Lt Col. John Gaspard Le Marchant

[Richard]

Gentlemen
The name of Lt Col. John Gaspard Le Marchant is well known to all collectors of British Military swords as being the designer, in collaboration with the sword cutler Henry Osborn, of the famed and well known British 1796 pattern cavalry swords. His death, leading the charge of heavy cavalry at Salamanca in 1812 robbed Wellington of his most able cavalry commander.

So, out of interest, I post below a photo Le Marchant's own sword which is today in the possession of his direct descendant Sir Francis Le Marchant. The sword was given to Le Marchant by a grateful Board of Ordnance. The blade is around 31 in. in length, the lower half with blue & gilt decoration of pre-1801 Royal arms, etc. and the top half is frost etched with the inscription : PRESENTED To LIEUT COL LE MARCHANT by the BOARD of ORDNANCE

Richard

PS, sorry for the poor quality of the photo. I lost the original when my computer was stolen in Switzerland and I have had to download this from another site I previously put it on

[celtan]

Sorry to hear about your computer. Big Headache, indeed.

I read somewhere that the M 1796 was based on previous blades used by german cavalry?

Best

M

Originally Posted by Richard

Gentlemen
The name of Lt Col. John Gaspard Le Marchant is well known to all collectors of British Military swords as being the designer, in collaboration with the sword cutler Henry Osborn, of the famed and well known British 1796 pattern cavalry swords. His death, leading the charge of heavy cavalry at Salamanca in 1812 robbed Wellington of his most able cavalry commander.

So, out of interest, I post below a photo Le Marchant's own sword which is today in the possession of his direct descendant Sir Francis Le Marchant. The sword was given to Le Marchant by a grateful Board of Ordnance. The blade is around 31 in. in length, the lower half with blue & gilt decoration of pre-1801 Royal arms, etc. and the top half is frost etched with the inscription : PRESENTED To LIEUT COL LE MARCHANT by the BOARD of ORDNANCE

Richard

PS, sorry for the poor quality of the photo. I lost the original when my computer was stolen in Switzerland and I have had to download this from another site I previously put it on

[Jim McDougall]

WOW! Absolutely fantastic, LeMarchant's sabre, now that really is amazing Richard. Thank you for posting it.

It truly is poignant that this brilliant officer died quite literally by the sword after his monumental contributions to the development of British regulation sword patterns. I think probably the best references to him, with some good information on his development of the M1796 swords is,
"Scientific Soldier: A Life of General LeMarchant 1766-1812"
R.H.Thoumaine, 1968

It seems that he was greatly influenced by his time serving with Austrian forces in Flanders in 1794-5, and thier professional use of the sword in combat. His observations for regulation patterns for the light cavalry sabre were with reference to Hungarian and Eastern sabres, which were of course indirectly including Austrian swords.

What has always puzzled me is that while the M1796 light cavalry sabre is typically officially recognized as the 'first' regulation British cavalry sword pattern, the M1788 was well established, and is the exact sabre used in the sword exercise drill manual.

The M1788 was very similar in its stirrup hilt to other European cavalry sabres and the blades as far as I can recall were in two or more cross sections. In my experience James Wooley seems to have favored the section which I believe was French and termed the montmorency as well as French style elliptical langets, while Thomas Gill seems to have favored German styling in the rectangular langets and 'hollow ground' cross section.

Richard, would you agree with those observations on the M1788?
Was the reference for the M1796 being the first regulation sword because it was 'officially' recognized in a specific military order?

Also, these M1796 sabres, despite being 'regulation' seem to have brought a wide spectrum of variations in the light cavalry sabres.
The Prosser sabres seem to have had a yelman like latch back blade tip; I have seen fully parabolic pipeback sabres that were almost shamshir like; and if I am not mistaken, one British officer (Ponsonby?) had one with a yataghan like blade!!!

I recall there have been attempts to put together articles with the variations of these light cavalry sabres, and wonder if anything comprehensive has been put together lately.

All best regards,
Jim

[Ian Knight]

Thank you for the photo Richard.
Did Le Marchant carry this actual sabre at the Battle of Salamanca?
Is the sword on display in a museum?
I note that the blade is about 31" in length making it 2" shorter than regulation.

Ian

[Jim McDougall]

I once had a M1796 light cavalry sabre with traces of bluing and inscribed motif on the blade, including the pre-1801 British coat of arms (with fluer de lis in upper right quadrant). It seems it was possibly even slightly shorter than the 31" described here. It was entirely unmarked as far as maker and was without scabbard.
I was always curious about this sabre as being rather on the short side, and wonder as well if there was a particular instance of the period for the size of the blade so much shorter than the typical cavalry length.

[Ian Knight]

Originally Posted by Jim McDougall

I once had a M1796 light cavalry sabre with traces of bluing and inscribed motif on the blade, including the pre-1801 British coat of arms (with fluer de lis in upper right quadrant). It seems it was possibly even slightly shorter than the 31" described here. It was entirely unmarked as far as maker and was without scabbard.
I was always curious about this sabre as being rather on the short side, and wonder as well if there was a particular instance of the period for the size of the blade so much shorter than the typical cavalry length.

Hello Jim,
I have five British P1796 LC sabre in my collection at the moment. They all have 33" blades apart from one which is 32".
One of my sabres, made by Osborn (the same maker who made Le Marchant's sabre), has much of its blue & gilt remaining, it also has the pre-1801 coat of arms. The blade is 33".

Would they have made shorter sabres for Officers of a smaller stature I wonder?

Ian

[Jim McDougall]

Originally Posted by Ian Knight

Hello Jim,
I have five British P1796 LC sabre in my collection at the moment. They all have 33" blades apart from one which is 32".
One of my sabres, made by Osborn (the same maker who made Le Marchant's sabre), has much of its blue & gilt remaining, it also has the pre-1801 coat of arms. The blade is 33".

Would they have made shorter sabres for Officers of a smaller stature I wonder?

Ian

Hi Ian,
I always wondered the same thing, and it seems the blade on the one I had may have even been 29 or 30", I need to find my notes to check. It does not seem that stature would have been an issue as it seems it was quite the fashion of the times for cavalry officers to wear these sabres rather in a low slung manner, accounting for the pronounced drag on the scabbard tips.

Until now I had not realized that these pre 1801 arms were Osborn products, which would make distinct sense as he was working with LeMarchant on this form. I truly regret now having sold that sabre!!! Who knows, maybe somebody out there knows who has it now.

All the best,
Jim

[Richard]

Jim and Ian,

Most of the P1796 light cavalry swords I have seen have a blade of around 32½ in. but they do vary between 31 and 33½ in. Anything less than 31 in and I would start to question whether it was cavalry or not. Le Marchant's sword was difficult to measure of course because I couldn't take it out of the case.

In answer to the other questions :

Ian, no I dont think Le Merchant carried this at Salamanca. Apart from the fact that he was heavy cavalry and this is a light cavalry sword, I think this is very much a presentation sword, i.e. a gift of thanks, not meant for campaign use. The sword remains in the possession of the Le Marchant family. When I was invited to see it a few years ago, I thought I was going to see the original prototype, i.e. P1796 No. 1 - can you imagine how exciting that would have been? In fact, it turned out to be this presentation sword but still pretty exciting nonetheless

Celtan - The P1796 blade with its high curvature and thickening towrds the point was an entirely new design, based if anything on eastern sabres. In fact, it was referred to as the "new cavalry scimitar" when it was first being produced. The Prussians, of course, copied the design for their M1811 cavalry sabre (the so-called Blucher sabre)

Richard

[Ian Knight]

Richard,
I wonder why they presented Le Marchant with a light cavalry sabre and not an officer's heavy cavalry sabre?
Ian

[Richard]

I an only imagine because the 1796 light cavalry sword was the real design revolution ; the 1796 heavy cavalry sword was pretty much a copy of the 1769 Austrian heavy cavalry sword and I am not sure if the 1796 heavy cavalry officers sword, i.e. the ladder hilt, was Le Marchant's design. It is an anomaly that when regulations said that officers and troopers should carry the same pattern of sword, the 1796 heavy cavalry officers and troopers are so different.

Richard

Originally Posted by Ian Knight

Richard,
I wonder why they presented Le Marchant with a light cavalry sabre and not an officer's heavy cavalry sabre?
Ian