THIS DAGGER IS A MEDIEVAL MAYHEM WITH MODERN EFFICIENCY

The Spartan-Harsey Dagger is a collaboration between Spartan Blades and longtime designer William “Bill” Harsey Jr. It embodies both the tradition of this iconic fighting blade along with design improvements and modern manufacturing excellence.

DAGGER’S LONG HISTORY

Daggers have something of a mystique about them, and we often see them symbolized in military heraldry and unit crests, particularly among special operations groups. The dagger present on the U.S. Special Forces crest in particular has become a symbol of freedom that goes hand in hand with the SF motto “De Opresso Liber,” or “to free the oppressed.”

“The dagger is a blade with a lot of history behind it, and the rendition of combat dagger that Bill Harsey has come up with is truly excellent.”

Despite the somewhat romanticized image that you might get from these symbols, the fact is that historically the dagger was a brutal, close quarters combat tool. In the Middle Ages, the dagger was used to attack gaps in enemy armor at the joints or to penetrate the eye slots of the helmet. In the 20th century, we didn’t have to worry so much about armor, but it developed into a specialist’s tool, particularly with special operations units, for close-quarters fighting and sentry removal.

The Spartan-Harsey Dagger is a specialist’s tool. This isn’t a camp knife or a utility knife. It’s a tool that’s hyper focused on anti-personnel use. At 10 ¾ inches long and nearly 7 ounces in weight, the Spartan-Harsey makes for a formidable fighting blade.

Probably the best known of 20th century military daggers is the British Fairbairn-Sykes, which was used by Commonwealth troops from 1941 until present day. Despite its long and continued service, there are some deficiencies in the design that soldiers have identified from use, such as a relatively fragile point, a narrow tang, and a small diameter grip.

When knife designer William W. Harsey Jr. sat down to design what he felt a combat dagger should be, it’s obvious he gave more than a nod to the Fairbairn-Sykes, but with an eye toward avoiding its weak spots.

THE SPARTAN-HARSEY

William “Bill” Harsey Jr. has an impressive resume of knife designs with a number of companies, and he uses his own extensive experience working with the Special Operations community to come up with designs that are effective and practical.

In the case of the Spartan-Harsey Dagger, he took the good aspects of the Fairbairn-Sykes design but improved upon them with top quality modern materials and enhanced engineering principles to come up with a dagger that was not only extremely functional, but also much stronger.

“When I moved to overhand ice pick stabs, I could bury the blade easily up to the guard.”

The Harsey Dagger uses a Coke bottle shaped handle with spiral grooves to ensure the user has a solid grip, regardless of conditions. A heavy steel cross guard keeps your hand off the blade when thrusting or stabbing.

The Spartan-Harsey Dagger is a full-tang design that’s 10 ¾ inches in overall length with a 6-inch double-edged blade. It’s made from a 3/16-inch slab of CPM S45VN steel that is vacuum heat treated with a double-deep cryogenic treatment and pressure tempering to obtain a Rockwell of 59-61. Not only is this a steel with high corrosion resistance and edge retention, but the thickness makes for a very strong knife.

The blade is coated in a PVD (Physical Vapor Deposition) finish with either a flat black DLC (Diamond Like Coating) or a Flat Dark Earth ZrN (Zirconium Nitride) color. The PVD coating forms a molecular bond to the steel and provides for the toughest finish available today that won’t corrode, discolor, or tarnish.

A set of grooves on either side of the grip, just behind the cross guard, helps enhance the grip on the dagger.

Moving to the handle, you have a double guard to keep your hand off the blade when thrusting, followed by a 3D contoured handle of double black canvas Micarta, meaning that both the resin and canvas used to make the Micarta are black. The handles are mortised around the sturdy tang so that your hand won’t be making contact with bare metal when grasping the knife, assuming you aren’t wearing gloves.

The Harsey Dagger has a 3/16-inch-thick full tang enclosed in a set of mortised 3D scales made from double black canvas Micarta.

The handle of the Spartan-Harsey has a Coke bottle shaped handle with generous palm swell that’s reminiscent of the Fairbairn-Sykes, but more hand filling. The handle scales have a spiral pattern cut into them that gives texture and a set of finger grooves just behind the guard on either side. The handle swells at the pommel to keep the hand in place and is capped by an exposed tang with a skull crusher.

The Spartan-Harsey Dagger uses CPM S45VN steel which has improved edge retention, wear resistance, corrosion resistance, and toughness over S35VN.

The dagger comes with either a nylon sheath in black, coyote brown, or MultiCam, or a black or coyote brown Kydex sheath. The nylon sheath has a hard insert and can be worn on the belt or attached to MOLLE gear. MOLLE loops on the front of the sheath allow you to attach an additional pouch for a multitool, folding knife, or other gear. The Kydex sheath comes with a MOLLE loop, but it can also be fitted with a Tek Lok if that’s your preference. A very nice leather sheath made by Chattanooga Leatherworks is also available for $120 if you want a more traditional look.

TO THE TEST

I checked with my neighbors to see if anyone needed any sentries removed, or if the trench works around the housing plan needed to be cleared, but alas, I came up dry on both counts. Lacking any real world testing, I headed to the garage. At the time, my garage was probably a balmy 25 degrees, which was considerably better than the 8 degrees and foot of snow we had outside.

Daggers are a little harder to test than field knives because they really aren’t designed for cutting stakes, prepping kindling, processing game, or camp cooking. They definitely have a much more martial purpose. While you certainly could use it to cut open your MRE pouch, I suspect most folks pair the dagger with a decent folder or multitool for utility work.

Bill Harsey has been designing knives for over 40 years. During that time, he’s worked with myriad other designers, knifemakers, and companies such as Rex Applegate and Gerber Legendary Blades.

The Spartan-Harsey has a good feel in hand. It’s solid and the almost 7-ounce weight is a comforting heft. The balance point of the knife is about a half-inch behind the guard, so it was a slightly handle heavy feel. The Coke bottle shaped handle is comfortable in the hand, and the texture and finger grooves give a reassuring grip without being overly aggressive.

A traditional saber grip (holding the blade parallel to the ground with your thumb on the blade flat) or an ice pick/reverse grip works equally well with the dagger. The handle heavy feel tends to make the blade nimble in the hand.

The Spartan-Harsey moves easily and strikes fast.

SLASHING AND STABBING

I used a 6-foot-high sheet of cardboard, stacked six layers deep for my initial slashing and stabbing tests. This was an appliance box that was considerably thicker than a typical shipping box. I was saving it to use for target backers but hey, it was 8 degrees outside. I wasn’t likely to be shooting outside for a while.

Unlike other military issue blades, such as the M9 and OKC-3S bayonets, the Spartan-Harsey Dagger is a sleek, specialized tool. It carries lighter, takes up less space, and is much more efficient at tasks such as sentry removal than the typical issued blade.

Daggers aren’t really made for slashing, but I wanted to see how the Spartan-Harsey would do. So, I did a series of forward and back slashes on the target. The tip on the dagger is extremely sharp and it did slash deeply into the fist-sized layer of cardboard. It would likely slash through light clothing such as a t-shirt, but I believe heavier clothing could stop or at least significantly minimize effective slashes. That’s OK though, because the dagger’s primary job is stabbing.

Spartan offers either a nylon MOLLE compatible sheath with the dagger or a Kydex model. A leather sheath is available as an option.

Using underhand thrusts, I could punch through the cardboard up to about an inch or so above the cross guard. Horizontal thrusts gave me similar penetration. When I moved to overhand ice pick stabs, I could bury the blade easily up to the guard. I wanted to try something denser, so I moved to the old phone book stab test.

For anyone under 30, just Google “phone book” or ask your parents. A phone book is considerably denser than a fleshy target, but it gives an easily measurable penetration distance. I put on a work glove so that I could really stab full force and my best stab was 611 pages in, right in the “L” section of the book on the Lawyers page. Also, I added a double layer of denim and tried again and found that punching through the denim did provide some resistance; I only got to page 523 that time.

The full tang is exposed in a skull crusher point at the pommel of the knife.

Then I moved to a piece of leather from an old blacksmithing apron, which dropped me to 509 pages, landing on the contact numbers for hospitals. The last round was through both the double layer of denim and the leather. I got to page 435, so there was a considerable effect on penetration. I considered testing the dagger on one of my old Kevlar vests, but based upon my results in the stacked cardboard and through the phone book, I’m confident it would have punched right through that without any problems.

WHO NEEDS A DAGGER?

Well, if you’re in one of the select professions where you do need to creep up on people in the middle of the night and send them off to meet Elvis, then you absolutely need one. It’s also a solid choice for grunts, although I’d suggest pairing it up with a folder for utility use, such as the Spartan Talos or Astor. Save the dagger for serious work; open your care packages with your folder.

The author tested penetration by stabbing into a phone book bare, and covered in denim and leather. If you’ve never seen a phone book before, it’s what old writers used to use before ballistic gel tests.

Some social occasions warrant serious tools to achieve the desired result. One could do considerably worse than a Spartan-Harsey Dagger and a set of RMJ Snuckles when things get close and intimate.

Even if you aren’t in one those professions, I can see a lot of folks, myself included, wanting one for what it represents. The dagger is a blade with a lot of history behind it, and the rendition of combat dagger that Bill Harsey has come up with is truly excellent. Add in the top-quality materials, and superb build done by the folks at Spartan, and you have one of the preeminent examples of 21st century dagger craft.


A History of Design

If you’re a regular reader of Knives Illustrated, there’s a good chance you’re already familiar with Bill Harsey and his work. Even if you aren’t sure, you’ve probably run into his work without knowing it. Bill started making knives in 1980 after being inspired by Bob Loveless. Not long after, he met and became friends with Al Mar and did custom and prototyping work for him. Mar was a Vietnam Vet and a Green Beret and, in turn, introduced Bill to Col. Rex Applegate.

I didn’t realize until doing some research for this article that Bill worked on the Applegate-Fairbairn dagger and ground blades for him and prototyped other designs. The two of them introduced Bill to the Special Operations community and he’s worked closely with those folks ever since.

Harsey has come up with designs and worked for many different knife companies over the years, such as Al Mar, Beretta, Chris Reeve Knives, CRKT, Fantoni SRL, Gerber, Lone Wolf Knives, Ruger Firearms, and of course Spartan Blades.

Probably my first “tactical” knife was a Gerber Harsey Air Ranger that I picked up at the PX. I carried that knife for years as an EDC knife and on Reserve weekends and annual tour. Somewhere along the way I became infatuated with the Applegate knives and gathered a number of the Gerber Applegate folders both manual and automatic, and finally snagged an Applegate-Fairbairn dagger from Boker a few years back.

When I look at Harsey’s work now as a collective whole, I see that many of the designs I was drawn to over the years were his work or his collaborations with others.

You don’t have to look hard to find a Harsey design and when you do, you can pretty much guarantee that it’s going to be solid, well thought out, and supremely functional. The designs that Bill has done with Spartan are no exception and I think I’m going to be seeing a Spartan Harsey folder in my near future.


SPECS

Spartan-Harsey Dagger

Designer: William “Bill” Harsey Jr.
Overall Length: 10 ¾ inches
Blade Length: 6 inches
Thickness of Blade: 3/16 inches
Blade Steel: CPM S45VN
Hardness of Blade: 59-61 HRC
Blade Style: Dagger
Coating: PVD—Tungsten DLC (Flat Black) or ZrN (Flat Dark Earth)
Handle Material: 3D contoured Double Black CE Canvas Micarta
Sheath: Lined nylon MOLLE sheath (black, coyote tan, or MultiCam) or Kydex with belt loop (black or coyote tan)
Weight: 6.72 ounces
MSRP: $420


SOURCE

Spartan Blades

625 S.E. Service Road Southern Pines, NC 28387

Contact@SpartanBladesUSA.com

SpartanBladesUSA.com

Editor’s Note:

A version of this article first appeared in the May/June 2022 print issue of Knives Illustrated.