Ron,
I find it difficult to believe that you would "ever" be speechless. I just got in from a very late visit to the Randall shop. Picked up my order, due out some 3+ months ago...(ugh)... Scott & Michael Randall "both" looked at my photos of the back of the sheath. Sorry Ron. It is their belief (not mine, dude!) that the numbers are, indeed stamped and more so, even to the point that Michael blew the photo up to an extremely large size and noticed and stamping "border".....just sayin'...
Best, Capt. Chris

An interesting turn of events on the Generals knife. Who would have ever thought there would be a Model 5 inside that sheath.

Thank You again Wally for helping all of us to be able to see what General Westmoreland carried in that sheath in all of those wartime pictures.

As far as all this non-sensical rhetoric over the sheath stamp, I've read enough.....

Not sure I understand the disagreement...this sheath was hand-stamped like I do when I mark a "replacement R" and the indentions around the numbers show the "pressing in" of the leather around the numbers pretty clearly...

There should have been no disagreement. .. Wally took it upon himself 2 seek out an awesome piece of military history, document it and even go so far as to actually arrange to hold it. Have first hand pictures taken of it. The sheath should not be the issue here. It diminished what Wally did. We should have just enjoyed this post and ALL of its work for what it was..
NOT picked apart what people perceived as "flaws "

Thank you Scott and Michael 4 taking your time though to look at it and resolve said disagreement.

Cap / James / Michael / Scott,

In my quest for clarity, the last thing I wanted to do was cast a pall over the amazing work that Wally has done. However, it seems that I may have done just that based on several of your posts. For that I humbly apologize. In thinking through this, there may be a way to put both sides on a winning track: My primary motive was trying to narrow down the timeframe that Bo gave the knife to The General. The Cap and Scott have taken the position that the marking was made by hand stamps, and I'm not going to further question this: I went through the markings on my early 60's Heiser sheaths, my Johnson BB sheaths and my Johnson baby dot sheaths. What I found was a confirmation of the research that was previously done pursuant to the identification of Johnson BB sheaths: Heiser used a serif font while Johnson used a plain font on both BB and baby dot sheaths. Here are examples:

Heiser BB:



Johnson baby dot:



Johnson BB:



For comparison, here is the General's stamp:



It's apparent that the marking on my Johnson BB sheath (Or the General's sheath) doesn't align with any marking that Johnson was known to use!

Going back to Jack's comment:

The introduction of a model/length number stamp on Johnson sheaths occurred several months after the introduction of the baby-dot. This sheath is probably a case of the shop improvising an identification number to ID the sheath before Johnson began using ID stamps. The lack of an actual stamped set of numbers on this sheath still likely dates the sheath very precisely to early-mid 1963, say March-July. That would include the production dates between the introduction of the baby-dot (early-1963) and the introduction of model-length stamped numbers (mid-1963).........

It is very easy for me to believe that the shop marked some Johnson sheaths with a model and length number until Johnson got his stamps (By stamp or freehand - it doesn't matter for the intents or purposes of this discussion!).

I'm going to let this thing rest no matter what else is posted. And I am again going to apologize to all members for mucking this thread up.

Respectfully,

Well done Ron. Thanks for the input and information.

On a different aspect, is there any solid information concerning how the General obtained the knife. I believe there have been statements here about it being a gift and also some suggestion that it was given to him by Bo? What's the story on that?

Ron -

I was gonna stay out of this one but the stamp on what you identify as a Hieser (HKL to me for clarity) in the first photo, and the stamp in the third photo that you identify as a Johnson BB bear an uncanny resemblance. In fact, aside from the errant 7, the 3 is a serif on both sheaths. Neither jibe with the identified Baby Dot in photo 2.

I think this shows that Maurice apparently had the older style serif stamps as I have maintained. The rule of thumb is the shop did not stamp sheaths, so that is another debate. While it is apparent they were not used much, the Johnson sheaths with this stamp do exist. I do not know if he changed to a more modern font in an effort to distance himself from HKL as an impetus for the change.

Joe (My last post on this thread as I mentioned I want to let this rest)),

It boils down to you believing that the much larger serif font you see occasionally on Johnson BB sheaths (Like my 3rd photo) were made by Johnson, while I believe they were made by the shop prior to Johnson getting his smaller plain font. I certainly don't want to dredge up the old sheath arguments here (or anywhere else). Thanks.

I got it, neither do I, but I am trying to get a handle on this. Didn't Jack say that an "east" facing RMK stamp was unequivocally a Johnson? Didn't he also say a serif stamp was unequivocally a Heiser (HKL)?

If my memory is correct and contradicting Jack's "theory", either not all Johnson made sheaths stamps were east facing, OR, some early Johnson sheaths had serif stamps. Can't have it both ways.



I totally agree Ron, it is a Johnson with serif stamp.

Note, it is the different size between the two serif fonts, so I surmise again, Johnson had the serif stamps. Don't know of any other explanation.