Bowie-Knife Fighter: David "Buckskin" Evans

The following excerpt is from John Speer's Bloody Kansas: Life of Gen. James H. Lane (1896), a chronicle of the violent period when settlers fought over whether Kansas would enter the Union as a free or slave state. It tells the tale of David "Buckskin" Evans, an anti-slavery fighter of the rough-and-tumble school:

In the troubles of 1855, Messrs. Wemple and William Ross, brother-in-law and brother of Ex-Senator Ross, brought to Lawrence, from Shelby county, Missouri, a free colored man, with all his certificates of freedom regularly certified and sealed by the officers of the proper court, and a white Missourian named David Evans, as farm hands. Evans was a Free-State man of very marked characteristics.

The Pro-Slavery men expressed doubts about the freedom of Jonas, the negro and wanted to investigate "the nigger-thieves." Dave took it up, and armed to the teeth with bowie-knives and revolvers, drove them off.

Lane heard of him and his prowess, and hired him for fifteen dollars a month "just to stand around and accommodate ruffians spoiling for a fight." He was known as Buckskin, because he wore a buckskin suit, and he was ready for a fight either "fist and skull, or with the cold steel and malleable iron."

His first job of "fist and skull" was on Luke Corlew, a noted bully, whom he pounded terribly, tore his clothes from him, and ran him, half-naked, out of the town. They gave Buckskin a wide berth after that -- shied away from him; and for a long time, he was a terror to all of them.

Soldier Survives Knife in Skull

This is an old ABC News item, dating from December 2007, but still of interest:

 Sgt. Dan Powers

Soldier Survives Knife in Skull
ABC News
Oct. 31, 2007
Of all the injuries in the war in Iraq, the one Sgt. Dan Powers sustained was among the most unusual.

Powers, a member of the Army's 118th MP Company Airborne, was in eastern Baghdad investigating an explosion when suddenly an Iraqi walked up to him and stabbed him in the right side of his head. He didn't know what hit him.

"It felt like someone kind of clothesline tackled me and a thump on the side of the head, like a bang," he said.

An Iraqi teenager had inched up behind Powers on a Baghdad street and plunged a 9-inch knife deep into his skull, penetrating his brain.

 Knife with which Power was stabbed.

Powers, who did not realize he had been stabbed, reacted quickly by throwing his attacker to the ground. Sgt. Michael Riley then tackled the man and turned him over to Iraqi security forces.

"He had no idea what had really happened," said Spc. Ryan Webb, a company medic. "I did have to fight afew people off that came by and were like, 'Whoa,you've got a knife sticking out of your head.'"

Amazingly, Powers remained conscious and alert as he was rushed to a combat hospital, when he finally noticed the knife and realized the gravity of his injury.

"They kept telling me to go sit down, they didn't tell me how bad I was hurt yet," Powers said.

Video report on knife in head

Miraculous Survival

Just a few hours later, doctors in Iraq prepared to take the daring but necessary action of pulling the knife out of Powers' skull -- a move they knew might kill him, and almost did.

Powers lost 2 liters of blood -- about 40 percent of the total in his body.

Back home now at Ft. Bragg, Powers and his wife Trudy are counting their blessings.

"All along I knew he would live because I know him and I know how strong a guy he is," Trudy said.

Amazingly, Powers' memory, speech and coordination are all intact.

"I have a little bit of a loss of sensation on my face due to all of it and I can't raise my right eyebrow. So I am kind of like Mr. Spock," Powers joked.

And Powers is forever grateful for the care he received from the military.

"Those are the heroes to me. They're my heroes," he said. "I am just glad to have made it when so many didn't."

Thanks to the doctors' skill and Sgt. Dan Powers' determination to get back into the service, he made a complete recovery within two years and is once again a fully-qualified paratrooper with the 118th MP Company out of Ft. Bragg.

Krav Maga Defense Against Knife to the Throat

When I see a technique like this demonstrated, I always wonder if it has ever actually worked in the real world or is just a confidence-building exercise.

Affray at Talbotton

From the Brooklyn Eagle, January 28, 1846:

AFFRAY AT TALBOTTON - We learn, says the Charleston Evening News of the 23d inst, by an extract of a letter received in this city from Talbotton, Georgia, that an affray occurred in that place on Thursday last, between two young men of the names of Chambers and Ceily, in the course of which Ceily cut Chambers nearly in two with a bowie knife. Chambers lived about a minute. Ceily was immediately arrested and imprisoned. A strong guard was placed around the gaol in consequence of an apprehension that an attempt would be made by Ceily's friends to rescue him. Ceily was confined last summer for ninety days in consequence of having made an attempt on the life of his uncle with a bowie knife.

Traditional Swedish Knife-Making

This is an interesting video on traditional knife-making technique, demonstrated by Julius Pettersson of Karlsborg, Sweden. The making of the handle is particularly interesting, as is the beautifully decorated knife shown at the video's end.

Bowie Knife Murderer Tied to Tree

Report of a murder in Alaska in the 1890s:

Murder in Alaska
SEATTLE, Oct. 25.-The passengers of the steamer Farallon, which arrived here yesterday from Alaska, brings the news of a murder committed near Lake Tagish on October 1st. Two men from Seattle, named Henderson and Peterson, quarreled over a trivial matter, and Henderson, after stabbing Peterson with a bowie knife several times, drew a revolver and beat his victim's head into a jelly. Peterson died soon after from the effects of his wounds, and Henderson was arrested and bound to a tree for ten days, until the arrival of the Canadian Mounted Police, who took him to Dawson City for trial.

Texans Armed With Bowie Knives in Civil War

From The Gulf States Historical Magazine, Volume 2 (July 1903), comes this description of the production of bowie knives for Texas troops:

Enlistment in Texas commenced in earnest in June 1861. Arms and all necessary military equipments were exceedingly scarce. No attempt in Texas, was made to arm men who enlisted for service east of the Mississippi river. Outside of the arms and munitions that had been secured from the Federal troops in the state, which had been turned over to the Confederate states by the Convention, there were no arms, except double-barreled shot guns, hunting rifles, and pistols, that belonged to private individuals. The state had made some appropriations to buy arms, and ammunition had been procured, but not a tithe needful to meet the demand. The most of the companies raised for service west of the river equipped themselves as best they could, with such arms as each man had, and such clothing as he had or could procure. . . . At this time, the Texas soldier seemed to be impressed with the idea that hand-to-hand and man to man fights would frequently occur, and that in such case a bowie knife, or some other big knife, was an indispensable part of his fighting outfit, and as the knife never failed to fire, the Texas soldier was strongly impressed in favor of the knife. To supply this demand for knives the merchant's stocks in the country were soon depleted, and then came a demand for all of the new and old files that could be found large enough to make a bowie knife; and so it was that the demand for . . . knives kept the blacksmiths busy day and night. They did not carry the big knives long, for they soon found them useless and burdensome. Another curious idea occurred in the early part of the war. Colonel Carter raised a regiment of cavalry, and proposed to arm them with iron spears, into which wooden handles, about twelve or fourteen feet long were fitted. The writer saw a number of these weapons. They were certainly a strange anomaly in modern warfare. Whether the Colonel really armed his men with these lances, the writer does not know. These weapons of a bygone age only emphasized the scarcity of arms and the straits of the Confederacy to arm and equip her soldiers. A brigade of those poorly armed Texas cavalry, who were dismounted and made into infantry by order of General Holmes in 1862, was marched into Arkansas and camped between the Arkansas and White rivers, not very far from Duvall's Bluff. Many of these soldiers had no arms at all, some had nothing better than shot guns and squirrel rifles, with very little ammunition, and what they had were of poor quality, and ill suited to their guns. While so camped, the brigade was ordered post haste to meet a rumored detachment of the enemy, marching up White river. These Texas soldiers manifested the utmost eagerness to meet the enemy. The rumor proved to be false. No enemy appeared, and this was fortunate, for equipped as the Texans were it would have been murder for them to have met a well armed and disciplined foe.