Cutting Edges

[Jim McDougall]

Keith this becomes more complex and intriguing as I work toward regaining traction in the research involved that you worked on over all these years.
It is interesting to see all these names associated with silver hilts in England, which are familiar to me through research I did years ago on silversmith Paul Storr.
I have a munitions grade briquet which has the distinct anomaly of being stamped with PS in cartouche on the brass hilt. This was a known touch mark of Paul Storr, a famed silversmith to the Royal Family. For many years many antique experts decried my theory that this could POSSIBLY be from him.
Then Bezdek came along, and he was listed as having been a sword maker!
Obviously, the suggestion would be silver hilts, but no such hilts are known attributed to him. It appears that he may have produced such a group of swords specifically for George III in the defense efforts in late 1790s, and copying the French briquet (there are NO known records of 'briquets' in British military swords.

The reason I bring up this anecdote is to illustrate the often convoluted records of these artisans, which ratherfalls hand in hand with the case of Shotley.

Remember, in the case of the blade trials perpetuated by Thomas Gill in the 1790s, where several makers entered examples to be tested. At that time there were basically only three British makers including Gill recorded....HOWEVER, there were examples submitted by OLEY !!!
This was bizarre, as Oley is NEVER included in references on British swords, and only noted with non specific mention in cases in some. Aylward (1945) is the only reference who delved into this esoterica.

It seems there are references to rolling machines, but I thought these were to rolling the stock for blades. The hollow grinding machines for grinding blade faces were it seems an innovation which superceded the fullering in stock removal of blades to both lighten and strengthen.

As you say, much more needs to be done to discover the origin of the hollow ground colichemarde blade.

I had never thought of hollow ground colichemarde blades only being mounted on English hilts, time to look deeply into Dean (1928) and some other sources,

[urbanspaceman]

Hi Jim. Paul Storr was apprenticed to Andrew Fogleberg, St Anne's Court. I am not certain that Fogleberg hilted swords but I came across him when looking for the maker of my latest smallsword - which turned out to be William Kinman; that's two I have by him, one of which is a colichemarde, both have grooves, even though one is not a colichemarde. I now have four such grooved (non colichemarde) smallswords.
The rolling machines you refer to Jim are from mid to late 1800s. Fritz Weyersberg bought a patent from an un-named Birmingham source for a 'blade roll forge', took it back to Solingen, before the merger with Kirschbaum, and is reputed to still be in operation at WKC today; although I asked Andre Wilms about it and he pleaded ignorance.
The Shotley Bridge machine was only ever described as being for the rapid production of hollow blades and had been since the 1630s. Remember, no-one ever got into Oley's forge, just Mohll's mill (Angerstein 1754) where the little grinding wheels were, so the second machine was never seen, but the product of its operation is quite obvious: grooves.

[urbanspaceman]

Remember that Oley was from Solingen; used the bushy tailed fox; and was regarded as a German smith and not necessarily from England and Shotley Bridge. Given the above, his products may well have been regarded as being from Solingen to the non-cognoscenti. Consider the dealers marketing his products and exclaiming their high quality German workmanship.

[Jim McDougall]

Keith, Storr was apprenticed with Fogelberg and after freeman, he became associated with Rundell & Bridge, who were officially precious metals workers for the Royal House, thus Storr stepped into that capacity. Storr had access to a forge and

It seems like somewhere I saw noted that Oley left Solingen WITH his 'machine'
but have never been able to recall where I saw or heard it. It is interesting to note (Aylward 1945) that the Oley's were grinders rather than blade smiths.

The bushy tail fox being taken for being from Solingen in the perception in the colonies seems likely, and as noted, Oley was not particularly well known as far as English makers. The note that the highest quality colichemarde blades were from Solingen, would not preclude the blades from Shotley, which would have been assumed as Solingen under that premise.

[urbanspaceman]

Hi Jim. You cannot imagine how many chroniclers have got it wrong over the centuries - most just regurgitated what had been written previously. Aylward is one perfect example: this man claimed Shotley Bridge never made any hollow blades because there were no such blades with the Shotley Bridge name on them. The fact that there were no names on any hollow blades until Klingenthal began seems to have eluded him; I will allow the very rare exception as nothing is impossible.
I have spent over eight years wading through a catalogue of errors and misconceptions, trying to get to the facts and establish the true story. Even now I am still doubling back, and down, putting any vague doubts I may have to the test and ensure what I am claiming (because I am making some revelationary claims that are sometimes contentious, to say the least) stand up, at least to my scrutiny, and I am not easily satisfied.
The Mohll family were from a village called Oak (sic) in Lennep, which was eventually absorbed by Remscheid, and were paper mill owners. Abraham and Harmonn have been listed as Grinders - yet were not in any guild, this was totally contrary to the whole Solingen guild exclusivity which was responsible (along with local ores) for the permanent high quality output over the centuries. Their father had invested in a revolutionary machine, invented by the Huguenots, but was unable to exploit its potential because of the Luddite attitude of Solingen.
This was understandable, because their system of separate and exclusive guilds for each process was responsible for the high quality of their output (along with the quality of their ores) and 30,000 Huguenots had flooded into the area, fleeing from the French kings' relentless persecution. This was ironic, because back then, despite centuries of mistaken assumptions, the Wupper Valley was not part of Prussia, but part of the Holy Roman Empire… and Catholic (and still is a Catholic city). Such an enormous labour force - both skilled and semi-skilled - seriously threatened the livelihood of much of the area's workers… so please, no machines!
Anyway… unable to exploit its potential to reduce labour time in fashioning a hollow blade, the Mohlls had been trying to get it established in Britain for a long time, as frequent requests for exclusive patents over here can attest. One of the other things the Huguenots exploited was what we now call 'tool steel' (invented in Nuremberg in 1601) that - as well as allowing the design of the spectacular 'slitting mill' for producing nail rods - allowed them to profile those ultra-hard dry-grind wheels which also came over with the Mohlls.
It is my opinion that the Mohlls were never actually trained grinders (Schleifen)… just mill owners, both wealthy and independent from the start; certainly never under contract to the syndicate at any point.
The Ohligs were forgers (Schmielden) and had been since the 1400s, but that Mohll rolling machine was in his forge at SB – had to be (this may well be what you have seen Jim); and as Peter is frequently at pains to attest: "the works buildings were effectively inaccessible from the village" so no chance anyone ever got into his forge, and consequently never got to see the rolling machine until eventually, in the last quarter of the 1700s, Mole and Oley descendants took themselves, and it, down to Birmingham- but that is another story I'm qualifying as we speak.

[Jim McDougall]

This is why you are such a good researcher! you dont trust anything, not even yourself.....I can TOTALLY relate, and constantly double and triple check myself...to my dismay finding more errors as time marches on.

As Aylward was among the first books I ever owned in my early days of this stuff back in the late 60s...naturally like other giants like Oakeshott, Wilkinson, Blair, Norman et al....I thought their words were sacrosanct.

So if I understand, the French must have been producing colichemarde blades even before the marked examples?
It seems in Aylward, I think, it was noted that British makers, did not place names on blades (until 18th c.)? Again, must find that reference......there must have been use of markings though, as the Cutlers Co. decreed that there should be no use of others markings by makers on blades. Naturally that was about as effective as the rest of the Cutlers Co. rulings.

Interesting that Shotley never put names of marks on colichemarde blades when they did use at least the fox on conventional small sword blades.
Also the numbers of blades marked SHOTLY BRIDG are known, not sure if any of them had the fox.

Then we come to, how many blades out of Solingen (or even France) came into Shotley for finishing.? Did Shotley ever forge blades?

[urbanspaceman]

Hey Jim.
All hollow bladed colichemardes have a groove, which means they come from SB as there was only ever one machine until, possibly, the Oleys and Moles moving to Birmingham left it behind in SB and built a new one. This is highly likely as it would be a simple task for them in Birmingham.
I am still convinced they were supplying Gill… if not actually working for him, but this is an area I need to search. I've asked Mark Cloke a few times for some help but have had no response. Somebody elevated Gill's forging to Solingen standards – and higher, and I've always wondered who.
Here's that Naval smallsword; I've seen others.
PS, the hilt is almost certainly from Matthew Boulton's Soho factory.