WORLD WAR II, PACIFIC THEATER: US MARINE RAIDER STILETTO.

A US Marine Raider Stiletto, metal blade and handle. [1942-45].

A US Marine Raider Stiletto, metal blade and handle. [1942-45]. Unmarked, the hilt cast in a new zinc-aluminum alloy. Length 12.25 inches (310mm). With a leather scabbard, marked Hunter, with scratched name J.Emett on the verso.
Provenance: The War Museum.

The US Marine Raider Stiletto was the first knife in USMC history to be designed by a US Marine Corps officer, one Lieutenant Colonel Clifford H Shuey. Shuey designed the knife in 1942, largely copying the Fairburn-Sykes pattern, and it was issued on a selective basis to the marine forces mostly out in the Pacific. The marines of the 1st and 2nd Raider Battalions received it in 1942, and although good for silent warfare, could not do the many jobs a knife was supposed to do. It was replaced n 1943 by the 1219C2 knife. Included in the lot is a press photograph of a marine carrying a example of this stiletto. As a result of a flaw in the manufacturing process the stiletto had flaws affecting the handle, which often corroded badly in the field, and as a result, the surviving examples are few and rare, and highly sought after.