Something About Us
I had a lot of fun with the John Paisley story (bottom of this page) and I hope you do too. I received a lot of additional tales of his exploits from friends and visitors to the site. It appears Paisley has been very active in the CIA and other dark ops positions. So anyway I hope you get a laugh out of it. I decided to add a short profile and a couple photos so you know something about the man behind the insanity and this web site. You see, I may be new to the web, but I am not new to fighting knives.
I have been collecting and researching fighting knives for over 50 years now. Not just any old knives like, hunting knives, bayonets or utility knives, but fighting knives, modern and much older. My heritage is Scottish, I'm a Highlander and I am very proud of that. It is also the initial source of my interest in swords, fighting knives and daggers. I was raised an Army brat and served four years in the USN SeaBees (running bull-dozers mostly). I volunteered for duty in Vietnam in 1968 and was stationed in Danang with MCB53. I also spent a year at the Camp David presidential retreat.
Much later in life I took up GoJu ryu karate and advanced to black belt and became an instructor. I also started training in Silat and Bowie knife-fighting, Iaido and kenjutsu, a little wing chun. My great passion was/is Yagyu Shinkage Ryu, a family school of Japanese swordsmanship reaching back over 400 years. My instructor is Yagyu Koichi, the 22nd head master. So my familiarity with edged weapons is fairly broad and deep. A few fencing and rapier classes over the years, while not making me an adept, certainly gave me some appreciation of the fine skills and techniques involved. I melded all of this into my classes as an instructor and eventually into my first book on knife defense, "Hittatsu no Hyoshi" which means "the Rhythm of One." I hope the following photos give you some idea of who I am and my background. Thanks for all of your support and for visiting our site!
Much later in life I took up GoJu ryu karate and advanced to black belt and became an instructor. I also started training in Silat and Bowie knife-fighting, Iaido and kenjutsu, a little wing chun. My great passion was/is Yagyu Shinkage Ryu, a family school of Japanese swordsmanship reaching back over 400 years. My instructor is Yagyu Koichi, the 22nd head master. So my familiarity with edged weapons is fairly broad and deep. A few fencing and rapier classes over the years, while not making me an adept, certainly gave me some appreciation of the fine skills and techniques involved. I melded all of this into my classes as an instructor and eventually into my first book on knife defense, "Hittatsu no Hyoshi" which means "the Rhythm of One." I hope the following photos give you some idea of who I am and my background. Thanks for all of your support and for visiting our site!
I am not all about knives and swords, i am also interested in long range shooting and tactical carbines. Been to a few classes on both styles of shooting and I love to get out and punch holes in paper now and then, or ring steel plates at 1,000 yards. And ISIS thought all they had to worry about is the youngsters.
|
|
Below: Sword bouting in our dojo. A combative test of styles: Broadsword, Rapier, Hand & a half sword, Katana, Small Sword, and Hungarian Saber. That's me with the bokken going against a friend with rapier and dagger. Photo to the right is my daughter and I preparing to give an Iaido demo. She is the warrior woman behind White Shadow & Associates LLc, and the White Shadow dojo, a bonny lass with a heart of gold and an arm of steel. Love you kid. In these days of unspeakable horrors, its good to know your kid can defend herself. She can defend you too should you need it.
|
|
So I guess that is a broad overview of my credentials when it comes to the bladed arts and fighting knives in particular. Many thanks to all of my instructors and training partners over the past many years. Also thanks to the knife makers, dealers, friends and collectors who have shared their knives and knowledge with me. Apologies to my Abbot who tried (mostly unsuccessfully) to steer me clear of a life of martial ways and weapons to the more priestly path of peace. I am an ordained Celtic Priest, but mea culpa, as one famous Renaissance sword instructor said: I knew i could not hold a sword and a bible at the same time and I chose the sword.
Paisley and the (True) History of the FS Finally Unraveled
We have finally unraveled the mystery of the origin of the Fairbairn Sykes knife, John Paisley, and the secret location of his WW-II forge. The secret finally revealed itself with the investigation into the mystery of this wood handled fighting knife. A friend born in England helped us make the connection between this knife, a daily convenience, and one of history’s more obscure knife-makers. The long held belief in the Shanghai dagger being the progenitor of the FS knife, or any Wilkinson Sword Co. involvement, has finally been exposed as nothing more than a fluke of history. Here is the true story......and all the rest are lies.
|
|
Paisley, an itinerant knife grinder wandering the streets of Hackensack, NJ was contracted by British intelligence MI5 to produce a fighting knife to arm their operatives. The knives were to be shipped from their secret production facility somewhere across the Sinai peninsula and lower Mesopotamia to waiting British submarines that would carry them on to an intermediate destination in Shanghai.
Once they arrived in Shanghai the J.P marked knives were stamped with secret code numbers and ferried by "Yaks R Us" over the ancient spice trade route to Europe. After they finally arrived in France they were transported via small one-man kayaks to a port on the south coast of England. Due to the rapidly advancing Japanese forces, interrupting the spice route, Fairbairn was forced to escape with his stock of knives aboard a Chinese junk to England. The "WSC" stamping sometimes found on the knives refers to "Wong's Shipping Company," a sleazy purveyor of the covert knives and flammable Yak dung.
Once they arrived in Shanghai the J.P marked knives were stamped with secret code numbers and ferried by "Yaks R Us" over the ancient spice trade route to Europe. After they finally arrived in France they were transported via small one-man kayaks to a port on the south coast of England. Due to the rapidly advancing Japanese forces, interrupting the spice route, Fairbairn was forced to escape with his stock of knives aboard a Chinese junk to England. The "WSC" stamping sometimes found on the knives refers to "Wong's Shipping Company," a sleazy purveyor of the covert knives and flammable Yak dung.
|
|
Arriving back in England J.P visited London’s most famed knife and sword maker in an attempt to find a new manufacturer for his knives. They did not like his design and decided to strip the wooden handles off and replace them with ones of knurled, turned brass. ( More than one soldier was heard afterwards to remark, during training in Scotland, that the new handles were colder than the nether part of a brass monkey.)
|
Recycled handles painted white
|
The proverbial brass monkeys
|
A Scottish entrepreneur named Thomas Crapper bought the discarded handles from the famous sword maker company, painted them white, and employed them in a rather unique way. In fact, Every Brit for decades now has had his hands on the discarded knife handles (which are still charged with the solar power of the Egyptian sun), and enjoyed the combined genius of Paisley and Crapper. Yes the Brits flush with pride at the knowledge their handles somehow played a critical role in winning the war against the Germans. The Brits stoically used the wooden handles throughout the war in Loo of modern flippers like fitted on American toilets.
|
Comfy British Loo versus
|
Solid American Engineering
|
Yes I guess I gave it all away. The secret location of Paisley’s forge is tied to an obscure sect of the Lithuanian Masons. Ironically the secret location is openly displayed on the back of the American dollar bill in recognition of one of Hackensack's favorite sons and his role in winning the war against the dreaded Hun. Right, you have guessed it! Paisley’s forge was located deep in the bowels of the pharaoh’s tomb. That’s right, the first British Commando knives were created in a secret chamber in the heart of the Great Pyramid of Giza. The mystical power generated by the pyramid provided Paisley with the necessary heat for forging out the blades eliminating the need for a proper forge or anvils. Forget all that nonsense about using bayonets for blades. That was a story made up to hide the real one, which you are now privy to.
|
|
As any Irish Bard worth his Tullamore Dew would proclaim, THIS is the true story, and all of the rest are lies. signed J.P
