Very Unusual "Konan Essei" Mantetsu

[Bruce Pennington]

Thanks Geoff! Yes Spring 1943. BEautiful example, and now included in my study.

[Nick Komiya]

I have released these figures already once, but here is the 1944 production plan for Kou-A-Isshinn Swords. They were to produce at a rate of 6500 swords/year of which 500 were to cover the shortfall at the Tokyo Arsenal. A further 5500 partially completed blades were also to be supplied to the Tokyo arsenal.

[Bruce Pennington]

Wow! That’s over 540 blades per month!

[Sporter90]

Thanks for the picture, Nick! That explains the W stamp on some of the Koa Isshin swords: they were completed at the Tokyo Arsenal (To-Ichi). It also answered a question of the T95 NCO sword owners: the "Ichi in a flower pedal" stamp on the fuchi. Is the To-Ichi factory the Kokura factory?

[Nick Komiya]

No, not the one that got moved to Kokura, but a new Tokyo Arsenal set up in 1940

[Sporter90]

For what it is worth, the chart #3 in Nick's picture (the middle chart) is the 1944 Special Steel Gunto Production Plan at the Tokyo Arsenal. 5,700 completion.

[Bruce Pennington]

I have released these figures already once, but here is the 1944 production plan for Kou-A-Isshinn Swords. They were to produce at a rate of 6500 swords/year of which 500 were to cover the shortfall at the Tokyo Arsenal. A further 5500 partially completed blades were also to be supplied to the Tokyo arsenal.

Nick, fabulous piece of information! So, I'd like to get this straight in my head - the 6,500 swords were to be produced by the Mantetsu factory, correct? And the 5,500 additional were blades begun at Mantetsu, but finished at Tokyo Arsenal? And ALL of these were "Kou-A-Isshin" mei blades?

This would explain the folklore-level collectors' stories about there being 2 factories making Mantetsu blades, one in Manchuria, the other in Tokyo. Part of that discussion always includes the idea that the Tokyo made Mantetsu were slightly inferior in quality. Even Fuller, in his book, felt that the non-Koa blades (mei without the slogan) were slightly inferior in quality. I have no idea if that is true, but it might account for at least the visual impression of less quality finishing work or something.

[Bruce Pennington]

Thanks for the picture, Nick! That explains the W stamp on some of the Koa Isshin swords: they were completed at the Tokyo Arsenal (To-Ichi). It also answered a question of the T95 NCO sword owners: the "Ichi in a flower pedal" stamp on the fuchi. Is the To-Ichi factory the Kokura factory?

Great observation about the W stamp, Sporter! It does help to narrow it's use to the Tokyo arsenal.

I'm a bit puzzled about the Ichi stamp idea, though. Would an Arsenal have it's own "contractor" stamp? I had always believe the stamps on the 95's were Arsenal (Kokura, Nagoya, Tokyo 1st) and a contractor stamp (Iijima, Suya, Seki, etc). And that the contractors were making the 95s for a particular arsenal. If the Ichi stamp is the stamp of the Tokyo Arsenal, the the arsenal was it's own contractor? I see your possible connection, but I can't make it make sense in my head. What do you think?

[Sporter90]

The Tokyo arsenal is the very same Tokyo 1st arsenal 東京第一陸軍造兵廠 (陸軍造兵廠東京工廠).

------
Mantetsu swords were made at least at three places: Mukden arsenal with stamp 南, Dalian railway factory 大連鉄道工場 with stamp 連, and Tokyo 1st arsenal with W stamp.

[Nick Komiya]

I have no further background info than what the chart says, so I do not know what background caused Mantetsu to supply Kou-A-Isshin swords to the Tokyo First Arsenal. The 500 swords supplied are described as finished Kou-A-Isshin swords, so I assume they came with the mei. However, the 5500 blades are merely unfinished blades, so whether those were with mei is not clear. These statistics I gave you already more than a year ago in the form of production statistic links that later went dead. I recall there were more Mantetsu statistics, so if you downloaded any of those charts, you might want to check them again.