Vietnam Soldier Bring Back

[turmanator]

I met a gent that was a Lt. Col. in the Infantry and was part of operation Junction City,
the largest Airborne combat operation since Market Garden. This was in Feb 1967.
I bought a couple of really nice uniforms from him (1 sateen and 1 camo) and an
M37 demolition kit bag. He has this Vietnamese axe he found in a Viet Cong camp
they hit and killed all the commies in. He kept it all these years.
He wants to sell it (not sure why) and is asking $175.00 for it. It is quite heavy
(about 5 pounds) and has a real thick triangle shaped blade on it. I cannot find
anything about them, or what they are really called.
It's kinda late to buy cool bring-backs from the WWII vets, so this might be my only
chance. Anyone have any info on these? Would you pay 175 for it. The story to
me is worth the money.....

As an addition I found out the guy was in for 28 years, got the Bronze Star,
and afterwards was an aide for 5 Presidents ..(Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan and Bush)


http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j223/turmanator/axe.jpg

[drine]

I will show a pic of this to my ARVN engineer at work. He's a good man and very smart. Has a ugly hole on his right thigh from an AK (front and back). :eek:

[turmanator]

I ended up buying it from him. He picked it up in a VC camp while he and
2 other Lts. were doing artillery spotting. He took it off a dead guy ....
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j223/turmanator/100_4059.jpg
It's 30" long and weighs about 5 pounds. It's sharp along the upper side of the blade
in this pic. The blade cross-section if triangular, so maybe splitting bamboo?
But it'd hurt like hell to be hit with it. The bands around the handle are iron or steel.

[Patria Povo]

Cool! Be sure to get him to write-up the story of how he got it and to give you a receipt for the sale. Provenance makes all the difference between a priceless military antique and suspect goods.

My grandfather-in-law served in the ARVN - would love to get him a present like this.

[turmanator]

This guy was military white house aide for 5 administrations after nam
and I even bought 2 uniforms from him....they even had the CIB patch on them. He was part of Big Red 1. I couldn't pass up something like that. You just don't come across first generation bring backs .... especially from a well know operation ....

[drine]

Glad you got it. I'd say it was a good buy. The engineer I work with who was ARVN was at another plant last week and I'll be on vacation this week. I printed out a picture to show him and will let you know what I find.

[turmanator]

I can't figure out what it is called. I can't find anything anywhere
remotely like it. I did find 3 chars on the blade. No expert but kinda looks
like chinese instead of vietnamese... but then again, that is who supplied them!
Or even more likely, that I don't know what I am talking about ...

[Caeb75]

I yhink this might be a "rice knife" Anyway...is he able to provide you with capture papers for this?

My FIL offered me a type 1 AK bayonet that he brought back from Vietnam. I asked him about capture papers, and he ran upstairs and got them. Also listed are a Type 53 which is in his safe, and something which escapes me right now. He also brought back a native crossbow with arrows, and a "rice knife"(both listed.) he gave the bow and knife away at some point, but has the other stuff.

I think I hurt his feelings a little when I told him to hold onto the bayonet, and to keep it with the type 53, and the other thing which for the life of me I can't remember what it is. I told him that it should all stay together with the papers for historical significance.

My point is that without the capture papers, it's hard to establish the provenance of an item like this.

[bhound]

saw somthing similar from atlanta cutlery on history like yours take a look.

[SteelCore]

I have a collection of old asian, filipino, javanese, and nepali blade meself. I dunno if I woulda paid that much for it, maybe offered 100. Still, when you see a unique piece that needs to be in a good collection, ya gotta snap it up.

Consider conserving the thing by coating the steel and handle in Johnson's floor wax, or a clear coat of some sort so any active rust (reddish brown) is not in contact with the air.

[turmanator]

I agree on the price. I bought it more for the historical significance of the
time and place it came from, and the operation the gent was in when he got it. And since I have some more of his belongings it makes it even cooler ... Just as a knife it is not worth it. That is why I spent several days making my decision.. but it is cool looking, too....

I will take up your suggestion and get a good coat of wax on it....... I was
actually wondering about that ....

[turmanator]

Here is the top for the sateen set I bought from the same guy I got the knife from. I got a pair of cammies too. And a demolition kit pouch and 2 compass pouches. That CIB and Jump Wings look nice on the sateens. He carried the demo kit bag on the Korean DMZ. (just to carry his junk in)
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j223/turmanator/100_4063.jpg
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j223/turmanator/100_4068.jpg

[cwo4uscgret]

Consider conserving the thing by coating the steel and handle in Johnson's floor wax, or a clear coat of some sort so any active rust (reddish brown) is not in contact with the air.


remove the rust first or else it will be eaten from within. Renaissance Wax, a museum quality hard wax with carnuba goes a long way and is (like I said) used by the Royal Museum in London among others to put a protective coating on their artifacts. Not cheap, but a little bit goes a very long, long way...

[metrotps]

One of my coworkers, 101st Airborne, who was in Vietnam from 1966 to 1969, said he is fairly sure it's a bamboo axe.

[drine]

I'm back at work today and made contact with my ARVN engineer who says it was a "farm tool". Use it for anything you needed to cut, ie bamboo, limbs, hack fish heads off, etc.. As we will all agree these folks could make a mortar out of trash left laying around so they used what they had for whatever the needed to. According to ToNY (his American name since he had a tag pinned to his shirt: (To NewYork) after the war. It would probably have been hand made in a local shop either in Vietnam or China and hence no two would be exactly alike. He has seen similar but was from the aristocratic society and says he never used one.:rolleyes:

[xrayjuan]

I saw it use on the rice fields and to cut tall grass called Pangola

[turmanator]

Thanks to all of you.I have to assume then that it is a general
purpose knife for cutting and/or harvesting stuff. It will be a
nice piece to display with my guns and stuff at the airshows
and displays we do. That and the uniform. A nice little story ...