You might want to read a bit further on page 138 about the original owner of John Cheek's knife.

For those of you who do not have access to Bob Hunt's book, here are the facts.

"Long before introducing the Model 16, Mr. Randall had designed a true saltwater diving knife, one of which is photographed here. The knife is interesting, but so was the man who used it. A pioneer in spear fishing and skin-diving in general, Hal Messinger was an underwater angler of some reputation before entering the US Navy during WWII."

"Subsequently he was elevated to a new position that put him in command of ALL combined forces of Underwater Demolition Teams (UDT). The organization was created through the influence of both the President of the United States and the British Prime Minister and Messinger's appointment was made on the recommendation of the OSS."

"As a Naval officer, he organized, trained and developed the UDT's, which led to their successful operations in clearing enemy waters on invasion shores. During his service, Captain Messinger developed procedures used to pick up SEAL teams from a moving boat"

"Hal Messinger carried the knife depicted during the war, but any reference to how and where it was used has been lost in time. Its unique design is devised from forging a 3/4-inch bar that was hammered and then ground to shape out of one solid bar of stainless steel. The result was a rustproof knife that held an edge and was ideally suited to the type of work IT WAS DESIGNED FOR."

To make the assumption that Capt. Messinger was the only member of all of these units combined that carried one of these knives, especially since he was in charge of training each and every last one of them, and that he would not recommend the use of one similar..... well that would be just asinine. I do not value anybody's snide comments or "mightier than thou" attitude, especially when it involves MY knives. I call it what I want because it is the only logical reason for it's existence.

If somebody would like to authenticate MY knife, send me $150.00 and I will allow them to look at it.

Eric,

does your knife have the Mu ( non-magnetic ) stamp?

some of the UDT/EOD knives also had a specific serial number Which I can't remember that number, which indicated Non-magnetic.

max

It has been a loooonnng time since I opened any of Hunt's books so if I ever read about this fish knife that Bill is talking about then I forgot it a long time ago. I really did think Bill was joking at first but there it is. So it does stand to reason that some of these could have been used by sailors and soldiers alike.

Eric that Kabar is fantastic. Wish that I had a shot at that one. It's cool as beans!

Eric,

You continue to post some really interesting knives all the time. You must have now and in the past a very cool collection. Thanks for all of your contributions.

Ronnie,

Anybody that has a copy of Robert Gaddis' reference book and Bob Hunt's three books, Along with Dominique Beaucant's books, "The Randall Saga" First and Second Edition, has all of the information that they need to know about Randall Made Knives. The rest is just color commentation like John Madden would do.....

BS
It's a Fish or Bar knife, nothing more -nothing less.

Less of course one subscribes to the "Modern Era" Clinton'ism -it's not what it is; it's what I say it is.

And your Model 2-5" is a letter opener.....

Max, It was a standard blade marked US Navy Camillus Mark 2. There were no other markings. It came from Gary Boyd's Collection.

Max,
Although my knowledge of these knives is very limited, I do not believe just because they were made during WWII that this was the intended use, Bo and the RMK workers "named" the knives for their intended purpose...just as Gary and the shop do yet today...

That being my opinion, it is YOUR perogitive to use your RMK for whatever use you want...no matter what it's named for...