Nihonto Club

Hi,
When you pasted the pictures together, I think you left out 2 characters (the most important ones!).
In your picture, it says "Noshu Seki Ju ni-ju-san dai Fujiwara [missing] saku kore".
Noshu is a province.
Seki is a town.
Ju is "resident".
ni-ju-san is the number "23".
Dai is "generation".
Fujiwara is a historic clan name.
[missing] is the smith's art name.
Saku Kore is "made this".
So, you could translate it to be "Made by the 23rd generation Fujiwara [missing], a resident of Seki in Noshu".

There is an excellent chance that the [missing] name is Kanefusa.
I happen to own a blade by him, and mine has almost the same signature. In his signature, he claims to be the "23rd generation" of his swordsmith line. As of about 25 years ago, his descendants were still in the cutlery business in Seki - I bought a kitchen knife made by the "25th generation" Kanefusa.
Post another picture showing the entire tang, and I can verify that it is Kanefusa.

Also note that your blade has a "Seki stamp" (at the top of the signature). Google it for explanation. It means that the blade was made with "shortcuts" compared to a traditional blade.

Pete

BTW, as to value: A collector will want to see a lot more pictures showing the condition of the blade, scabbard, handguard, etc. Since it is a WWII blade with a Seki stamp, traditional Nihonto collectors will not be very interested in it (I think).
Its main value is with "militaria" collectors.

Pete

Ya, that sounds about right, my Japanese is a little lacking. I have uploaded another image of the tang, I broke out the big camera.

added 2 more images

Yes, it is Kanefusa. The Hawley reference is KAN799.
If you look at the entry here on nihontoclub: https://nihontoclub.com/smiths/KAN799 , note that there is an error in the kanji - the "ju" in 23 is the wrong kanji.

Here is the modern descendant:
http://japanesechefsknife.com/FujiwaraKanefusa.html

Pete

Thank you Pete. So the sword is just a "generic" sword. I paid $400 for it 20 years ago. Apparently it was a war trophy that hung in a gentleman's garage since he came back from the war. His son was selling it and another one that had a metal sheath at a gun show.

Thanks again.

If the blade is in reasonable shape (not too scratched, chipped, or bent), it's probably worth about twice that much now.

Pete

Thanks, Pete, I've fixed the kanji.