 He was wanting to add some of my items, some of my daggers per se, because it fitted the character, you know, when you're thinking about a lot of assassins and James Bond type people. Again, it's another sort of action thriller undercover CIA, you know, that type of film. John's worked for Hollywood. He does an awful lot for charity. They'll take that actual dagger itself and they'll make like a silicon mold. Handling my weapon. Hello, legends. I hope this finds you absolutely wonderful. I'm delighted to be joined today by John Hamilton of Hamilton daggers Glasgow. John is an incredible craftsman. His work is certainly a lot better than my first attempt at knife making. John's worked for Hollywood. He does an awful lot for charity, creates these these works of art that then get auctioned off by the veterans, charities, etc., etc. I'm very proud to be a patron of John's company. Thank you for that, mate. Gosh, John, before we talk about how you got into this, can we go straight into the Hollywood thing? Because that's I just find that fascinating that you've been involved in in the filmmaking. And one of the photos you sent me was of the Bond girl, Olga Kurilenko. Yeah, who was the Bond girl in Quantum of Solace. Yeah, I've seen photos of her. Am I allowed to say handling your work? Yeah, handling my weapon. Yeah, so I'm very privileged, Chris, to. As we get older, we get to know a lot of individuals and I've got a very good friend of mine who's a director in Hollywood of the woman called Jesse B. Johnson. He produced quite a lot of films and he was aware of what I was doing when obviously I originally started. And because he does a lot of action and adventure films type of thing, usually mainly the action, he was wanting to add some of my items, some of my daggers per se, because it fitted the character. You know, when you're thinking about a lot of assassins and James Bond type people and covertly done in street alleyways. And then I mean, at night time, all these things kind of fitted in. So I was more than happy to have life, because, like I said, he's a friend anyway. So I produced a couple of first pattern daggers, the very, very first batch that I ever done. And I sent her through across a couple to Los Angeles where they were received. Obviously, you see the real dagger in the films, but clearly for the films, they get the the costume department or call them. They'll take that actual dagger itself and they'll make like a silicon mold for the more dangerous parts. And then obviously Hollywood takes over and they add the blood, etc., etc. But the good thing about it is most of the actual physically holding it in a lot of the shots is actually the real dagger, you know, obviously the cut to, you know, when something had to happen, etc. So Jesse's been fundamental, actually, in the breaking. I think we with any adventure that you go or not anything you're thinking about doing, you have to have that breaking point. And that's usually the the fight or flight, isn't it? It either works or it doesn't work type of thing. So it was quite nice to have Jesse, who basically opened the doors for me. And since then, the daggers have been basically shown in, I think it's about seven or eight films now. You know, all over the place. And he's actually just done another couple in Budapest. Again, it's another sort of action thriller undercover CIA, you know, that type of film. And there's another couple of daggers that I've sent across that he's actually he's been shown in the films as well to use it because here's the thing. That's what they've designed for the classic stilettos and it's those kind of individuals that would have used them not so much back in the day, still today, if that makes sense, because nothing's changed, you know. Well, well, we we chatted about this, didn't we? You said that you had Royal Marines and fellow commando or other commandos by your commissions to take to Afghanistan. Yeah, you know, absolutely. I'm very privileged now in my latter years like yourself. We know a lot of individuals, obviously being a commando myself. For ex-commando now, because obviously my time is done. I've done 25 years. But through the brotherhood, shall we say, you get to know a lot of different people, a lot of different people get to know you. So before, you know, when you start opening things up like Facebook groups and stuff like that, you get all these guys who are familiar with somebody else that you know, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So the family builds and all of a sudden they're starting to get a lot of messages for the classic range. All black daggers. So we've got the second pattern, roped and ribbed fat boys or fat men, whatever you want to call them, et cetera, et cetera. And a lot of these guys were going on operations. Quite a lot of the guys are probably based around the pool area. You've got the SF signals. You've got the SP boys that are down there as well. One, four, eight commando battery part of two nine commando. They're down there. And yes, a lot have went in that direction. But not just specifically in that niche SF world. Your normal commando units as well, four, five, four, two, 40, two nine commando. I'm going to say five nine because five nine was my time. But I think they're renamed to it could be 30 commando or something like that. They've got a new title that I'm not really aware of because I'm not in anymore. So I don't really pay attention to it. Commando log, everybody, everybody's been doing it because the guys are operational now and as we very well know, warfare changed. You know, it's it's not the conventional warfare that I would have been more familiar with during my time, fighting unknown enemy in a uniform, et cetera. Now it's a kind of you're in ravines in the middle of Afghanistan and things like that. And then you're moving into cave complexes where there's no ambient light and all you've got is them. You know, that type of thing. There's guys as hereditary boys that I've spoke to and I've said some that way as well. They were telling me stories about Torah Bora and things like that. I've known guys through my career from those backgrounds that we have discussed at length stories about Torah Bora, for example, and things that happened there. And unfortunately, some of the mental health issues that people get when they come back from places like that due to the claimant that they find themselves in. Hence the reason why they use what they use to get the job done. John, how if you serve so long, where was where was the time to pick up the skills to to get into knife making? It wasn't and I didn't. That's the whole thing. I had left the military. I've had one or two daggers, you know, during my service time, I think. Nothing fancy, just what it was. Most of the time, it was things that you came across. I've got out and everybody reaches that crossroads when you get out. You don't really quite know what to do or where you want to go. But because I was quite a high rank when I got out, I had decided quite early on, whilst I was still in the latter stages that I was going to keep away from the turmoil of life, shall we say, and try and settle down a little bit in a bit of a quiet time, try and enjoy myself, you know. So then I got to thinking about. Not so much knife making, parsee. I wanted something to collect. I got into a little bit of history, special commando history. I started learning about it. I started meeting people, veterans, etc., etc. I started collecting some World War Two examples, daggers, which were very, very tactile. And you kind of get that sort of buzz off them when you hold them in your hand, you know, and I was looking at it and I thought, I just assure you, they don't do these anymore, isn't it? Then I realized it was probably around the world. There was a couple of people that were doing making one or two things. I thought, you know what, I'm quite a handy guy. I'm good at stuff. So I might have a go at this. And basically that's exactly what I did. There was a Belgian commando friend of mine sent me an old tattered dagger across and asked me if I could fix it up from which I did. And I sent it back to him. And he kind of got the inspiration going because he said, you should do this as a living, right, whatever, in sort of a laughter off type of thing as you do. But then I walked in the door, guys, we all do the big man moments when you do your big man thinking. I thought, hmm, what is involved in this? That's OK, we can do this. We can do that. Could I do that? Well, there's only one way to do it. You try it, don't you? Initially, friends got on boards and supported what I was doing, which was fantastic. And then before you know it, I've got a little batch gone. Straight away, gone. How? How? I mean. Your work is just exceptional. Friends, I'm not sure if I mentioned, but John very kindly. Created, I'm not going to say knocked up because it just doesn't do his work justice. He created this work of art, this. Beautiful commando dagger. When I led the veterans, nine mile speed march up there at Nicari, the home of the the original home of the commando or Churchill's commandos. And so we went out there and smashed out this. The command at the Royal Marine's nine mile commando test. Some of us are almost 50 years old. And like I say, John very kindly gave us one of his daggers in support that we auctioned off. It made an awe. We it made over a thousand pounds, John, didn't it? It did. Yeah, yeah. The bids just I think it was closer to two thousand in the end. The bids just and a lot of the old. Old timers. Can we say that? It says I'm almost old time on myself. But I think they just gobsmacked that they can like buy it. They have access to actually buy something that that is that is so sort of special to them. And it was all I could do make to make this thing, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm very aware it's, you know, I'm a novice to to to to to get all the gear friends watching, you can do it cheaper. But that's about two and a half thousand pounds worth of equipment and supplies just to make just to make your first knife. How did you know how to temper stuff and sharpen it? And this is part of the process. And the good thing about being in the military, it gives you that mental way of thinking, I say of all those analysing the process. So I've basically done a combat estimate if we're going to keep it sort of military speak. And I looked at things. Now, obviously, you can get guys or Blacksmiths have already got the forge set up. You can buy little killings for a better word. Or you can go to people who've already got that set up already done. So why go out and buy a killing when, you know, a company who already owns it because that's what they do. They fabricate steel to certain rock wells, etc. So if you had something produced, then you could take it to them. And obviously they will then heat it to the required temperature for you. Show us anything that you've got there, mate, by the way. Is that quite clear? Can you see that? OK? Yes. Now, you can see that lovely little bone. I appreciate it. It's got a background and you can't see it. That's a blank. That's how the blank gets cut. What type of steel is that chance? That's A.S.S. I.S. 10 85. So it's a carbon steel. It's your classic carbon steel, almost like a tool steel. The reason why we use it is because when it gets hardens for military grades, it has to be fit for purpose. It has to be able to do the job as we very well know, like Benets, etc., etc. Daggers have got the exact same principles. We call them daggers. We call them knights that actually stilettos as we were and talked about before. Everything's got a purpose in life. This is not a gear, but this is not a multi-tool. This is a weapon that's been designed for a specific job and that job only something you need to carry. So basically that there gets turned into. That there, you'll be familiar with that one, mate, because that's the one. That was auctioned off the first pattern. That, as you can see, comes from that. I was never sure whether they were made from one single piece of steel, but now you've shown us like that. Clearly, the handle and the help and the what do you call the finger guard? Yeah, yeah, it's interesting what you said, because you actually are correct. Yeah, you're actually you've got quite a mechanical brain, and it's actually very good to thinking about this. Not everybody does it like that. Some people will do the blades and part of the time is just cut and then it gets welded. They'll do a welded section on to it with a thread on it because during the heating process, things can bend. That's all to do with the the thickness of the blade prior to the heat treatment, does that make sense? If it's too thin, it'll bend. So you've got to do like a first grind first of all. So it's got quite a bit of thickness on it. Then it'll be heat treated. Then it comes back to you. But by doing that, you've then created another monster because now you've only done the first grinding and you've got subsequent grinds that have to be done after that. The metal is now hardened. So when it comes to the paper wise and on your belts and on the sanders, et cetera, the grinders, it takes a lot more damage, a lot more effect out of those machines. Whereas in its softened state, it's quite malleable and you can get it to roughly where you want it to be, you know? So you're absolutely correct in what you're saying. I do it the traditional way where it's the full time. Nothing has changed since World War Two. That's the way our blind would have been produced. Then it gets subsequently profiled after that table thing. I so I built a furnace out of two fire bricks, yeah, like breeze block size. Yeah, and I hollowed out the oven in the middle of them. Yes, a hole in it for for a the most expensive blow torch. I think you can buy in in the shops, you know? Yeah. And I got this thing. I got the blade fired up until it was cherry. Yes. And it's a distinct color. You can't mistake it. You look at it. You're like that. And then it went straight in an ammo can full of I think it was vegetable oil. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm holding it there for you. Please don't bend. Don't walk. Don't walk. And then after that, I think you further temper it and put it in the oven. Yeah, again, you basically take them up and you take them in layman's terms. You take them up and take them back down again, you know, to get things done. But what we are talking about, that's that's a lot of information. So a guy, we not a lot of knowledge on that, or would you go and seek help and ask somebody who's been doing it for 60 years? And they know exactly what's been going on about that they're not producing them for you. They're not doing the blades for you. But these individuals, that's their job. So when you do give them something, you get back what you give them. Does that does that make sense? You know, we don't have the little instances when you put a hell of a lot of effort and work into something. And like you say, you can take it out and it's like a boomerang, you know, because you've got something wrong because you didn't know that, I don't know, you should have put a pinch of salt in there or something like that to counteract this thing, you know. So I looked at everything and I looked at what was available. But I thought, well, why not use people as well? Because it's all about helping other industries and businesses out as well. That's how you build a little community of people that look after each other. It's not an insular thing. It's not a personal thing. You know, when you're making one dagger or two daggers, well, of course, you can have a little furnace where you can preheat and do your treatments and stuff like that. But when you're making batches of 30, it's not feasible, Chris, you know, it's just not feasible. So you think they've got to get a little bit industrial and you've got to up your level a little bit hence the reason why you have to get other agencies involved and helping out in the process to get things done, just like they've always done. That's how they always do it, you know. Fascinating, incredible. I hadn't even, you know, considered. So, John, can you just tell us a bit? Because we get a lot of parrots watch the show. Yeah. The Arnhem knife was quite a beautiful one, was it not? Yeah, yeah. Arnhem 44. Yeah, it was Arnhem 44. It was a big celebration. Clearly, everybody who's in military circles, they will associate the dagger, the commando dagger with commandos because it was originally conceived for that sort of concept. But it's also fair to point out that as the war progressed, there was a airborne forces were created. The dagger then became, if you fell into the caveat of elite forces, your units could obviously indent to get these things issued to you, which a lot of them have. So when you look at a lot of the old Arnhem footage, you'll see a lot of guys that have actually got daggers on their kit, etc. There's one or two reasons for that. One, the guys got them issued, but two, it's remembering that airborne forces were actually created from commandos. That's the whole point because some of the army commando units were then parachute trained. So these guys were obviously issued daggers anyway. The Arnhem Boys is a huge group of, we're talking 17, 20,000 guys on Facebook. Obviously, they've got internet connections and stuff as well. I'm very good friend of a guy called Darren Kay, and he's one of the admins of the Arnhem Boys Facebook group. And they approached me and he spoke about Arnhem 44 because it was a couple of years ago now. Forgive me, I can't remember the exact dates. And they were talking about doing a charity event. But could I make them a batch of daggers, i.e. 30 daggers? And I thought it's a bit of a push because they're not mine. It's a one-man army. Obviously, I've got a team of friends that help out on the internet and Facebook and stuff. But the actual guy that gets the majority of the stuff done is myself. So I said, yeah, no problems at all. And we wanted to focus on the parachute regiment itself, the glender pilots and the reconnaissance. I'll call them reconnaissance brigade, the reconnaissance unit. So it was the three main elements of the airborne forces that went in. And we'd done some of them. So out of that 30 daggers, let's just say, 17 was allocated to parachute regiments. You know, five or six was allocated to each subsequent one. I got them all made. I informed Darren that they were all made. That was fine. It came o'clock across and collected them, took them back. All gone. Literally, they went online just within the airborne community. And I think they sold out and probably I'm going to exaggerate slightly, but I'd say no longer than 36 hours. Better than many people have got lights. They were not all online all the time. Everybody's at work and stuff. Thirty six hours, the entire batches were gone and they went all over the world. So there was absolutely correct. There was that huge airborne connection as well. You can probably see there's an airborne bearing in the background there that I got off one of the guys who sent me up. Can you see that? OK, Chris, on the... Yes, can do, mate. All these things are all things that guys have sent me through the command zone and the airborne brotherhood. Just as a thank you, as an acknowledgement of things. So they're more successful. And then with them daggers as well, they've also got the airborne tulip front, again, which is done by the armed employees. And they've done several daggers, which they have auctioned off. And all proceeds, all proceeds go directly to the man, to the charity, for example, for the tulips, where they go out and they get the young Dutch kids and they're planting all the bulbs and stuff and remembering so the individuals and then they grow up, etc. So yeah, so it was a big undertaking, but it was absolutely really worth it. And a lot of goods came from it. There's a lot of people out there who maybe can't look after themselves anymore. They're fed on hard times, etc. And that's the one thing about coming from the military background. We might not be in it anymore, but we can help. We can do something. I can do a lot of things, but what I can do is make them and if I have to make one and give it away, that's fine. Because if that's going to buy somebody a tumble dryer who needs one, I'm all for it. Because I'd like to think that maybe the greater world one day if I fed on bad times, somebody would come and help me. You know, that's just the kind of way my philosophy of life is actually, you know. Give us an idea, John. What are the things? I mean, you obviously make the commando knife. What other things do you get commissioned to make and what sort of scale do you have to produce them at? It's mainly unlike a lot of guys that are out there who go into making bowey knives and things like that. I am very niche and I am very specific. I've only really got the one interest and that happens to be making daggers. But when it comes to making daggers, I can quite comfortably and factually say this, I have made the biggest range of daggers, roped and ribbed, beaded and ribbed, nine beat and six beat. Two different variants, second patterns, first patterns that the device goes on. The classic ones have been in black, others have been nickel plated. There's nobody else on the planet that's made as many different variants of daggers. And what I can to get a little kick out of is the original concepts came around in World War Two. Having known about it, I've studied them, having owned them. I've studied them and I've tried to improve on little single things like maybe making the blade a little tatch thinner so it's better in the hand and proving the grips slightly by making the knurling. Just that micron, a little bit deeper. So you get a bit of punchiness on it, making it a few ounces heavier. So you get a bit of balance on the daggers. Have you ever put a little magnifying glass in the handle and a little pair of tweezers that you can pull out? No, no, no, no, not as of yet. I've got a couple of ideas that I'll show you. That's the fat boy there. It's basically a second pattern, but as you can see, the grip is a lot thicker. It's actually one of my favourites because it's very, very good in the hand. I like a trumpet grip, you see. The last time that was made was during the World War Two. Nobody's ever done it, so I was the first guy to come around to do that. Obviously, you'll have individuals in the world that have maybe made one since, but, you know, in a batch level, nobody's ever done it. So I've done that. We've got the standard third pattern that everybody will be familiar with. Again, this is classic range. Now, what does it mean by classic range? It's important at this stage to point out these are not reproductions. These are originals. Hamilton daggers, Glasgow's originals. The concept was derived during World War Two. And they actually kind of got it right. So where do you go from that? Well, you have to do the same sort of thing because I still let one dagger as a dagger if you agree, you know? But when you do improvements on it, you've got to get the technical drawings done, you've got to go and visit people and foundries to get things done the way that you want. That's kind of what you can come up with. The classic range is where I've done a range where in tribute and homage to the artisans during World War Two period. And the commandos who used it, the grip, for example, is blackened in the same way that they'd done it during that period. So as you can probably see there, Chris, it can, it will patina down, maybe it's a bit bright, it will patina down. So you get that classic World War Two look to it. And why do you get the look? Well, that's because the daggers done the same way. All I've done is refinement. When you've got a thing that's been refined to the point where it's nearly perfect, there's not a lot of places you can go with it, if that makes sense. But a lot of people get confused with terminology to say, oh, yeah, that's just a post-war copy. No, there's not a post-war copy. That's a Hamilton dagger Glasgow dagger. That's original to me and I've made that. And there must be something in it because everybody wants one. Surely there's a difference between a reproduction and a copy anyway, isn't there? That's absolutely correct. Absolutely correct. And what it is, it's people's lack of understanding of the terminology when you just stand there. You know, a reproduction is when you take a thing, you microscopically look at it and you try and imitate and copy everything about that thing to sell it as a copy or a reproduction of that thing. A copy is a little bit flyer. A copy is when you copy it again, just like a reproduction, but you're selling it as the real thing. Does that hence the reason why fake? You know, people say, oh, yeah, that's a fake dagger, you know. And the materials can be inferior, can't they? That's exactly the thing that you've got to embrace. We're not in 1942 anymore. You know, in 2023 and the beauty of life, the beauty of science, the beauty of industry, everything has come along. So why not make something better? And here's the thing that got me. I was a part of a brigade for basically the most of my life. And the dagger symbolises everything. It's about about a commando. It's his heart, his soul and his blood that comes through his veins. But here's the irony. They actually don't really get issued them anymore. So everything about them is all dagger orientated, but they don't have one. And I feel that was unacceptable. Now, I'm not planning to get some sort of Ministry of Defence, you know, contract type of thing, because I'm not skilled for that. I'm just a bloke that does his thing. But as we were speaking about earlier on, when the communities get slightly smaller and slightly more niche in the SF world, I've sent quite a few to pool to other places. Shall we say that? Obviously, I'm not going to mention. I reckon if they were to issue all these commandos and the new Scouts Regiment and the parrots, if when you passed that training, you got issued a commando knife. I reckon that would be more worth more personally than you, Barry. Yeah, you're exactly right. And that's what I thought as well, because it's quite hard to put into words which things that we're talking about, which is emotions and feelings, you know, you've been there. I know what I've been there. I can't quite put it into it. But that dagger, it's a rite of passage, isn't it? You know, you've done that, you're getting the berry and stuff, and it's what you've become. And I understand modern rules of conflict, et cetera, and I understand that there is ways to dispatch the enemy, humanely, et cetera, et cetera, things have changed. But every single soldier or every single Marine, Air Force personnel, whatever, Matlow that goes away, they all carry some sort of knife. They go and buy them themselves. So I sort of looked at that and I thought, well, that's actually unacceptable. So I'm going to approach a few people, which brings me on nicely. This is the Kraken, which is the new HDG second part. I've changed all the different elements of it. Now, the good thing about this is I think I've sent you a few pictures across Chris, where you can probably see a little white dot there, which is actually a luminous. I came up with the concept because during times on operations and stuff, even though your kits packed and you've got all your stuff on, and you know where it is. Sometimes you just need that little combat indicator, just so when you look down onto your belt kit, you can just see this little tiny glow and that tells you that that's your new best friend. It's just sitting right there. In modern day operations, you've only got a millisecond to make a decision, that lights your millisecond to locate something so you're not fumbling about in the box and gloves, a fear go on. You can see what you need to do. You can draw it out. Obviously, the nut, the actual grip itself, the guard and the blade, these are all getting made from different materials, which is one good for the soldier, or the Marine, or the commando, or the paratrooper. Aluminium grips, nice and lightweight, could also be chemically anodized. We're still keeping a mild steel guard because you need some sort of protection. Stainless steel blade, which has been blackened. Your standard steel nut because you still need to retain the strength on it. And obviously, the luminous chemicals that we put in the base armor. A little bit lighter than standard, which changed the balance slightly, so I had to change the geometrics of the actual blade itself. So basically when we talk about balance, that's balance. When we talk about a balance dagger, it's from throwing it from hand to hand and catching it in the same place. If it was unbalanced, it would tumble and it would catch Vicky Berger, you know? So that's one that we're doing, and that's the latest batch. And I can quite comfortably assure you there's a small batch of these which are going south and there's a small batch of these which are going slightly north, you know, as we speak. That's one that's been finished, but I've just kept it to one side to show you type of thing. So to answer your question, yes, they actually are getting trialed as we speak now, mate. Wow, incredible, incredible. And can we just, I think it wouldn't be fair to end the podcast before talking about Sykes Fairburn. Could you explain that? Could you explain for people at home? Fairburn and Sykes, two separate individuals, two elderly men actually, when they became famous, they were actually elderly men. Coming from a, basically coming from a police background, when we had the empire, we had the colonies, there was a lot of trouble in certain areas. China being one of the problems, Shanghai in particular. Fairburn and Sykes being a policeman and good policeman were sitting across there because they had various skills and they learned from the local Chinese population because there was a lot of knife crime, et cetera. So they would pick up little bits of skills from the indigenous population and obviously weapons as well, they would come across different types of weapons. And they devised your common dagger, which has been around, by the way, a long time before Fairburn and Sykes even thought about a dagger, knights would have daggers, et cetera. Romans had daggers because funny old thing, a dagger's a dagger and it still looks like a dagger today. A Roman dagger doesn't really look any different from a modern commando dagger, apart from it's been refined a little bit more. So they came up with the concept, World War II started, these gentlemen were very talented, you know, when it came to the on-on combat and things like that, you know, and using weapons. So in the naivety of the early British foresees, government at that time, we weren't prepared for World War II. So we had to grab everybody in that we were requiring to help train. They set up, obviously, originally it was, I think it was luckier lot, they went up to, that was before the Commando Training Centre was there, where they'd send individuals up to be trained. And that's when the naivety came into it, Fairburn and Sykes, probably more Fairburn, he was more the front man of that, I think Sykes was a slightly more reserved guy in the background. They then got interlocked in with Wilkinson, Wilkinson would invite them down, what do you want? Well, I would like something like this type of thing, they'd make, you know, prototypes, et cetera, well like that, no, you need to refine that a little bit, do this a little bit, and then they sort of came up with the classic first pattern concept. But when you think about it really, Wilkinson has been renowned for making small arms, weapons, knives, swords, since they came into existence way back, obviously they're no longer in existence now. A first pattern dagger is actually a shrunken down version of an 1888 Bennett. If you look at an 1888 Bennett, it's a huge Fairburn and Sykes. So they did listen to the guy, but they've still done what they've always done. Their guys are trained to make a certain type of thing. So ironically, when this guy said, I'd like this little thing, you know, about a seven inch blade, you know, five inch handle, about 11 inches in total, that I can conceal, right, okay. They go to the grinders, and the grinders were just blanks. These grinders have been making all these 1888 Bennett, it's the whole life. So what do you think the blade came out looking like a miniaturized 1888 Bennett, with a little twerker on it, you know. But when it came to the balancing and the handling, that's when it gets more scientific, when people actually had to start counting the ounces when they were doing things and making molds for things and trying to get it right. You know, so that's how the Fairburn and Sykes came around. People often use the tail, in my opinion, a little bit too much. They came to class every sort of dagger as a Fairburn and Sykes, you know, because it's like a whitewash type of thing, isn't it? Which you're not entirely wrong, but bearing in mind the most influential one was the first pattern. It was only in for a year. People forget that. You know, everybody raves about first patterns and stuff like that. Operationally, it was only around for around about a year. Why? Too much old Victorian type of messing around during a quite a serious war, you know, with the Espen guards and all the fancy etchies and stuff. Why do we go to the second pattern? You don't need an Espen guard, you have a straight guard. I don't need the fancier castle on the blade and I definitely don't need the fancy etchies because that's adventing money, it's adventing manpower, it's adventing time. Refine, refine, refine. When we say refine, it actually means simplify. The second pattern came along, which in my opinion is the best fighting knife ever. Absolutely ever. It has been perfected, no matter what you do to it, it's just perfect. And it's just designed to do exactly what it does. Again, that was too much of a hassle as things became slightly more worrying during the war. And they asked them if they could refine that process as well. Now we're going into the mass production because commando training was coming along. We were talking small groups of men. I think we were talking over 26,000 over the whole period, you know. That's when the classic third pattern dagger, I mean this one that everybody recognizes with the rings, the ribs around it, that came in and they were basically produced from molds. So yes, they did simplify it, but that was because it was a necessity to be simplified, you know. And that's what kind of inspired me to look back at these things that they've done in homage, not to recreate, to make something, but improve upon it. If you're going to do something, try and improve upon it, but keep the standards to the same standards as everything, you know. And my classic thing is if it's not good enough for me, it's not good enough for you. That's it, you know. This is what I carried in the Marines. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I had one myself, yeah. Yeah. Is that a little, is that a parachute tag on that? Yeah, that's the, yeah. Parachute release, what do you call it? Like your weakest link, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So friends at home, that's what pulled, that bit there is what pulls your parachute out. I think many of us, when we did our jumps course, you grab your last one as a, So I'm talking. As a souvenir that you've passed your course. That's the original holder. I think I have my Normark knife in it, which is what all Marines used to carry, Normark being a Norwegian brand. I always loved the Swiss Army knife. Yeah. Particularly in black, because it's just that bit different and so yeah. So that's actually my replacement, the first Swiss Army knife got a bit battered, but yeah, that's what I mean, because it's funny, the great thing about being in the Marine, what one really good thing is, unless it's changed now, you're still allowed to carry a knife. Yeah, of course, yes, sir. And like this, the state of this country now, where, you know, because they're deemed a danger and which, let's be honest, they are in inner city violence, they are young people, can't carry, I mean, it would never stop me go, you know, obviously I take my knife when I go camping or if I go to the woods with my son, we take a machete and a bushcraft knife to. It used to be back in the day, long before ever time, when young kids, but they were given pen knives and stuff like that, you know, that was part and parcel because we were outside a lot more, you know, back in the 50s, 60s and stuff like that, all young kids had pen knives and stuff, but yeah, absolutely, carry a knife save a life is the better way of looking at it. My son's first birthday present job was a knife. Yeah, yeah, yeah, well, my son's a grown man now, but you can imagine with me being his dad, all the way through the things that I was picking up throughout my career, you know, he's been spoiled when it comes to water trophies and things like that, you know. And the last thing I wanted to ask you, have you ever thought about, or have you been to Japan? I've not been to Japan, I've got a couple of good friends who have actually been stationed in Japan. It is something now that I'm maybe contemplating doing slightly later on because it's a completely different world, isn't it? They've got two wicked museums in Tokyo, one's just outside the city, and that's where it's the history of the katana, so the history of the samurai sword. It shows you, it's just incredible to see how they used to pile the coke onto the iron, get the iron ore from the rock, you know, a special way to do it, special furnace that drops they collect the iron ore at the bottom of the furnace, then they sprinkle coke onto it, not that kind of coke folks, the coal burn coal to put the carbon in, then they hammer it into a little square block, then they fold it and then they hammer it and they fold, they said to, well, if the film Highlanders anything to believe, they would fold their blades anything up to a thousand times. I think that might be a bit extreme. Yeah, a little bit of a push, a little bit of a push. And in Tokyo itself, there's the National Museum and it's, there's so many katanas in there and they're just incredible, incredible to think that they produce to the standard you do and vice versa, but they did it with no modern machinery. Yeah, yeah, and that's the thing, that this is the evolution of things. These Smiths, they would have been around, as we know for thousands of years producing these items because they're a warning people, they're always arms, it's in the culture, it's in the society, not so much now, but it was back then, a lot of rival clans fighting each other. So you need people to do it, but as time's going on and industries caught up with it, the Western world shall we say, they can do all that stuff in a day because they'll just smelt all the stuff industrially, everything will get banged out, but it's not quite the same. And I think there's a lot of these original Smiths, they're actually struggling now to find apprentices because it's almost like a dying art. But they'll take like a month just to produce the steel, to make board the actual blade. And the whole thing to do might take up to a year for that one-off sword. And that's the complete craftsmanship of it. It's that individual who's master of none, but Jack of all, he knows all the different processes, and he's specified in each one. And as an individual for myself, that's kind of what I have to do. It's a bit like when you're talking about the daggers, so not only have I got to grind blades, but I've got to understand how to polish blades, how to put an edge on blades, how to butter blades. What grit do you use? When you're more industrial, you've got certain departments that deal with all those subcategories. As an individual, as an artisan, I've got to do all of that myself. And the end result is that all those different levels to produce that, everything from the nuts to the tip. Understand every element and how to do it all. That's the difference. It's beyond words, mate. It's beyond words. Have you got Japanese wet stones? I actually believe it. Believe it, I'm not used to them yet, but I did. My future son-in-law actually went out on Christmas ago. He actually bought me some, and he's got a little wood type of a holder. You put it into stock and put it in a boat, you know, that type of stuff. And they did intimidate me slightly. I must admit, I've never used them, because I've never actually been able to use them on probably what I'm doing. But there is a few kitchen knives that need to get sorted out, and I'm probably going to, when I'm a little bit freer, I'm probably going to do a few of them. I'm just giving a good sharpen up and a good clean, you know. Yeah, I learned the knife sharpening from watching Ray Mears' videos. And he said, you've got to get these Japanese wet stones. I bought a load on eBay or something. Absolutely fascinating chatting. We're going to put all your links below. So, folks out there, if you've got anything, you know, if you want to commission some daggers from John, getting contact. Absolutely. Getting contact just to discuss your knees. I'm sure if John can't do it, he'll know the person that can. No, absolutely. And that goes for yourself as well, Chris. Any of the things that you're doing, mate, please let me know if I can help. I will help. You know that. Yes. I have something to ask you after the show. No, that's fine, mate. That's absolutely no problems at all. I hope you've enjoyed that as much as I have. Massive thank you to John and Hamilton Daggers Glasgow. If you can like and subscribe, that would be wonderful. And we'll see you next time. Thank you.