AN
ENGLISH RESTORER OF JAPANESE SWORDS
I
would begin by saying that I am of the firm belief that I was somehow destined
to restore the blades of Japanese swords from an early age. Apart from family
matters, swords have been the single most important thing to me in most of my
adult life and continue to be so.
During
various discussions some years ago with my good friend B W Robinson
(affectionately known as “Robbie”) we discovered that both of us had a
similar introduction to the “samurai sword”. As his has been reported
elsewhere I will not repeat it here, but for me it was when I was a junior
schoolboy. A friend’s father, who had been a Royal Marine during the Second
World War, had returned from the Far East with a samurai sword. It had a
military mount which I can no longer recall with any clarity, but I do remember
the blade had a strong curvature and a suguha hamon. At the age of about 10 or
11 years, I sat on the pavement with my friend Gary, who was lifting the sword
up high and letting it fall onto the edge of the kerb to demonstrate how
amazingly sharp, these Japanese swords were. If my memory is correct, the stones
chipped far more than the blade.
At
the tender age of 13, I was involved in shooting. This took the form of pest
control (pigeons, rabbits etc) mostly on Metropolitan Water Board property in
the east of London. An association with local gypsies refined my technique and
introduced me to a shop named “Moxams” in Forest Road, Walthamstow, which
was the in-place to buy shotguns. Here they sold second-hand shotguns at about
£5-£10 and in that same shop there were many Japanese swords for sale at
prices that were less than the guns! My mind, however, was fixed on the guns and
these were my priority. Of course,
I still regret that, although I would have liked to own a Japanese sword, guns
were still uppermost in my mind and as I was still only a schoolboy, this is how
it stayed.
School
years passed without me attending to any marked degree, being a rather sickly
individual. My mother was happy as long as I did not cause her too much trouble
whilst out fishing etc rather than attending school. I still have a school
report that is quite damning of my behaviour, much to the utter disbelief of my
grandchildren. It was around this time that I met a 15 year old lady who was to
change my life forever.
My
next encounter with a Japanese sword was at a karate club. On looking at the
sword, I was truly impressed. One of the members of the club said that his
father had two similar swords and that he might be willing to sell them, but the
club sensei was to have first refusal on them. The following week passed
painfully slowly, but sure enough the student turned up with the two swords at
the scheduled time. One was a fully mounted gunto with an openwork iron tsuba
that I later learned was termed as a sukashi-tsuba and the other was a very
rusty blade in shira-saya, hilt and habaki. As sensei had more money than me, he
got the gunto (which turned out to have an arsenal blade) and I the other sword
that was in worse condition. However, this was a reasonable gendaito by Sadaroku
and this was the sword that launched me onto the restoration trail.
I
would come home after a hard day’s piecework laying bricks and go straight
into our little outhouse with the sword and some jeweller’s rouge. I would
then spend much of the evening rubbing at the rust and am pleased to say that I
never did anything worse than that!
One
day, after borrowing £60 from the karate club’s funds, I went to a shop in
Islington and bought a shin-gunto. I subsequently discovered that it was not a
real blade and managed to sell it to Rising Sun Antiques.
I then bought a sword at the London Arms Fair which was held at Lancaster
Gate at this time. As I was now practising Iai-do as well as karate-do, it was
possible to use this sword with Hi for my practice, my Iai-to having broken in
half just with practice cutting. I asked permission to use this live blade and
was first in the dojo to use such a blade for all of my practice.
The
main sword retailer that I knew of at that time was the Islington establishment
known as “Call to Arms”. This shop was owned by Chris Farlow who had been a
“one hit wonder” on Top of the Pops. There was also Regimentals owned by a
certain Malcolm Fisher.
Chris
Farlow and I had a somewhat turbulent acquaintance. However, Chris had a brother
who lived in America who would advertise there for him. As soon as he had a
gathered a few, Chris would go over to The States and come back with a crate
load of swords. . When they arrived at the shop, Chris would call me in to
appraise the shipment. I would always be honest in the appraisal and tell him
which I considered to be good, not so good, Gunto etc in so far as my limited
knowledge allowed. He would repay
me for my honesty by allowing me to buy a blade at almost cost price.
One
of the swords which I bought from Chris for only £50 was badly bent and gimei
but now has a Hozon paper from the NBTHK. I also still have a wakizashi with a
well cut Horimono for which I paid £130. It was rusty, bent and chipped and
declared as gimei at NBTHK shinsa but will be going into the NTHK shinsa to be
held in the UK in November 2008, as a mumei blade. Over the years quite a few
gendaito, as well as arsenal stamped blades have passed through my hands... Most
were sold because of economic necessities but I am only able to remember one or
two that I really wanted to part with.
When
I started to try to polish swords, I sold the family car and bought a cheaper
one. This enabled me to buy polishing stones in Japan, as my Aikido sensei was
visiting Japan at that time. This turned out to be good for me as I had been in
contact with a Mr Omino who had a sword business in Japan. My friend hurt his
shoulder doing Aikido in Japan and I had given him, what to me was a
considerable amount of money, to take to Mr Omino and to purchase for me as many
of the stones on my list, as was possible.
Fortunately
for me, Mr Omino was away and the lady in his shop allowed my sensei to
photograph the polishing set-up and sent my friend to the wholesale supplier of
polishing stones. The wholesaler could speak no English and my friend no
Japanese, so my friend was taken by the supplier to a nearby YMCA building.
Here, with the help of a language student, they managed to fill my order.
My friend was instructed to tell me that I could put any questions I
might have to the supplier who, in turn, would put them to a polisher. There
would be some delay whilst translations were made to both questions and replies.
I
will leave my elation at this arrangement to your imagination and some years
later, the supplier’s wife came to England with a lady friend who had done the
translating. I met them on their first evening with a very large bouquet of
flowers and the supplier’s wife came to my home for dinner. This sealed a
friendship which has lasted over 20 years and is still as strong today.
Two
dealers, Mr David Parker and Mr Tony Gibb were the first to entrust me with
polishing work, shortly after which, I bit the bullet and gave up full time
building and sub-contracting work, and started to restore blades. When Tony
Chapman agreed to show me some polishing techniques, I was overjoyed and I often
travelled to Basildon to be shown a little something, but as his then domestic
situation was difficult, these visits were often cut short.
Tony
later moved to Halstead with a new partner he called me one day for a chat and
told me of Mishina Kenji’s impending visit and he said we would both learn
much. My first meeting with Mishina san went well, but thereafter the situation
unfortunately became progressively strained...
As
I have stated on many occasions, Mishina Kenji was a great inspiration to me and
an encouragement to do better work. Of course, I am still constantly trying to
improve my polishing, both for the benefit of the swords and myself and
certainly it has never been for financial gain. For me it is an honour to do
what I do, but sadly, financial considerations are unavoidably part of
everything in this modern age.
Some
20 years ago, a sympathetic local bank manager, gave me the chance to go to
Japan to study polishing for a few months. My wife and family, however, had not
been away on vacation for several years and so I felt it impossible and selfish
to indulge myself in such a personal quest. I have come to appreciate that time
is the most precious gift that we have and unfortunately finances have never
been adequate for me to travel to Japan, even pre-supposing that somebody would
take me on and teach me more. Now, with my age and health, it is inconceivable
that I could be separated from my wife and family, for even a relatively short
time.
Last
year was great year for me. Firstly, Mishina Kenji gave me some welcome advice
on the selection of polishing stones and very kindly sent me some Hazuya and
Jizua. This was followed by a visit from Abe Kazunori to the Seni martial arts
show in London’s docklands. Abe
sensei gave me much help and advice and allows me to e-mail and write to him
with any questions I might have. Of course, this is a very slow business but has
been a most rewarding experience.
Before
this time, for a good number of years working on my own, I developed my own
style of finishing work. This was prompted by a request to polish some swords
for Birmingham Museum and I attempted to develop a finish that was suitable for
viewing details of swords, especially the hamon and jihada, when the swords were
viewed through glass, as we all know how difficult it is to see blades displayed
in this manner. I believe that I achieved this goal, but some said that the
polish was too “bright” and lacked a degree of subtlety. I agree that it was
bright but still good enough for the swords to pass NBTHK shinsa, even to the
level of Tokubetsu Hozon, of which I am very proud.
I
have never been completely satisfied with my work and if I were, I am sure I
would become complacent, but daily, with the help of my Japanese friends, I
strive to improve my technique. There are variations in what the Honami,
Yoshikawa, Fujishiro and Ono Kokoei sensei say about almost every aspect of
polishing, except they all agree that the Jizuya and Nugui stages are the most
difficult tasks and I have certainly found that to be the case.
My
workshop is not ideally suited to produce really great polishes. It lacks air
conditioning, and dust extractors but I am reasonably confident at the moment,
that there are few who are able to provide the service and polish that I do, at
the same cost. However, I have to admit that some of my polishes leave my
workshop with some fine visible
scratches from the jizuya and
occasionally a customer may point this out, as “constructive criticism”. In
such cases I will often smile to myself and take the sword back to spend more
time on the finish.
In
conclusion, I would say that I would not willingly change my work even if the
remuneration were increased by 50x! I consider myself very privileged to be in a
position to save and restore many Japanese swords.
Tony
Norman
London,
September 2008
ADDITION
I
would like to add that in the recent past a sword that I polished went Hozon
Token and the owner was told by the agent that if the blade was refinished
by the Japanese polisher that he uses it
could then go straight to the Juyo Token shinsa and be expected
to pass, once the blade was re polished. It was decided
that rather than get a Juyo Token certificate, it would get Tokubetsu Hozon
which it did receive. This as happened on at least one
other occasion to my certain knowledge.
Previously as already mentioned above, the other blade received Tokubetsu Hozon in my polish, but unfortunately it failed Juyo Token after re polish by a top Japanese polisher. I am so proud of the fact that my work is of a standard for Juyo potential to be recognised.
Of course both blade's were even more beautiful after the Japanese Polisher's had finished them.
I
would also like to say that I abhor the use of ACID
e.c.t. on Japanese Sword's, as all to often I see the damage it can cause.
T.
Norman Oct 5th 2008