3290 ELEGANT PAIR OF AMERICAN STOCKED WAR OF 1812 ERA

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This item SOLD at 2023 Nov 05 @ 15:29UTC-4 : AST/EDT
Category Firearms & Military
Auction Currency USD
Start Price 3,000.00 USD
Estimated at 6,000.00 - 8,000.00 USD
FLINTLOCK PISTOLS CARRIED BY ANCESTOR OF CIVIL WAR CAPTAIN AND FOUNDER OF MILITARY ORDER OF THE LOYAL LEGION OF THE UNITED STATES, PETER DIRCK KEYSER. Cal. 56. NSN. This beautiful pair have a refined simplistic elegance, chaste in design, American in style of early 19th Century Kentucky pistols. Barrels are British proofed. Locks are marked "I. Rea" for John Rea, London (1793-1797), with flat supported cocks & unbridled frizzens. Stocked in American walnut with single thin brass ramrod pipes & brass trigger guards with pointed plain finial ends. Ramrod channels stamped "WH" (probably William Henry, Lancaster, PA). Each pistol is branded twice "P. A. KEYSER"; Peter Keyser (1766-1849) who would have likely carried these in the War of 1812. His son Peter Augustus Keyser (1805-1869) was father of Capt. P.D. Keyser (1835-1897) whose name appears on small brass plaques along with old exhibition numbers 162 & 167 painted on each. This pair have been well cared for showing little use with 2 or3 generations having their names attached. Peter Dirck Keyser was Capt. in the 91st Pennsylvania; he was one of the three original founding members of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion United States, his membership number is "3". The Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States also known as MOLLUS was a post Civil War organization of the elite veteran military officers. It is the first and oldest Civil War fraternal organization in the US. Many highly notable military officers were members of this elite organization; including General Meade, General Custer, General Sheridan, etc. It also included past presidents who were officers; such as U.S. Grant and R.B. Hayes. The original MOLLUS headquarters had an impressive museum of past military relics (which at one time included these Keyser pistols). Around the year 2000, their building was sold and the remainder of its collection was transferred to the National Civil War Museum in Philadelphia. The organization is still in existence today. The Keyser family lineage of Germantown "Pennsylvania Dutch" dating back to 1688 emigration of Dirck Keyser (1635-1714) from Amsterdam. UNATTACHED ACCESSORIES: large file of research into Keyser family. CONDITION: fine overall, both are original & complete. Guns were cleaned & varnished back when fashionable in Victorian era. Iron is smooth gray patina overall, brass has light smooth patina. Stocks are sound & solid, one gun has chip under forward section of lock & hairline crack between sideplate & barrel plus a hairline following grain about midpoint on right side barrel channel. Even the attached plaques & inventory numbers are varnished or shellacked over. Guns are mechanically crisp, smooth pitted bores. (01-24145/JS). ANTIQUE. $6,000-8,000.