Grenadier Guards Officer’s Sword Lt Col A E Ponsonby

Very interesting sword pre regulation 1854 pattern although produced by Wilkinson Sword in 1854 number 5313. The sword is a pattern 1822 with folding guard however has a Wilkinson solid steel gilt and patent tang with oringal leather liner. The slightly curved blade etched with VR Crown flaming grenade and owners crest and motto plus Henry Wilkinson Pal Mall London Patent Solid Hilt the spin numbered 5313. It is complete with black leather scabbard with gilt mounts. Arthur Edward Valette Ponsonby was born on 4 December 1827 in Malta, the son of Major-General Frederick Ponsonby and a nephew of the 4th Earl of Bessborough. In 1850 he was commissioned into the Grenadier Guards and stayed with them until 21 April 1863 when he transferred to the Suffolk Regiment to take command of their 2nd Battalion, then serving in Dublin. He was an unconventional soldier, full of enterprise and ideas. One of his first innovations was a battalion journal, the East Suffolk Gazette, believed to be the first such publication in the Army. His father Major General Hon. Sir Frederick Cavendish Ponsonby GCMG KCB KCH was at Waterloo Campaign, the 12th Light Dragoons were attached to Sir John Ormsby Vandeleur’s light cavalry brigade. At the Battle of Waterloo, the 12th and 16th Light Dragoons were told to charge down the slope, but no further, to support the withdrawal of the Union Brigade of heavy cavalry. But, like the Union Brigade (led by his second cousin, William Ponsonby), the light horse charged (as he later admitted) too far.