John Musgrave Waite

rdf:langString John Musgrave Waite

rdf:langString John Musgrave Waite (c. 1820 – 13 September 1884) was a Victorian fencing master (sabre, singlestick, small-sword, foil), non-commissioned officer in the 2nd Life Guards. "A master who had a considerable following between about 1865 and 1880 was JohnMusgrave Waite, formerly Corporal-Quartermaster in the Second Life Guards, a regiment inwhich the tradition of the sabre had always been maintained. As far as the small-sword wasconcerned, Waite had been the pupil of Pierre Prévost, but his speciality was the sabre andthe singlestick, about which he wrote a book called Lessons in Sabre, Singlestick, Sabre and Bayonet, and Sword Feats; or, How to use a cut and thrust Sword, published in 1880. Sir Frederick Pollock, who joined Waite's school in 1868, says that his master had never been able to acquire that lightness of hand which would have enabled him to compete with his French colleagues, but that his lessons were excellent and profitable. Waite's genius lay in teaching the sabre, the practice version of which weapon was then a most formidable affair, far different from the feather-weight Italian sabre used today."