The Delaware Historical Society’s collection includes a sword that originally belonged to Captain William Robeson (1743–1815), a shopkeeper and landowner from Newport, DE. Robeson served as a captain in Colonel Thomas Duff’s Whig Battalion of the New Castle County Militia during the American Revolution. In 1791, he represented New Castle County in the Delaware House of Representatives. In 1800, Robeson retired and turned his business over to his son, Alexander. After Robeson’s death, the sword passed to his daughter Jane and her husband, Dr. Allan Thomson, who then donated it to the Delaware Historical Society during the 1876 Centennial celebrations. Robeson’s sword, which dates to c. 1775, is a colichemarde—a lightweight, rapier-like sword that first appeared around 1680 and remained fashionable until the late 18th century. The upper seven inches of the blade feature arabesque designs, and the silver hilt has an engraved guard, one side of which is engraved with “Liberty & Property.” Both of these concepts, later so central to the framers of the U.S. Constitution, were clearly already part of a nascent American sense of identity. The other side of the hilt is engraved with “WR Sep. 1, 1775.” The delicate silver knuckle guard has a decorative twist at the center and is stamped with ”JS” for John Stow, a silversmith active in Philadelphia from 1769 to 1772, before moving to Wilmington, DE, to set up shop on Market Street.