5 WW2 US Army Airborne Bringing Back Japanese Swords

[Ben@HI]

These 5 swords (well 3 1/2 and a tanto) came from the estate of Colonel William T. Call of the 11th Airborne US Army. Sadly I don't know a lot about him and his service other than he was part of the occupation force's in Japan and obviously served in the PTO. He brought back a unbelievable pile of stuff from his time in the PTO. Mostly the type of stuff you would expect an officer to bring back, furniture, wall scrolls, pottery and the like. As for military bring backs he brought home the 5 swords you see here as well as an type 30 bayonet, a pair of Japanese binoculars and a couple of common western style dress swords which I had no interest in. The interesting thing about these is that out of the 5 only two are actually military. The one that is in pieces has a hanger added to it for military use during WW2 but would have otherwise been a late edo civilian sword. The other military sword is a Gunzoku sword for use by civilians in military service. As they where not technically military they didn't use swords as much and you don't see their swords as often. The Gunzoku had their own uniforms which where almost the same as the IJA uniforms and different insignia for rank and such. The one with the red sheath was originally a tachi that was shortened and mounted as a katana probably during the late edo period. The black one is a typical samurai katana. The blades in these two and the civilian sword that's been cut up are old. The Gunzoku has a WW2 production blade. The tanto is also WW2 era. it's a nice one and a common type bought by Japanese soldiers during the war, not one of the junk tourist ones made from cut down left over sword blades and sold to GI's. I've had these for a year or so but wanted to find more information about the vet first before I posted them. I haven't had much luck unfortunately.

[doyler]

Interesting collection of blades Ben. Thanks for posting.

 

[1st Sgt CES]

Wow---- 5 swords at one Time

[manayunkman]

Very nice find.

[Ben@HI]

10 hours ago, 1st Sgt CES said:

Wow---- 5 swords at one Time

It's the first time I have personally seen this myself. Most guys seem to have only brought home one or two swords if any and a firearm or two. Once in awhile you see where someone brought a footlocker worth of stuff back, I found a large trunk of captured Japanese stuff a different Army officer brought home once and I thought that was a lot. This guy was on a whole other level, he brought home at least 7 swords and enough other stuff it could have filled a small U-Haul. Still kinda kicking myself for not buying some of the other stuff as nothing really went for much. A lot of the stuff sold in the $25-$50 range give or take. I don't know if that was a good deal or not for Japanese wall scrolls and pottery but it seemed cheap to me. The swords didn't go that cheap but where very reasonable. 

[Backtheattack]

Great items, with an interesting background, very interesting.