The Sandbar Fight
A coffin handled Bowie Knife.
Main article:
Sandbar Fight
The first knife, with which Bowie became famous, allegedly was designed by Jim Bowie's brother Rezin in
Avoyelles Parish, Louisiana and smithed by blacksmith Jesse Cleft out of an old file.<SUP id=cite_ref-MC_3-7 class=reference>
[4]</SUP> Period court documents indicate that
Rezin Bowie and Cleft were well acquainted with one another. Rezin's granddaughter claimed in an 1885 letter to
Louisiana State University that she personally witnessed Cleft make the knife for her grandfather.
This knife became famous as the knife used by Bowie at the
Sandbar Fight, which was the famous 1827
duel between Bowie and several men including a Major Norris Wright of
Alexandria, Louisiana.<SUP id=cite_ref-MC_3-8 class=reference>
[4]</SUP> The fight took place on a
sandbar in the
Mississippi River across from
Natchez, Mississippi. In this battle Bowie was stabbed, shot, and beaten half to death but managed to win the fight using the large knife.<SUP id=cite_ref-MC_3-9 class=reference>
[4]</SUP>
Jim Bowie's older brother John claimed that the knife at the Sandbar Fight was not Cleft's knife, but a knife specifically made for Bowie by a blacksmith named Snowden.
James Black's Bowie Knife
The most famous version of the Bowie knife was designed by Jim Bowie and presented to
Arkansas blacksmith James Black in the form of a carved wooden model in December 1830.<SUP id=cite_ref-MC_3-10 class=reference>
[4]</SUP> Black produced the knife ordered by Bowie, and at the same time created another based on Bowie's original design but with a sharpened edge on the curved top edge of the blade. Black offered Bowie his choice and Bowie chose the modified version.<SUP id=cite_ref-RJ_6-1 class=reference>
[7]</SUP> Knives like that one, with a blade shaped like that of the Bowie knife, but with a pronounced false edge, are today called "Sheffield Bowie" knives, because this blade shape became so popular that cutlery factories in
Sheffield,
England were mass-producing such knives for export to the U.S. by 1850, usually with a handle made from either hardwood,
deer antler, or bone, and sometimes with a guard and other fittings of sterling silver.<SUP id=cite_ref-MC_3-11 class=reference>
[4]</SUP>
Bowie returned, with the Black-made knife, to
Texas and was involved in a knife fight with three men who had been hired to kill him.<SUP id=cite_ref-PG_7-0 class=reference>
[8]</SUP> Bowie killed the three would-be assassins with his new knife and the fame of the knife grew.<SUP id=cite_ref-MC_3-12 class=reference>
[4]</SUP> Legend holds that one man was almost decapitated, the second was disemboweled, and the third had his skull split open.<SUP id=cite_ref-MC_3-13 class=reference>
[4]</SUP> Bowie died at the
Battle of the Alamo five years later and both he and his knife became more famous. The fate of the original Bowie knife is unknown; however, a knife bearing the engraving "Bowie No. 1" has been acquired by the
Historic Arkansas Museum from a Texas collector and has been attributed to Black through scientific analysis.
Black soon did a booming business making and selling these knives out of his shop in
Washington, Arkansas. Black continued to refine his technique and improve the quality of the knife as he went. In 1839, shortly after his wife's death, Black was nearly blinded when, while he was in bed with illness, his father-in-law and former partner broke into his home and attacked him with a club, having objected to his daughter having married Black years earlier. Black was no longer able to continue in his trade.
Black's knives were known to be exceedingly tough, yet flexible, and his technique has not been duplicated. Black kept his technique secret and did all of his work behind a leather curtain. Many claim that Black rediscovered the secret of producing true
Damascus steel.<SUP id=cite_ref-RJ_6-2 class=reference>
[7]</SUP>
In 1870, at the age of 70, Black attempted to pass on his secret to the son of the family that had cared for him in his old age,
Daniel Webster Jones. However, Black had been retired for many years and found that he himself had forgotten the secret. Jones would later become Governor of Arkansas.
The birthplace of the Bowie knife is now part of the
Old Washington Historic State Park which has over 40 restored historical buildings and other facilities including Black's shop. The park is known as "The
Colonial Williamsburg of Arkansas". The
American Bladesmith Society established the William F. Moran School of Bladesmithing at this site to instruct new apprentices as well as journeyman, and mastersmiths in the art of bladesmithing.
