The history of knives and other edged instruments is tied to the history of people in general. As humankind’s oldest tool, unraveling knife history can lead to even more surprising and enriching information to better understand the world.
If you believe the story, this is Abraham Lincoln’s pocketknife.
Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in the December 1996 issue of BLADE. Read more from BLADE‘s archives with this collection.
Abraham Lincoln’s Knife
George Morris is an antique collector in Monmouth, Illinois. His home is filled with treasures from ages past, but one of his most precious artifacts is seldom seen within the walls of his historic home. The little knife with which he is so careful is said to have once belonged to Abraham Lincoln.
Morris acquired the knife about four years ago. His benefactor stipulated that he not tell exactly where he got it and that he not put it on public display. He has twice gotten permission from the benefactor to display the knife and had to ask again before telling the tale.
Origin’s of Lincoln’s Knife
Sumner Phelps, left, was a dead ringer for Abraham Lincoln.
Lincoln, after a stop in Monmouth, Illinois, during his senatorial campaign against Stephen Douglas, visited his longtime friend Sumner Phelps in Oquawka. It was there that the benefactor’s grandfather, Bill Boden, is said to have witnessed the passing of the knife to Phelps. Boden’s daughter-in-law, Agnes Boden, later recalled the story her father-in-law had told her in an essay titled, A Little Town Where Old Friends Met:
“There was a striking resemblance between the two men (Lincoln and Phelps). They could easily have passed as brothers. Many had noticed and spoke of it when they sat together in the Phelps carriage. Lincoln must have noted it too for he played a cute joke on his friend day,” Bill Boden said.
“After telling how he had won a knife, to the merriment of all present, especially S.S. (Sumner) Phelps, who was boisterously laughing, Lincoln, with a twinkle in his eye, took the knife out of pocket and said, “Sumner, this knife was given to me to keep until I found a homelier man than myself, so I present it to you.”
The knife was passed down through the Phelps family and eventually was given to Frank Boden, Bill Boden’s son and the husband of Agnes Boden. In 1941, Will Phelps, the grandson of Sumner, signed an affidavit in Rock Island County, Illinois, attesting to the authenticity of the knife Morris now has.
“It’s Not Insurable”
Though he casually slips the knife in and out of his pocket when showing is to visitors, Morris regularly keeps the knife and affidavit secured in a safety deposit box in a bank. He takes such precautions because the knife is a one-of-a-kind.
“It’s not insurable,” he said. “There’s no way you can appraise it. It’s worth whatever somebody will give you. Something like that can’t be replaced.”
Morris said he plans to keep the knife as long as he lives. What will become of it then, he hasn’t decided.
“The state has heard about it and they say they’re not interested,” he said. however, for some strange reason, state officials keep calling him about it, he added.
Skepticism
Read more articles from BLADE’s archives with this collection of 25 years of back issues.
Morris said he wouldn’t consider giving it to the state unless it were accepted as 100-percent authentic.
And there’s the rub.
Kim Bauer, historical research specialist for the Henry Homer Lincoln Collection at the Illinois Historical Library, said more concrete evidence is needed to verify the story.
The joke of giving a knife to someone with instructions to pass it on to a homelier person was a common one in the mid-1800s, and Lincoln’s humble appearance may have won him many a jackknife.
“I’d like to believe (Boden’s story),” Bauer said. “It’d be great if you could (verify it), but too much time has passed.”
From all indications, this folding fruit knife belonged to Abraham Lincoln. The legal papers in the background are from Lincoln’s presidential years. Note the similarity in his signature and the name engraved on the shield. (Inset) The hallmarks on the blade of folding fruit knives contain a language all their own. These particular hallmarks stand for the following, from left: Queen Victoria’s profile-duty stamp; the crown-made in Sheffield; the capital letter “MJ’-in this case, made sometime between 1855-56; the lionsilver blade; and JYC-made by John Yeomans Cowlishaw. (The Lincoln Museum, Fort Wayne, Indiana-a part of Lincoln National Corp., photograph by Scott Simpson)
Is This an Honest-to-Goodness Knife for Honest Abe?
A silver folding fruit knife owned by U.S. President Abraham Lincoln? It seems too good to be true. But there it is, bigger than life on display at the Lincoln Museum in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
It all started with a letter to BLADE magazine from William Graves, Sr. He wrote that he’d seen a picture of the knife in Lincoln Lore, the official publication of the Lincoln Museum, a part of the Lincoln National Corp. All the signs seemed right; the hallmarks on the blade, the carved pearl handle, even Lincoln’s name engraved on the shield. But the question remained: Was the knife really Lincoln’s?
Abraham Lincoln’s Knives Can Fetch $100,000
Acting museum director Ruth Cook said the knife was bought by television executive producer Harry Ackerman at the auction of Oliver R. Barrett’s Lincoln collection in 1952. Ackerman’s discovery of the knife is a story in itself. He bought Lincoln’s legal wallet, inside of which, unknown to the seller or buyer, was the knife. A collector’s dream come true!
Cook said the Lincoln National Corp., subsidiary of Lincoln National Life Insurance Co., bought the wallet and knife from a dealer. She could not divulge how much was paid for both items, though she said the price was in the five-figure range. She said neither item is for sale. Another knife-a multi- blade pocketknife-that belonged to Lincoln sold alone at auction for $99,825 at Sotheby’s in New York in 1989, as reported in the August 1989 BLADE magazine.
Even though Cook said there is no documentation of when Lincoln received the folding fruit knife or who gave it to him, it reportedly has been authenticated. There are photographs of it in famed poet and biographer Carl Sandburg‘s Lincoln volumes and elsewhere.
History of Fruit Knives
One of the only books about fruit knife history offered a few clues. (image via Amazon)
But were the principals involved familiar enough with the special “hallmark language” of fruit knives to know if this particular fruit knife could have been made for Lincoln?
We decided to check with Bill Karsten, author of the only known book on the subject, Silver Folding Fruit Knives, to flush out the facts.
According to Karsten’s book, folding fruit knives first appeared in France in the 17th century. They often had blades made of silver or gold for corrosion resistance as stainless steel was not yet available. Men often gave them as presents to their wives or girlfriends.
In England, silver fruit knives flourished after the silver assay offices opened at Sheffield and Birmingham in 1773. The blades were hallmarked following assay (a procedure analyzing the blade’s silver content) in accordance with the system conceived in London during the early 14th century.
A series of five small stamped marks disclosed the city of origin, the maker’s initials, the year of assay, the sterling silver (92.5 percent) content and the duty stamp (Karsten said the latter was no longer carried after the duty was abolished in 1890).
How Lincoln’s Knife Measures Up
The hallmarks on the Lincoln knife blade are of a profile of Queen Victoria, a crown, the capital letter “M,” a lion and the initials “JYC.” Karsten said the “JYC” stands for the maker, John Yeomans Cowlishaw, who was so well thought of that a street in Sheffield, Cowlishaw Lane, is named after him.
Karsten said the queen’s profile means the duty on the knife had been paid indicating the knife was made pre-1896 the crown indicates the knife was made in Sheffield, and the lion means the blades are made of silver.
The Mysterious M Holds Key to Lincoln’s Fruit Knife
When you’re on the hunt for knife history, don’t discount books that aren’t explicitly about knives. A book about silversmithing contained another clue about Lincoln’s fruit knife.
But it was the “M” hallmark for the year of make that intrigues Karsten. He said the capital letter or uppercase “M” meant the-knife was made-either from 1855-56 or from 1879-1880. If it were made between 1879 and 1880, then the knife could not have been Lincoln’s since he was assassinated in 1865.
Moreover, Karsten said, Cowlishaw made his last knife around 1920, which indicates if he made a knife in the mid-1850s, his knifemaking career spanned six-and-a-half decades. If that’s true, it’s a remarkable record for working longevity at that point in history.
Some checking by Karsten in The Book of Old Silver: English, American, Foreign by Seymour B. Wyler revealed that Cowlishaw was admitted as a maker of silver folding fruit knives to the Sheffield Assay Office in 1854. So he could have made the knife in 1855-56.
However, Karsten said the “M markings on the knives made in 1855-56 are thinner than those made in 1879-80.”
“If I had to make a choice I would say the shape of the ‘M’ indicates the knife was made in 1879-80,” he said, but he could not be positive and would not discount that the knife could have been Lincoln’s on that basis.
Mistakes Don’t Necessarily Discredit Lincoln’s Fruit Knife
Learn more about knife history in this collection of BLADE back issues, dating back to 1973.
Next came a question about the order the hallmarks appear in on the blade.
Quoting from Wyler’s book, Karsten said on almost all fruit knives made from 1844-1921 the crown is the first hallmark to appear at the left. On the Lincoln blade the queen’s profile appears first at the left. However, Karsten said there is a picture of a Cowlishaw knife made in 1855 with the hallmarks in the same order in Karsten’s book.
Moreover, he said mistakes in the application of hallmarks were made and the Lincoln knife may be an example.
“They did make boo-boos,” he noted. “I’ve found several of them. They’re not normal but the mistakes don’t discount the knife’s authenticity, either.”
Simon Moore, a leading English authority on fruit knives, agreed with Karsten’s assessment.
“We do often get mistakes like that. There might be a whole batch of blades with marks jumbled up higgledy-piggledy,” he said. “They might go stamping away before they’d realized their mistake but by then they might’ve run off quite a few blades that way.”
As for the shield style and the engraved blade, Karsten said he had seen examples of neither on other Cowlishaw knives. Concerning the “A. Lincoln” engraved on the shield, Karsten said it was probably done some time after the knife was made. He said if the knife were made especially for Lincoln by Cowlishaw, Cowlishaw may have engraved the name on the shield later.
The Verdict for Lincoln’s Fruit Knife
Dr. William Rosenthal, a leading fruit knife authority who donated a huge collection of fruit knives to the National Knife Museum, said the shield was probably engraved after the knife came to America.
“The fancy shape of the handle, the engraved bolster, these sort of things say to me Cowlishaw well could have made the knife,” Karsten noted. “And the knife very well could have been Lincoln’s.”
The sword is 2,100 years old. Click for a larger view.
A rare Roman cavalry short sword made before the time of Christ that has been preserved in its entirety and still cuts is one of several recent highlights of the Celtic Collection Program in Milner, Georgia.
The ancient short sword is from the La Tène III (circa 2nd to the 1st century B.C.) timeline. It was in the H. Liebert private collection, Cologne, Germany, and was acquired during the 1960s and ’70s.
The iron sword is completely intact and is 20.5 inches long. Over time it has become permanently attached to its iron scabbard, and the buckle remains from where it once hung from a belt. Its thin hilt, which terminates in a small pommel, would have once been encased in wood.
According to a spokesperson, the sword has a double-edged blade still sharp enough to cut.
Though the ancient sword is believed to be from Gaul (modern France), Peter Connolly reports comparable swords in his book, Greece and Rome at War.
Similar swords reportedly have been recovered from Switzerland, France, the Thames in London, and Embleton, England.
The sword belonged to either a male or female warrior specializing in close combat tactics, a spokesperson stated.
Jamesan Stuckey, director of the Thomaston-Upson Archives, examines the Roman short sword relic. (Lewis Hales image)The sword’s thin hilt, which terminates in a small pommel, would have once been encased in wood. Part of the sword’s edge, which has remained sharp all these centuries, is exposed above the guard. (Lewis Hale image)The buckle remains from where it once hung from a belt. (Lewis Hales image)The sword relic as contained in the Prehistoric European Collection at the Thomaston-Upson Archives. (Lewis Hales image)
Learn More About Knife History
BLADE gathered 14 years of Knives annual books into a single collection. Get it here.
Notation knives dating from the mid-16th century were used to sing a pre-meal blessing and a post-meal grace. This example is on display at the Medieval and Renaissance Galleries at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London.
They’re called notation knives, and they’re engraved with what amounts to sheet music for multi-voiced song. They’re indicative of the formal role music played in medieval dining, according to Flora Dennis, an art historian and author of the book “Re-thinking Renaissance Objects: Design, Function and Meaning.” Holding the knife in the left hand, edge up, diners could see the notes and lyrics for the benediction, or blessing, sung before a meal. After the meal, again held in the left hand, edge down, the knife showed the music for the grace, thanking God for his generosity. Since cutting was done with the right hand, the knives may have been ritualistically transferred to the left hand, or they may have been solely used for singing purposes. Dating from the mid-1500s, one notation knife is on display at the Medieval and Renaissance Galleries at the V&A (Victoria & Albert) Museum in London, where Ms. Dennis works. There are others—seven in Paris, three in Philadelphia, two in The Hague, one in Austria, some in private collections—but as much as is known, much more remains unanswered about these rare items.
In addition to the 16 surviving notation knives, there are also written references to at least four others, according to Ms. Dennis. Essentially, though, the knives have been overlooked by historians because they don’t fit neatly into either “knives” or “music” and have been relegated to curiosity status. All the notation knives share a similar look. The steel blades are broad with straight spines and triangular points on center. According to V&A curator Kristen Kalber they may have been used to proffer a slice of meat to a diner, the point skewering the serving. Then again, squires normally carved meat and that was a highly skilled, status-imbued position. Carving rose to the level of entertainment with offerings carved from cooked fowls and beasts held aloft on forks. So, while some knives seem not to have been used other than to sing from, others show wear on the point and were definitely used.
Museum Curator And Historian Bring Notation Knife To Life
In this 2009 video V&A Museum curator Kristen Kalber shows the notation knife in the museum’s collection and demonstrates its use. Flora Dennis, an art historian at the museum, discusses the project that allowed the music on the knife to be recorded. Ms. Dennis holds a PhD in musicology, specializing in early music, and through an Arts and Humanities Research Council grant she was able to convert the music into modern notation, and then work with the Royal College of Music to bring it to life.
The points and the bolsters are engraved with leaf scrolls and strapwork, often gilded. The handles are made of ivory and green-dyed horn or bone with copper or brass spacers. The ivory is decorated with foliage, empty tablets of scrolls, Arabic or Moorish designs or winged cherub heads inlaid in black. The pommels are adorned with silver spherical knobs. The engravings are usually in Latin, though some are in the vernacular. The one from the V&A reads Benedictio mensae (The blessing of the table) on one side and Gratiarum actio (The saying of grace) on the other. The musical stave runs the length of the blade. In the upper right is the voice part, in this case “Tenor.” What this means is that there were different knives for different voices, in some cases as few as five or six or substantially more than 20.
Royal College Of Music Singers Record Two Versions Of The Meal Benediction
Knifemakers across Europe at the time would have been members of guilds and were specialized. Handles would have been made separately and assembled by the cutler who sold them. Ms. Dennis’ writings detail how challenging it can be to pinpoint where the notation knives were made or by whom. Knives were being made in Solingen and Nuremberg, Germany, and in Milan and Brescia, Italy. Possible guild marks show up in the form of arrows, fluers-de-lis or clovers, and etched Ns can be found on many of the blades, but those are more likely an engraver’s mark. One of Ms. Dennis’ knife consultants intimated that a Nuremberg mark would be on the tang, not the blade. The best guess is that they were made in France, with Italianate influence or for an Italian patron.
Were the knives collected after the gathering or did each singer keep his or her knife? In Ms. Dennis’ summation, judging by the scattering of surviving pieces, the latter might be more likely. It could also be that the knives were made for a group, such a monastery. In some instances, the strict, mass-like approach to such a shared meal could result in latecomers being fined for missing the benediction. What is clear is that the knives are not all from the same musical piece; there are two separate pieces of music represented by the known notation knives.
Royal College Of Music Singers Record Two Versions Of The Meal Grace
Interestingly, the notation knives are representative of both coming together and separating. It is the very nature of a knife to cut apart, but in this instance it is for the purpose of sharing, both repast and praise.
As Ms. Dennis writes:
“Benediction and Grace texts are inherently collective, expressing notions of conviviality and sharing. The knives reiterate this idea, needing to be brought together in a social context in order for their music to function. Simultaneously, however, they represent a contradictory action of dismembering and dividing. By slicing meat, the knives permit it to be shared between the gathered company in the same way that dismembering and scattering the musical text across the knives enabled a group to perform it collectively. The acts of uniting to say the Benediction and Grace, uniting to eat, and uniting to sing become inextricably intertwined with those of separating, dividing and sharing both meat and music.”
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To understand the Camillus M3, you need to know a bit about the history of the company that originally designed it.
It all ended for the original Camillus on February 2007. The old Camillus went gone out of business due to poor sales, a workers’ strike and a lockout—and then the long-time knife manufacturer filed for bankruptcy. Acme United Corporation bought the company’s brand name and intellectual property rights, relaunching the Camillus brand in 2009.
Camillus hadn’t always had business problems. The company was founded by Charles Sherwood in 1876 and became a good candidate for buying when the Dingley Tariff Act, which greatly raised the import duty on knives, was enacted in 1897. The company then had 20 employees.
This issue’s cover knife, here’s the one of six “Salesman’s Sample” M3s Camillus made in the early 1990s that Bill Adams found in a bucketful of leftovers he bought at the auction of the old company in 2007. According to Phil Gibbs, who worked at Camillus when the one of six M3 was produced, it was “truly handmade” in the Camillus Model Shop. (Terry Moss image)
The War Years
In 1902, Adolph Kastor, a powerhouse of a leader, bought Camillus and the company grew quickly. Camillus had grown to over 200 employees by 1910 and produced over 900,000 knives that year alone. During World War I, the manufacturer cranked out over 470,000 knives for the U.S., British, Canadian and Dutch governments.
The company continued to do well during the ’20s and ’30s. It had knife contracts with Sears Roebuck & Co., Shapleigh Hardware, Simmons Hardware and Woolworth. In fact, in the ’30s Camillus had the reputation of being the highest quality maker of knives in the United States.
During World War II, the company made over 15 million knives for the U.S. Armed Forces. Throughout the Vietnam War, Camillus produced the GI four-blade utility knife, the pilot survival knife andthe U.S. Marine Corps 7-inch Mark II.
(Author’s note: Camillus had developed the Mark II during World War II, and made more Mark II’s than anyone else, though the Marines stillcalled the Camillus-designed Mark II knife “the Ka-Bar.”)
The New-and-Improved Camillus M3
In the 1980s, the U.S. Armed Forces discussed improving the M3. Then in issue to troops, the M3 having been first produced and issued in 1943.
Of course, that was very interesting to Camillus—the company had designed the M3 in 1942—and military contracts, with additional sales in the commercial market to users and collectors, would be very welcome.
The Camillus prototype shop started work on improving the new M3 design. Most everyone thought the blade was OK as it was—6.5 inches long, .85 inch wide and made of carbon steel.
(Top) Most everyone thought the blade of the original M3 was OK as it was—6.5 inches long, .85 inch wide and made of carbon steel. As a result, the blade of the newer M3 maintained the same specs. (Bottom) The stacked leather handle of the “newer and improved” M3 has five grooves and is longer (4.7 inches) than the World War II original. (Terry Moss images)
The stacked leather handle had five grooves and was longer (4.7 inches) than the World War II version of the knife. The handle diameter was larger (1.2 inches wide) and had a pinned-on stepped pommel 1.35 inches wide.
The guard was a little wider than the one on the World War II knife. The lower leg/quillon was marked on the front with a capital “M” in a circle over the number “4.” The new design M3 weighed 9 ounces finished.
(Left) The guard of the newer M3 design is a little wider than the World War II knife. The lower leg/quillon is marked on the front with a capital “M” in a circle over the number “4.” (Right) The handle diameter of the newer M3 is larger (1.2 inches wide) than the original and has a pinned-on stepped pommel 1.35 inches wide. (Terry Moss images)
One of the things the U.S. Armed Forces learned in Vietnam was the importance of guarding against mold and insects—leather handles had deteriorated quickly in the jungle.
As a result, the new knife’s handle was saturated with deterrent. It would use the current fiberglass M8A1 sheath, the same sheath in issue for the M7 bayonet.
If you are fortunate enough to attend this year’s 40th BLADE Show, when you initially walk into the mammoth show hall of the Cobb Galleria Centre, take a moment and look around you. Every table, every booth, every person and the exquisite atmosphere that screams knives! would not be if not for two people: BLADE Magazine Cutlery Hall-Of-Fame® members Bruce Voyles and Jim Parker.
Bruce Voyles
It was Bruce and Jim who organized the first BLADE Show—advertised early on as The Blade Magazine 1982 Knife Show—at the Drawbridge Motor Inn in Fort Mitchell, Kentucky. (At the time, Jim and Bruce co-owned both the show and BLADE® Magazine.) Just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati, Ohio, the event drew 7,000 attendees, by the standards of the day a huge amount of folks for one knife show. Even now, other than the BLADE Show, few if any knife shows attract that many people.
Remember, this was all done long before there was an internet and social media to generate pre-show interest. Pre-show advertising was basically all print—mostly in BLADE—and by word of mouth. Add the fact that the knife industry itself was a shadow of what it is today in terms of numbers of factory knife companies, custom knifemakers and, most importantly, knife enthusiasts, and attracting 7,000 attendees is even more remarkable.
Bruce and Jim, the latter founder of Parker Cutlery, were nothing if not visionary marketers of knives and venues in which to market them. They knew that to make the BLADE Show really stand out, they would have to make it the focal point of all things knives. To do this, they had to establish the event as the be-all/end-all knife show.
One of the things that set the BLADE Show apart even back then was it gathered all segments of the cutlery industry—factory, handmade, antique, knife collections, etc.—all under one roof. While the concept had been tried before, it had never continued in an annual fashion the way the BLADE Show was about to do it under the direction of Jim and Bruce.
Jim Parker
Another way to make the show unique was to establish awards that would be the factory knife industry’s equivalent of the movie industry’s Oscars. The awards would be the standard to which all factory knives and knife companies would aspire. The BLADE Magazine Knife-The-Year® Awards were the result, and they remain the most coveted factory knife honors to this day.
Bruce and Jim had the Knife-Of-The-Year concept covered, but what about a way for the show to memorialize its pioneers, the movers and shakers that made the knife industry the dynamic entity that it had been and would become even more so? The solution: the BLADE Magazine Cutlery Hall Of Fame®, with the latest members enshrined each year at the BLADE Show. Created for the 1983 event, it remains the industry standard to this day.
Jim and Bruce would continue to grow the show, moving it to the Holiday Inn & Convention Center in Knoxville, Tennessee, in 1984. In only its third year, with over 30 booths and almost 500 tables, it was vying for the title of the world’s largest knife show—if it wasn’t already.
Bruce bought out Jim’s interest in both BLADE and the BLADE Show in 1986, and moved the show to Atlanta and today’s Renaissance Atlanta Waverly in 1992. Bruce sold the show and the magazine to Krause Publications in 1994, and the event moved to the adjoining Cobb Galleria Centre in 1997, eventually evolving into the monster it is today, now under the ownership of Caribou Media Group LLC.
Jim passed away in 2004 but Bruce remains active in the knife industry as an auctioneer, show coordinator and author, among others. As of this writing, he had reserved BLADE Show booth No. 608. Unfortunately, he might not be able to attend this year’s show and if he does not, his beautiful wife Debbie and equally beautiful daughters Heather and Vanessa will be there to woman the booth. If he somehow is able to attend, he can answer any and all questions you have about knives, as well as the early history of the BLADE Show. Oh, and pack a lunch. He would have more tales to tell than a little bit.
Each Tuesday in April, KA-BAR will release a video documenting a piece of its storied 120-year history. What, you thought it started with the USMC knife in the ’40s? You’d be wrong.
The KA-BAR website will host the videos, but you can also catch the installments on YouTube. Here is the first episode.
Beyond the marketing value of such a series, these episodes should serve as a history lesson for knife collectors. Often, the provenance of a knife, or a line of knives, is tied to its value or collectibility. And there are few companies with the kind of history that KA-BAR brings to the table.
