NCO armament?

[Sheogorath]

ROFL, right. You've been out of school a while, I take it?

Probably not even from the US. The most 'nationalist' education I got was a back when I lived in Oregon and they constantly taught us about either the Oregon Trail or Lewis and Clark, those being the only two events of any historical significance to take place in Oregon.
I do, however, constantly hear about how nationalistic and evil the US education system is from people who dont live in the US. Maybe I just missed the 'Nationalist Indoctrination' days.

[Martok]

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

What I remember of school coverage on the War of 1812 was it was basically a wash. I'm pretty sure it's taught accurately, if lacking detail.

Ditto that. I was taught that the war was pretty much a draw. We beat back the British, while our invasion of Canada was a miserable/laughable failure.

Back to topic:

Going by the screenshots and trailers/movies, it appears that officers will wield swords/sabers and possibly pistols as well. I don't know how accurate that would be for the time period, although I know it was like that half a century later in the American Civil War.

[Sheogorath]

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Ditto that. I was taught that the war was pretty much a draw. We beat back the British, while our invasion of Canada was a miserable/laughable failure.

Back to topic:

Going by the screenshots and trailers/movies, it appears that officers will wield swords/sabers and possibly pistols as well. I don't know how accurate that would be for the time period, although I know it was like that half a century later in the American Civil War.

As I said in the OP, my knowledge is generally limited to the Russian army, but they withdrew the halberd from standard service in the middle of the Napoleonic Wars (about 1802, I think). Roughly the same time they started issuing cuiriasses to their curiassiers :P
I think, though, that at the start of the game, pretty much all regular infantry (IE: Not militias or guerrillas) should have a sword, dagger, or some other melee sidearm. Those only generally fell out of service after the bayonet was introduced...and sometimes not even then (I think the Swedes in particular held onto the sword as a standard infantry weapon for quite a while.)