I suspect not Charlie!
As you know, I spend a lot of time pondering things like this!
While it may look strange and antiquated to many today, the square-end is one of our oldest and longest-lived blade shapes, seen on many types of knife throughout history, and was even fashionable once. The esteemed cutlery historian Simon Moore tells us that during the Commonwealth of Oliver Cromwell "knife points, like religious images, seem to have been disfavoured", with square-ended blades, which usually widened towards the tip, being the fashion. It was during this same period that there was a popular revival of folding knives, encouraged by the invention of the spring knife, which may have been as early as the beginning of the 17th century (though it is usually ascribed to later in the century). Moore tells us that in the 1670's, square-ended folding razors and pocket knives of similar form were carried. The knives had a curl at the end of the handle, which supported the little finger, suggesting that the square-ended "razor-knives" also doubled as shaving implements (with the common addition of a nail-file blade, I've wondered if it was ever considered that the shorter US Navy Knife might double as a razor?) The square-ended knife seems to have been considered a perfectly useful blade-shape in many walks of life, not just among sailor's, so it is possible we are asking the wrong questions. It may seem strange to our modern eyes that people generally carried knives without central points, but the history of knives is dominated by in-line points, not by spearpoints, and people seem to have found them entirely satisfactory for all manner of things, not just cutting rope
