James Black style Schrade custom

Codger_64

Codger_64

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Ever sinced I first saw and touched the James Black "Carrigan knife" back in my days in Little Rock, Arkansas, and visited his reconstructed blacksmith shop in old Washington Post during a period rendevous, I have fantisized about owning a knife like it. This simple frontier made knife, thought by some to be the likeness of the knife that James Black made for Bowie in 1830 (Jim, not David), has reappeared to me over the years in magazine articles, on the web, and in my daydreams. As many people provenence the Carrigan knife directly back to James Black's shop, many bitterly contest the idea that this knife was indeed made by James, and more frantically that James Black never made a knife for Jim Bowie. I finally decided to make my own rendition of this famous (or infamous) knife.

Not being a bladesmith, I obviously decided to forego the labor of forging, shaping, and heat treating raw bladestock. I had on hand a 1095 high carbon steel knife blank just begging to be finished, and with this blank and a pattern in hand, headed to the bench grinder. It will be a week or so of off and on adjustment in the metal removal before I will be satisfied with the shape and ready to move on to applying the ebony wood scales with steel or silver pins, and then a while again doing the silver wrapped choil and handle.

Here is the blank with the pattern after the first shaping session. I'll not say what the original pattern of the blank was, but a Schradeophile can guess it with little difficulty.


And here is what I hope to accomplish:


I wonder where I can get a sheath like that?

Codger
 
i'd say the blank started out as a 15OT/UH. judging my gridlines and a little imagination, I could be wrong though. have fun with your project and I wish you the best of luck.
M-M
 
Hey Codger,

That's looking cool. I have made some knives in the past, same as you, using blade blanks already somewhat finished. It's always fun to see what they turn out to look like.

Good luck and don't forget to share...

Glenn
 
Very nice Codger. I like that blade style and have seen it described as a Cherokee Bowie. Here's one with a more primitive frontier style sheath:

4926-002-002_250x250.jpg
 
Yes, I think that is because of the famous picture of Tah Chee (Cherokee Chief) with one in his sash. Same as the Black design. Copied in Sheffield?

Codger
 
Always loved that style and the Carrigan saga.Cool that your using ebony,that's what I'd want.And 1095 too. :thumbup: :cool:
 
The Tah Chee lithograph is a Mc Kenney & Hall, Volume 1, 1838, so I suppose they could well have begun copying the James Black knives by then, or shortly thereafter. They were of little use in England, so were meant as an export item. Sheffield exports were sparse until near 1840 though, I think.

Leatherbird, the Carrigan knife has a traceable history, which few knives that old have. And a close comparison and scientific analysis of the knife and wood tie it to the "Bowie #1", and both as the work of James Black, whose own life story would make a wacky movie.

The ebony is going to be a challenge. Hard as stone and when sanded, gives off a fine, very irritating dust. Since I won't be using a mechanical grinder or sander on the wood, it is sure to be a labor I will remember. Luckily, the scale profile is relatively flat and once shaped in outline, won't require a lot of shaping other than fine sanding and polishing. I still have to buy the nickle silver sheet and pinstock, and sterling is tempting, not a whole lot more expense, though a lot softer.

I am going to do a custom 165OT in Gabon Ebony too, but some lucky custom maker will get that honor. I think that this ebony is one whose export is restricted now, like my Madagascar rosewood, so I was lucky to get it cheap a year or so ago.

Codger
 
Hey, my name is Carrigan! Really.

Fill me in on this Carrigan saga, any links I can read up on?

By the way, I want my knife back when everyone is done copying it :D
 
The "Carrigan Knife" has the best documented history of owners, back to the time when James Black made it. The foremost bladesmith in the world today, Bill Moran of Braddock Heights, Maryland, has made the following comment concerning knives made by James Black: "They are spectacular knives with all that gleaming silver. They are very different; they have been forged so that the tang tapers towards the blade and also tapers from the back to the edge side--never seen before in other knives. On earlier blades (ones forged prior to 1820), we've never seen a coffin-shaped handle like these."


In 1853, Judge Thomas Hubbard gave this knife to Augustus Garland, his step-son upon Garland's entrance into the legal profession. Garland treasured this gift, especially for the fact that the knife was made by James Black. Both men knew Black, and knew that he made a knife for Jim Bowie. Garland called his knife a bowie knife, assuming that only Black made "real" bowie knives. When serving as United States Attorney General under President Grover Cleveland, Garland monopolized an entire cabinet meeting exhibiting this knife and telling the story of Black and Bowie.
Garland passed the knife onto another statesman from Washington, Arkansas, United States Senator James K. Jones, whose grandson, Steve Carrigan, wrote a history of the knife for the statehood centennial edition of the Hope Star in 1936.
 
Thanks Codger, Bowie knife history is interesting.

Now I'll have to go out to the garage and see if any of those old knives great grampa Steve left in a old box are worth anything. I think mice made a nest in the box.... ;)
 
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