Sword

[Blak bart]

A few months ago my neighbor died. She was a great 87 year old woman, and a fantastic neighbor. Her house was sold and the new owners have been remodeling. Ive already posted some bottles that I picked from the trash. Everyday I come home and rumage through the trash when they have been here cleaning out the house. Un believably one of the great bottles I got was owned by a company that is now owned by a member of this site, and is posted in the bottle forum on this site.any way as I pulled into the drive way I can see a sword sticking out of one of the cans. I stepped out of the truck pulled it out of the trash and brought it in the house. It is bad a-s !!! This is probaly one of the best finds of my life. Who would of ever thought you could get something so cool out of the trash. Here it is.







This is a nasty weapon that would still do work in a pinch, if someone was coming through the door. It is stamped R&C and the only other marks are a group of scratched in hash marks in the hand guard. You can see those marks in one of the photos. I had a great day on sat MDing, and now this 3 days later. Lady luck is on my side!!! Hell now that I think about it its been a great month. My wife won 600$ this month on a scratch off too.

 

[Blak bart]

the wooden handle has no grooves in it( if the blade only was imported --and it was "built" in America it would have a grooved wooden handle ) -- the smooth wood handle is common on European made swords..they used smooth wood handles and leather wrapped them with a wire over lay -- the leather has clearly rotted away ..leaving only the smooth wood and wiree wrapping ...so this was totally built in Europe and "imported" as a finished sword during the civil war era

Ivan there is actually a twine wrap a leather wrap and then the wire wrap. Obviously the twine and leather are almost gone. AARC s pic of that sword made me do a double take as it almost looked identicle. I will take a shot of the twine wrap and post it. I read that many had this triple wrap.

 

[Chizzy]

If you are superstitious........DON"T CHANGE ANYTHING!!
And, there's always something to look forward to after a day at work............

 

[Blak bart]

uh in a battle you don't take time to grind a sword --cuz your busy hacking away with it ...now before or after a battle yah --thats when you sharpen a sword

I was picturing them trying to sharpen 250 or more swords the night before some battle and weather they would take there time and make them all real nice and perfect or if they were rushing to get them done in time. I hate to think that some one hacked at this with an electric grinder 100 years later!!! Wouldn't suprise me since I was beating it with a 2x4 last night. I was pretty careful about it though. That sucker was stuck in the sheath really good.

 

[kcm]

As swords were so very important back then, I have to assume they would make them as sharp as possible. After all, you may not get a 2nd chance to cut not only through your opponent, as well as 2 or 3 leather straps, and maybe even a coat. Swords that weren't sharp, well, I think their owners didn't last very long.

 

[Blak bart]

Heres a pic of the triple wrap. Looks like the twine was under the leather and the wire was on top with the twine between the wire wraps but under the leather. Kind of bulked up the leather between the wire.
As it is now its pretty sharp !!!! Will definitely cut. Well said kcm, imagine trying to hack through all that clothing.

 

[UnderMiner]

That's a Civil War sword all right! Many times congrats! You're the second person I know of on this site who's found a Civil War sword in the trash. The other person was me! Quite a feeling to find something that awesome in the trash! No doubt countless relics are tossed out and lost forever to the trash every day. This is my Brass Hilted Peterson 75. German-made and imported to the US for the war just like yours. Was in the snow by the garbage cans outside about to be taken by sanitation workers when I saved it. You're even luckier than me though becasue you got the scabbard too!

 

[Silvermonkey]

Incredible find! Its shocking what people consider "trash", and will throw away on a whim. We live in a very strange world!

 

[Blak bart]

That's a Civil War sword all right! Many times congrats! You're the second person I know of on this site who's found a Civil War sword in the trash. The other person was me! Quite a feeling to find something that awesome in the trash! No doubt countless relics are tossed out and lost forever to the trash every day. This is my Brass Hilted Peterson 75. German-made and imported to the US for the war just like yours. Was in the snow by the garbage cans outside about to be taken by sanitation workers when I saved it. You're even luckier than me though becasue you got the scabbard too!
View attachment 1386806

Haaa.... the east coast trash pirates. I think we can put a crew together !!! Im pretty sure kcm is in. Well have to find him a sword though.!!! Nice find underminer !!! Feels good to find something like that in the trash dosent it !!

 

[Blak bart]

Incredible find! Its shocking what people consider "trash", and will throw away on a whim. We live in a very strange world!

You know whats really strange... people throw babies in the trash. If that is possible than anything can be found in the trash. Wonder how much gold is in the dump??

 

[UnderMiner]

Haaa.... the east coast trash pirates. I think we can put a crew together !!! Im pretty sure kcm is in. Well have to find him a sword though.!!! Nice find underminer !!! Feels good to find something like that in the trash dosent it !!

Yo, just realized we are now both part of the most exclusive club on Tnet - the Trash-Picked Civil War Sword Club! We can now have the world's first trash-picked Civil War sword fight in history! Only people with trash-picked swords from the Civil War can join our club - making it the most exclusive club on this site and possibly the planet.

To plunder and debauchery!

 

[MrBlueSkyNM]

Only one acronym...OMG!!!

 

[UnderMiner]

You know whats really strange... people throw babies in the trash. If that is possible than anything can be found in the trash. Wonder how much gold is in the dump??

There is more gold in the dumps of the world than all the gold lost on all the beaches of the world plus all the gold aboard the Atocha and all the treasure ships still lost at sea combined. How do I know this you may ask? Because I've seen it and done the math. There is a landfill that I know of that is slowly eroding into the sea not too far from where I live. I don't go there often but the times I do go I find gold, silver, and other precious relics - no metal detector needed.

The concentration of non-ferrous metals there is so high that metal detectors will not work. All the brass, copper, silver, and gold must be sorted out by hand, by eye, by sifter, or trowel. The ferrous metals have long since rusted away do to the landfill being exposed to the environment for over 75 years - which means the only metals left to find are stainless steel, copper, brass, silver, and gold. The amount of precious metals I've found there with just my eyes and hands leads me to the conclusion that there is a king's ransom buried in the world's landfills. I only had access to 0.01% of the landfill and still found treasure beyond my wildest dreams. If all this can be found in just a tiny exposed portion of the landfill just imagine how much treasure can be found if the landfill was completely sorted through - each and every piece. Just assume that in every ton of garbage there is a 1/2 gram of gold - then realize that every landfill contains several million tons of garbage. That's several million grams of gold per landfill.

After hundreds of years landfill material will disintegrate but the silver and gold within will not, and as time goes by the silver and gold will become more and more concentrated. Just something to think about for future generations.

 

[kcm]

Too bad there's no possible way of knowing that there is that much gold distributed evenly in the layers of decomposing trash.

 

[Benjamin52]

A German made blade from Solingen, hey its gotta be good quality, right? Haha :-) awesome find!

 

[UnderMiner]

Too bad there's no possible way of knowing that there is that much gold distributed evenly in the layers of decomposing trash.

Sampling and statistics work wonders.

 

[bill_wabo]

Thanks KCM, was not sure, but I'll try to find the picture I saw. Think I saw it on a PBS documentary.

 

[bill_wabo]

Hey UnderMiner, you're right. I found silver pieces and bracelets in a old dump two years ago and it was fun to dig. Curious to see your best find from that place you have.

 

[WolfmoonX]

There is about $9.00 worth of gold in a standard computer. I'm sure there are plenty of those in landfills/trash.

 

[ivan salis]

you folks talk about "hacking thru clothing" with a sword ...actually swords basically come in one of two types ...a straight bladed "stabbing" type sword or a curved bladed saber "hacking" type ... the straight bladed type was more used to stab at the main body torso areas by foot soldiers --the curved type was often used by horseback folks and the main targets were the head and arms of enemy soldiers ...very different fighting methods for the most part ....

 

[Bruce R]

I believe that's a model 1860 light cavalry sword, great find !