Original Item: Only One Available. The end of WWII marked the beginning of the sword ownership ban in Japan. By law, Japanese citizens were forbidden to own swords. General McArthur did not want the general population to be able to arm again. Most soldiers and citizens surrendered their swords to the American occupying forces. The Americans destroyed a large number of swords by dumping them into the ocean or by melting them. But a small percentage made its way back to the United States and into the collector market.

This very nice example is a genuine WWII Japanese Type 95 NCO Samurai Sword or katana, with aluminum handle construction and machine made fullered blade. Blade is 26 ⅜ inches long, with an overall length of 36 ⅜ inches. The grip wrapping and menuki are cast-formed out of aluminum, and then painted to give the illusion of fabric wrappings and gilt menuki. This example looks to have seen a good amount of service during the war, and the throat to the scabbard was lost at some point. It also has had the blade sharpened and machine polished relatively recently, which while making it look great, also did remove the history and made the markings a bit faint.

The design copies the typical WWII Imperial Japanese Army style fittings, known as the "New Military Sword" ( 新軍刀 - shin guntou) style, with a single hanger ring and bolster on the scabbard. It is said that during battle soldiers would not use the ring but rather would stick the sword through the belt the same way as the Samurai in ancient times. NCO Katanas were issued to soldiers who did not want to take their family sword to battle or who came from poor families that did not have swords to pass down through the generations.

All NCO swords were numbered. This example has a serial number 79153 on the blade, however the scabbard is missing the throat fitting, so it no longer has any serial number. Most swords do not have matching numbers because somewhere along the life of the sword the scabbard was changed. Next to the blade number is a faint 名 marking for Nagoya arsenal.

The Fuchi (grip collar) of the sword is marked with information related to the swords production and inspection. While holding the sword hilt up, the first character on the left is 岐, for manufacture by the Gifu sword company, and to the right of that is 名 for inspection by Nagoya arsenal. All the way to the right is the "stacked cannonball" logo of Kokura arsenal, where the sword was put into arsenal for issue.

The sword is complete with the metal locking spring tab that secures the blade to the scabbard, however as the scabbard has no throat, it no longer locks into place. This would normally prevent the sword from falling when the soldier is running. Traditionally this function is assigned to the Habaki (blade collar). But machine made swords like this one do not have the accuracy of manufacturing that enable the Habaki to perform such a function.

The condition of this sword is good, though we would imagine it saw a lot of use and oxidation from exposure to the moist air in the pacific theater of WWII. As the blade has been completely polished, we cannot see any oxidation, but we would assume with how much metal was removed, it probably had a lot of surface oxidation.

The hilt looks to have had the original brown paint mostly worn away, and we can see some pitting and other damage to the aluminum material. The yellow highlights on the cast in cherry blossoms are completely gone. The tsuba (crossguard) is the early-mid war brass MOKKO GATA (quince) shape, with holes in both sides to reduce weight. Later swords would be fitted with simple iron round tsuba. The blade collar (habaki) is the standard brass. The scabbard still has the original paint, though it has also suffered wear and and loss of the throat, as shown.

There are some Chinese replicas of these out there, however this sword is definitely genuine. It has the correct arsenal markings on the hilt collar (fuchi) and blade, indicating it was issued by Kokura Arsenal. The scabbard is painted the correct green color, and the spacing from the top to the hanging ring is the correct length. Overall the fit and finish is definitely far above a replica, which can be seen in the photos.

Overall a good condition WW2 Type 95 NCO Katana that will really look great hanging on the wall. Ready to display!

Specifications:
Blade Length: 26 ⅜"
Blade Style: Katana
Overall length: 36 ⅜“
Scabbard Length: 28 ¾"