Something odd in that. Looking at specs for one of their 1095 kitchen knives, they show the hardness at 53-58 HRC. Even so, 1095 has very little abrasion-resistance (no hard carbides at all), so it should still grind easily on most any abrasive.
I've noticed issues in grinding some simpler steels on XC or other very coarse diamond hones; I think it likely has more to do with the steel swarf clogging the coarse grit, and less about the hardness or abrasion-resistance of the steel. XC diamond hones can clog almost immediately with steels like these, and grinding virtually stops.
May sound strange, but you might try a less-aggressive abrasive like SiC* or aluminum oxide; OR, try grinding the same blade on a finer-grit diamond hone. I've noticed a lot more success with these steels on diamond no coarser than a DMT 'Coarse', and I often use their 'Fine' for jobs like this. For whatever reason, the finer grit diamond seems not to clog as easily on steels like this. I've almost never used an XC diamond, because I got tired of the hones clogging so fast on these simpler steels. Fast clogging sort of makes sense to me, in that the large grit in super-hard diamond is likely stripping the steel off in thick ribbons, until it clogs up.
* I've also had good results with wet/dry SiC sandpaper on 1095. 220-320 works very fast on it.
David
