Pistol Sword - Examples

Examples

Historically, some early flintlock pistols were constructed as gun-swords, with the barrel of the pistol attached to the side of the blade of a shortsword or dagger. A shell guard protected the firing mechanism when it was used as a sword. These were used by French and German hunters to kill wounded wild boar. Examples of these weapons can be found in the armoury of Wawel Castle (Kraków, Poland). Similar weapons were made in India, including the Katara (कटार), a thrusting dagger with two built-in pistols that could be fired by squeezing the bars together.

In 1838 the United States Navy developed the .54 caliber, single-shot smoothbore Elgin pistol, which was equipped with a 11.5-inch Bowie knife blade and was intended for use by boarding parties; it was the first percussion cap gun in naval service, but only 150 were made. The Navy specifically intended them for the Wilkes-South Seas expedition. Reportedly, in 1840 a naval landing party used the pistol to good effect when Fijian warriors attacked the sailors on the island of Malolo. A few Elgin pistols were still in use during the US Civil War, but proved unpopular. The Navy quickly replaced them with the M1860 Cutlass, which remained in service until the 1940s. Some found their way into civilian hands and some ended up in the Old West.

Pinfire cartridge gun-swords were produced in Belgium during the mid-19th century, although in limited quantity. These custom-made weapons were sometimes used by European officers and featured a loading gate behind the basket hilt. In 1866 T Rauh of Solingen filed a United States patent on the design of a 9mm caliber pistol sword with a 30in blade.

Another notable example of a pistol sword was the Swedish 1865 Cutlass Pistol; 500 were ordered by the government and issued to prison guards. It was a breech-loading 2 shot weapon with a 14in by 2in blade weighing 2.5 lb. A few ended up on the other side of the Atlantic and one became part of Buffalo Bill's gun collection.

In the late Victorian era some French swordsticks had built-in pinfire pepperbox revolvers to increase their lethality; these were carried by civilians for self-defence. However this idea was far from new; combination swordsticks and wheel lock pistols have been in use since the 16th century.

Pistol swords were not widely used and became uncommon relatively quickly, due to their expense and because instead of getting two weapons in one, one got a heavy pistol and a heavy, off-balance sword, as shown by the poor performance of the Elgin pistol.

A rare variant of the Japanese Nambu automatic pistol was a pistol sword

Modern versions occasionally appear on the market, however, as novelties or collectors' items, including the Sierra Madre knife pistol.