamin, wherein the drill instructor says something like the following during basic training:

"Beware... there are mine fields out there. Most of them are inert. However, some of them are ert."

Hysterical.

Get to the point...

OK. I will, you fucking lughead.

This next piece is a hand-forged pike-staff head, thought to have been manufactured by colonial rebels during the American Revolution. It would have been affixed to the end of a wooden shaft and used in defensive formations.

This piece probably was made as a cheaper and more expedient response to the British bayonet. Bayonets were necessary during the American Revolution because at that time, people still lined up in nice, neat rows and exchanged volleys of gunfire while advancing toward the enemy. Toward the end of this advance, combat switched to swords and bayonets.

At the time, folks were just figuring out how to hide behind trees and rocks and stuff (although, to be fair, this mode of combat was a European thing - other cultures long ago either figured out how to hide or shield themselves from projectile weapons or else ritualized combat to the point that few people were seriously hurt).

As accurate shooting became prevalent with the advent of rifled barrels and metallic cartridges, the "line up and shoot at each other" tactic became less prevalent, although it was still somewhat evident in WW1, even though the opposing sides finally figured out hiding in trenches (this was done in the US Civil War, too).

By WW2, battle lines remained fairly well-defined, but by the time of the Korean and Vietnam wars, opposing lines of battle were a thing of the past. Consider the modern "insurgency/counterinsurgency" mode of combat...it's a direct ancestor of this departure from the century-old "battle lines".

And yet despite the change in field tactics, bayonets are still standard issue for when things get up close and personal.