Kasama Ikkansai Shigetsugu Samurai Sword Found!

wilkere

Full Member
Sep 11, 2007
138
22
Jacksonville N.C.
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Minelab Excalibur, Tesoro Silver Sabre
Not your typical flea market find; I set up at the Raleigh this past weekend selling all the estate sale/auction finds I could not sell locally doing my picking, plus garage debris, toys, and even beanie babies.

Fortunately, at the last minute I decided to make up a couple of flyers “I buy war relics”. Under the hot sun as I stand baking a nice young man with his 2 young children stops by and states he may want to sell his Grandfathers WW2 trophy. He says that his GrandPa had a sword surrendered to him. Very interested, I tell him to bring it by as I’ll be here all weekend and sure enough he does return eventually.

Upon first seeing it I say, ” Wow, love the chain….., you say you’ve never had the handle off?”, He says it's never been off and it's stuck on the sword. I tell him if there is no arsenal mark it’s a nice WW2 sword for any collector.

He also tells me that Grandpa is still alive and coming back from Florida next week, I pose a question about this flea market deal, to make sure that Grandpa won’t get upset, and if not do you think he’d do an interview for my website. He assures me affirmative in both aspects, then we work on the stuck handle in the back of my van.

I get it off with a little persuading and see no arsenal mark and hand drilled hole. I make a fair deal for the both of us as a blade with a living storyboard are relics I cannot pass on, and hopefully Grandpa has an interesting story to share here soon. Came back with less than a half full van so that was a success too!

Upon posting a picture of sword signature on a Japanese sword forum, it turns out that I got lucky and the sword was made by famous 20th century master smith Kasama Ikkansai Shigetsugu. Sometimes you get lucky!
Semper Fi,
Bob
OKINAWARELICS
 

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Upvote 8
I'm looking forward to grandpa's story!
 

Great find. Im jealous.

BANNER VOTE FROM ME.

Not your typical flea market find; I set up at the Raleigh this past weekend selling all the estate sale/auction finds I could not sell locally doing my picking, plus garage debris, toys, and even beanie babies.

Fortunately, at the last minute I decided to make up a couple of flyers “I buy war relics”. Under the hot sun as I stand baking a nice young man with his 2 young children stops by and states he may want to sell his Grandfathers WW2 trophy. He says that his GrandPa had a sword surrendered to him. Very interested, I tell him to bring it by as I’ll be here all weekend and sure enough he does return eventually.

Upon first seeing it I say, ” Wow, love the chain….., you say you’ve never had the handle off?”, He says it's never been off and it's stuck on the sword. I tell him if there is no arsenal mark it’s a nice WW2 sword for any collector.

He also tells me that Grandpa is still alive and coming back from Florida next week, I pose a question about this flea market deal, to make sure that Grandpa won’t get upset, and if not do you think he’d do an interview for my website. He assures me affirmative in both aspects, then we work on the stuck handle in the back of my van.

I get it off with a little persuading and see no arsenal mark and hand drilled hole. I make a fair deal for the both of us as a blade with a living storyboard are relics I cannot pass on, and hopefully Grandpa has an interesting story to share here soon. Came back with less than a half full van so that was a success too!

Upon posting a picture of sword signature on a Japanese sword forum, it turns out that I got lucky and the sword was made by famous 20th century master smith Kasama Ikkansai Shigetsugu. Sometimes you get lucky!
Semper Fi,
Bob
OKINAWARELICS
 

That has to be exciting to find out who the maker was and his fantastic reputation. Great find.
 

Nice, thank you…..what metal is the chain made from?
It seems to be a type of brass, hard to believe but that chain is worth around $300 itself. I guess it was a expensive add on at the P.X.
 

Congrats on your find and settling on a fair price based on what the sword really was! :occasion14:

Dave
 

I hear you, I believe in karma and blessing's. Basically if you do right, you'll do all-right! I could have gotten it very cheap but paid a fair price for it. I knew it was probably a better than average blade and paid offered him a price for a quality handmade blade but did not know it was by someone that famous. He said he had it on Craigslist for awhile but none of the contacts ever showed up to look at it.
OKINAWARELICS
 

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