Original Item: Only One Available. This is a lovely Matching Unit Marked Rural Police (Gendarmerie) Long Dress "Walking Out" Bayonet by Alexander Coppel of Solingen. It comes complete with its original nickel-plated brass fitted brown leather scabbard, which is held in a lovely brown leather frog. These bayonets were identical to the Metropolitan Police version, but like with other items, the leather used was brown instead of black.

The handle of the bayonet is lovely nickel plated brass alloy, featuring a very nice decorated "Birds Head" pommel without a bayonet slot, and an upswept cross guard decorated with oak leaves. The grip scales are made of beautiful stag horn with an aluminum police insignia firmly attached on one side. These are held with solid aluminum rivets and show no wiggle at all. Both cross guard and eagle’s head are in very good condition, with most of the original nickel plating still intact, showing wear and light oxidation where the plating has worn away on the ends of the pommel and guard.

As with most police bayonets, there is a unit marking on the reverse guard of the bayonet:

L. F.      89.

We unfortunately were not able to find much information on the unit names of the Rural police units in WWII Germany, and leave this as an excellent research opportunity. The same unit marking is stamped onto the back of the scabbard, which we were not able to photograph.

The bayonet has a lovely approximately 33 cm (12.75 inches) long nickel plated steel blade, which was forged "cut-down" style, with the fuller running to the tip. We did notice that the tip of the blade is very pointy, more of a spear shape than the leaf shape usually seen. Blade is nice and bright, of excellent quality, and still has over 90% of the original nickel plating, with just a bit of wear through and oxidation speckling. There is definitely wear through from cleaning near the tip, and there is also a bit of oxidation on the edge near the middle of the blade.

The blade ricasso is maker marked ALEXANDER COPPEL / SOLINGEN in arcs surrounding the firms trademark scales logo, with the firm's initials ACS interspersed. The same trademark scale logo, only larger, is present on the other side of the blade. This type of trademark was used on Police and other dress bayonets during the Weimar republic and up into the beginning of the NSDAP era, up until around 1940, per J. Anthony Carter's work GERMAN KNIFE AND SWORD MAKERS.

Alexander Coppel & Co. KG, Stahlwarenfabrik, was located in Solingen, the legendary German "City of Blades." The company was a major manufacturer of edged weapons and tools from the end of the 19th century up until the WWII period. Unfortunately, as NSDAP-control increased, brothers Carl Gustav and Dr. Alexander Coppel, the Jewish owners of the firm, were forced out. In 1936 the firm had been "Aryanized", and started using the name ALCOSO to hide the Jewish family name. By the end of 1936 the brothers were ejected from their Solingen offices, and by 1940 the brand trademark initials ACS were changed to AWS to reflect the change in ownership and name: Alexander Coppel Solingen to Alcoso-Werk Solingen. Carl Gustav Coppel committed suicide in Solingen in 1941, and Dr. Alexander Coppel was arrested in 1942 and sent to Theresienstadt Prison camp, where he died August 5th 1942.

The scabbard is made of fine brown leather, fitted with heavily nickel plated brass alloy, and is in very good service used condition. The leather does show age and staining to the finish, but is still pliable, and the ripples in the leather are due to the spring steel throat inside the scabbard. The fittings show some plating loss and wear, but still present very nicely. The brown leather frog looks like it may be intended for a "butcher" style 98/05 bayonet, as it is quite wide. The leather is in good condition, showing wear, and the stitching looks to be fully intact.

This is a wonderful unit marked early war rural police bayonet by ALCOSO with some great research potential! Complete with scabbard and frog, this bayonet is ready to research and display!

Specifications:
Blade Length: 13"
Blade Style: Single Edged with Fuller
Overall length: 17 3/4”
Crossguard: 2 1/4”
Scabbard Length: 15 3/8”