UBB.threads Forums Edged Weapons Army, Navy, and Luftwaffe Forum Unmarked Kriegsmarine Dagger

I recently settled an amazing deal with the same neighbor who gifted me the 2nd model Luft. My dad and I are going to rebuild a fence, and in exchange, I received the rest of the man's daggers, consisting of 2 KM daggers, an RAD hewer, and a rare Randall Made model 2 dagger that was carried in action in Normandy. I will be posting the German daggers here as I get time to photograph them. If you want to see the Randall, I have posted it in USMF here: https://www.usmilitariaforum.com/forums/index.php?/topic/394188-named-wwii-randall-model-2-8/
Anyway, here is the first KM dagger. It is unmarked and unetched. I think it's in pretty good condition, although it is missing one band from the scabbard. The scabbard has lost a fair bit of its gilding. Why were some KM daggers etched and others left blank, were the blank ones for NCO's? Also, approximately how much value does the missing part detract? I'm really happy to have this in my collection and would appreciate any thoughts, opinions, or additional info. Thanks!

Hello Coyote_Kyle! The dagger you do show us seems to be -as far I can see from these pics which are not too detailed- an unmarked WKC one. Unmarked navies are much more rare than the common ones with blade etching but less sought after. The reason for the unetched blade might be that the dagger has been a "Kammerstueck" (NCOs and men could lend a dagger for walk out if necessary) but in this case it mostly would be numbered. As it is not it is highly assumable that the buyer of this dagger simply wanted to spare money (daggers with unetched blades naturally were less expensive than those with ethed blade). In regard that nobody sees the blade when worn it might be a legit consideration.
It is a shame that the second scabbard band with ring is missing but it is what it is. Although this happenes from time to time with armies, up to now I have not seeen this at any navy dagger. Imho the missing part lowers the worth of the dagger severe, I would think about 20%. On the other side the dagger is in overall good condition, no hits to the scabbard, flawless grip, a lot of "gilding" remained, so, as said, it is what it is.
Regards,

Well I never lived next door to anyone like that either.
What a outstanding Randall, and with that prov, wat a score.
Now my US fighting knife collection just took a huge hit.
Very nice.
And the KM also
Ed

Interesting, thanks for the comments! I will be posting the other KM here soon.