Sawback Bayonet

[Dan Patton]

A question for you experts regarding the German Imperial sawback bayonet

from the World War...In the classic novel ALL QUIET on the WESTERN FRONT,

it was told to the young recruits that they would be mutilated and killed on the spot if

they were captured with a "sawback"...so were advised to throw them away...(or something along these lines...been a long time since I read the book)

Question...Were there, in fact, cases of this happening?...Is this the reason sawbacks are often seen

with the teeth ground off?

I've always been curious about this, as I own one dated 1916 date

Weyersberg & Kirschbaum Mfg.

Thanks,

Dan From Texas

[Tom Y]

The Germans were indeed brutalized if caught with sawbacks, but only due to British propaganda. As far as I know there was never a documented case of mutilation or torture by sawback. Sort of like spitting Belgian babies on bayonets. Toward the end of the war they were being converted under official sanction by grinding off the teeth. On October 17, 1917 the Bavarian Army ordered the exchange of all sawbacks tor plain bladed weapons except for Pioneers and on December 3 the Prussians followed suit, issuing new straight backed 98/05's and reissuing the altered sawbacks.

[Chris Boonzaier]

And although it is a great book, the authors real service credits are very, very debateable.... great author, but so would sven Hassel have been if he had stoppped at his first, and best, book.

[leigh kitchen]

British protestations at sawback bayonets were rather hypocritical given their own history with saw backs - their old saw bladed yatagans too had their saw teeth ground off.

I've yet to find reference to rough treatment handed out to Germans captured in possession of saw backs other than in "All Quiet".

A similar legend amongst the British was that Lewis Gunners got "special treatment" if captured & there are written references to their "LG" qualification badges being removed & dirt smeared over the resultant clean oval of sleeve material before an attack - but I'm not sure if I've ever read of Lewis Gunners actually being singled out for the good old "special treatment"?

[Trajan]

The real point is (no pun intended!) that German soldiers believed they would be badly treated if found with a sawback. Like the babies spitted on a bayonet, the 'terrible' sawback bayonet and the wounds it inflicted, often after the bayonet had been purposely  covered with faeces, was Belgian propaganda put out to counter the fact that the Belgians were still in the public eye for their treatment of the natives in the Congo, which included, inter alia, double hand amputations

Anyway, the German General staff managed to stiffle that belief, common in the first 12-18 months of the war only, after researching the matter. But the belief was resurrected in 1916 or so presumably after the S.84/98 - many with sawbacks - started to become the bayonet of choice for trench-raiders. Hence the order to remove the sawbacks from all front line troops and then the de-sawbacking for re-use there.

Trajan