LaBonte, etal. I too have that book so lets review a bit.
Now I am open to all comments so what follows are just ideas.
p38. The full tang, birdhead. In re-reading the description it is unclear whether this type knife was from Europe or made by Mexican blacksmiths. It was my impression it was made by Mexican blacksmiths. The long parallel thickness also seems more like a knife from bar stock which doesn't make sense.
and there's more...Bernard Levine, the knife expert, gave me some tips on how to "READ" stuff. Watch out when you see words like "This style of knife is apparently" "It is very similar" "typical of knives made". What the author is telling you is the knife shown has no history. It could be a replica or date to the 1900's. What you want is,"this scalper was recovered along with many other artifacts from excavation work at Pine City Minnesota, a post of the NW Co. that operated from 1803 to 1805."
p 42. The top knife. These Sheffield knives are said to be made between 1821 and the 1850's. The drawing shows a stamp with the word Sheffield. Now, to me, when I see Sheffield in a stamp mark it screams 1891 or later because that's when the US law went into effect on requiring the country of manufacture to be shown. I realize this particular knife was for the Mexican market but the Sheffield in the stamp seems wrong.
The bottom knife, the bolster to me makes it more a cartouche rather than a scalper.
In any event, you are right about full tangs,they sure did exist. I am pretty much focused on butcher knives and scalpers sold on the northern plains by the American Fur Company and the HBC. When I said I had not yet seen any full tangs, it was of those styles I meant.
And... half tang butcher knives are shown in the 1930 Wilson catalog so just because a knife has a half tang doesn't necessarily mean it's pre-1840.
On the full tangs, as I said Jack Adams told me the same thing about the full tang and I once spoke to the company historian at Russell/Green River who said they from the start had both half and full tangs but once again when I pressed him on any extant full tangs I got zip.
Still, doesn't mean there weren't any, just I haven't seen one yet. Although the numbers of recovered scalpers are limited, it does seem odd that they are all (to my knowledge) half tangs. And, if they were forged and high carbon steel was hard to come by, a forged half tang would be a lot easier and cheaper to produce.
On the production issue Sean raised, if anyone does a lot of forging maybe they can answer this: can you work two or three blades at once? This could reduce the time you would otherwise waste waiting for a blade to get back up to forging temperature. If this is doable, how many blades could one man forge in a day?