Thread: A Rare Find?

And a few more for good measure.

Nice collection of pics, Martin!

They have reminded me of authentic french ones bearing words like 'Newcastle' and other places/countries on them, as well as spanish writing saying how excellent they are - anything for a sale! The uniform of napoleon III's soldiers dominates, as do the swirls and anchors.

Regards,
Neil

2years ago I've also got one with the sign "London" on the blade and "warranted cast steel" on the tang. English made? Who knows..

Nice razor, Traskrom!

The patterning in the acid etching - the swirls and so on - are just like on the french ones. But who knows about the origin of the blades? If they were not made by prisoners of war, then they could have been 'donated' blades from locals - you see some, particularly the four blade models, where the blades are different styles, so they obviously were not made by whoever incorporated then into a pair of scales. The curious 'flattening' of the blade is apparent in many of them, so perhaps the french re-worked them and ground off the tails. Indeed, some must have been from their own razors. That they were allowed to keep their own razors is documented - there is an account of a 'duel' (there were prisoners who schooled other prisoners in the art of duelling - for a fee) between a man and a boy, the razors affixed to sticks. The boy lost. He also lost a finger, so not as damaging as a real duel! In another account, two teachers got heated up discussing the virtues of their two best pupils, who were summoned to duel with razors fixed to walking sticks! Luckily, neither was harmed.

The demand for goods made by napoleoninc prisoners was great. Some places held a twice-weekly fair which very many people travelled to from afar, it is said that in the early 1800s (the prisoners were released in 1814) on one day £225 was taken! An enormous amount of money. A single model of a working guillotine made from scrap bone is well documented to have sold for £40, so it is no wonder that some of these fine craftsmen made their fortune while imprisoned! This applies particularly to straw covered boxes. The strands of straw were dyed and woven into intricate patterns over the shell of a thin pine box. Some prisoners began buying straw wholesale from local farmers, and these individuals got very rich.

Regards,
Neil

Oh my! Where oh where do you guys find this stuff?
Post 17 looks like a version of mine. This is beyond what I even considered when I bought this piece. I got it simply because I've heard about them and seen some crude photos but nothing like you guys are showing.
This is so very interesting. Thank you so much for all your input. My head is spinning now.
Nothing like dumb luck on my part.
I didn't buy it for the history that was given for it or whether it was true or not. I just loved the razor.

This is the page from the Jardella book I was referring to FWIW. That was what I had remembered reading about the subject of prisoners.

edit: not trying to argue for either side, just adding a data point

That is just one persons opinion - an author and collector of razors, not a historian.

We have already discussed that this type of razor appeared in catalogues, so were made by known makers. That doesn't mean that non-razor makers made them, nor does it disprove the POW theory - which after all must have arisen from somewhere.

The mis-spellings have also been alluded to, as well as the spurious countries. FWIW there was a prisoner of war hulk moored off Plymouth, as is etched on the OPs razor. The documentation for that shows it to have come from England - not France, and the article you have cited definitely calls them 'French double blade razors' - so I suppose we have no definitive proof either way!

Regards,
Neil

Another data point on this:



That ran in the October 5th, 1809 edition of the Savannah Republican out of Savannah, Georgia. That places his move smack in the middle of the Napoleonic wars. There's no way of knowing if he'd been a prisoner, if he went AWOL, was never in the military and just wanted to get out of town, or what. But he ground razors

Mr. Banatre ran the same ad twice, as near as I can tell, a few months apart, and I cannot find any more reference to him. Though Google Books turns up hits on his name in several journals of Southern Colonial art, the journals aren't viewable so I have no way of knowing if it's the same guy or even what the Banatre items were.