Origin of the traditional Marine Corps "Kabar" Design?

[hamsco]

Not enough pictures..... This is a 70s Kbar, and a Remington Rand 1911 45. The pistol was carried by my grandfather in WW2.

 

[peanutsxx]

My dad gave his Kabar to a fellow Marine while coming down off Hill 861S in Vietnam, en route to a Navy medical ship (second purple heart). While there his dad (my granddad) purchased and mailed a Randall fighting knife (still need to take a good picture of it; it is mounted in a shadow box on my wall; I think it is a model 14) which he then used for the remainder of his tour. Later, once stateside, he bought another Kabar which now sits on my bookcase:

 

[screened porch]

There was no USN - MK1 prior to WW2. That knife did not have the detailed specs that the MK2 had developed. The MK1 was simply a 5" bladed hunting knife. 8 or 9 companies made the MK1. True WW2 MK1s are stamped USN MK1.

THis explains the wild variations. Nice to know.

 

[zzyzzogeton]

Ooohh... so many misconceptions in one thread.

The USN-MK2/USMC 1219C2 were originally based on the Kabar 7" No.71 hunting knife.

The final specs were approved in Dec 1942. The first order shipped were about 50K knives made/shipped by Camillus in January 1943, which were delivered to the US Navy in February 1943. This was the only batch made to the original specs with a screw-on pommel locked in with split nut.

Kabar shipped the first ones to the USMC in April 1943. This batch adhered to the first change order - no split nut / thick pommel w/ round peened tang.

Other changes followed - squared peened tang, thin pinned pommel, marks transferred to the guard, bent guard.

4 companies made the MK2/1219C2 - Camillus, Kabar, PAL and Robeson-Suredge. Camillus made approx 2 million, Kabar made about 1 million. IIRC, PAL made about 100K and R-S about 50K. That's why the last 2 are so hard to find - not as many made.

There was no USN - MK1 prior to WW2. That knife did not have the detailed specs that the MK2 had developed. The MK1 was simply a 5" bladed hunting knife. 8 or 9 companies made the MK1. True WW2 MK1s are stamped USN MK1. Many other 5" knives were sold/donated/given to the military before the US cutlery companies ramped up to make the numbers needed by the military. Prior to the war, if a sailor needed a fixed blade knife, he bought his own.

Okay - since this post over 5 years ago, I have learned a few things.

One is that Kabar shipped a few thousand1219C2s to the USMC in December 1942. with the original split nut / screw pommel design. The ones that weren't destroyed in some manner of usage were returned to have the split nuts welded tight. Field usage had found that the split nuts had a tendency to loosen and fall off, allowing the pommel to unscrew and the handle loosen. This is why the first Union Cutlery made 1219C2s with split nut construction are so hard (read damn near impossible) to find - they were broken OR sent back to be welded tight. The only extant versions are the few that were retained by boot camp instructors and never sent back.

What I have not found out is why Camillus did not implement the welded tang/pommel construction before shipping their batch to the Navy in January 1943. Maybe they figured squids wouldn't be so hard on the knives,

 

[Culprit99]

Thank you all for the history you’re sharing in this thread! While not an old/original KA-BAR, I bought this one from the U. S. Naval Academy’s Midshipman Store in late 1995 (KA-BAR, OLEAN, N.Y.), and it served me well across four continents in the past 28 years. It just so happens to be here at work with me sitting on my desk today. I brought it in to cut the cake this morning at our command USMC Birthday celebration. Yes, it’s a week early, but we had to deconflict with the rest of the balls in the area.

I had a moment when I read the guest speaker’s bio and realized that he - an active duty LtCol - was commissioned after I hung up the tree suit! But I felt a little better when I found out I wasn’t the oldest Marine present - just the second oldest. LOL!

Fun fact: if you live in a fighting hole in continuous rain for a week or more, not only will you get trenchfoot, but that stacked, compressed leather handle isn’t as impervious to water as the advertising makes it out to be. On more than one occasion those leather disks were so wet and pliable I could spin them around. I had to make sure to straighten them all back out and try to clean up the grooves before it dried out and hardened back up when it would quit raining.

Semper Fidelis, Leathernecks, and Happy Birthday!

 

[Gato do mato]

I've never owned a Ka-Bar MK2, but I've always greatly admired this model and its history.
The Brazilian Imbel produced a reinterpretation in the 70s, 80s and 90s. I have the one in the first photo.
Now I purchased this Sheffield USMC, but I don't know anything about it.