[wildbill]

It supposed to be true--but I'm with you, I've never seen one. One of the problems would be in melding the steel and the brass together so they'd stay together.

But you'll notice most of them have brass hilt guards. The reason for the softer metal was to "catch" the blade of the opponent

[nomorelurker]

Thanks for the post. The hilt makes sense. I will try to research how they could put a brass strip on the blade in 1830 +- 10 years?