I am not an historian, That sword is a Masonic Templar sword. They are worn by members of the York Rite (a masonic appendant body popular in the United States, I am not sure about the rest of the world). This means that the relative to whom the sword belonged as a Master Mason, and a member of a Commandery where he received the Order of the Temple degree. I would like to note that this group has no direct ties to historic Templars, and merely adopted symbolism from the historic chivalric orders.

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In Freemasonry, all masons are members of the regular "Blue Lodge" and are Master Masons. Once one becomes a MM they are eligible to join other groups like the York Rite, Scottish Rite and Shrine. Many people are most familiar with the Shrine due to their famous Shrine Burn Hospitals that they support and their active participation in many parades and their traveling circus.

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The York Rite is broken down into 3 sub groups known as Chapters of Royal Arch Masons, Council of Cryptic Masons and Commandery, which the Knight Templar degree is a part of. Here is a link to the website of the Grand Commandery of Knights Templar which is still an active masonic group. http://www.knightstemplar.org/index.html

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If you know which state your relative was a member in, you may be able to reach out to the Grand Encampment for that state to find out more about your relatives membership, as well as to the Grand Lodge for that state to see when your relative joined as well.

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Mods, If this post is not sufficient for this sub I understand if you need to remove it.

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