1850s-1860s BRASS BLACKOUT LANTERN at South Coast Antiques & Gallery, Ocean Springs, MS-SOLD

This is a fully functional and complete 1850s-1860s pre-kerosene camphene or burning fluid, dark lantern with all the features intact.  This dark lamp has a triple curtain closure that allows a single or double (reverse) spot or a complete blackout while lit.  Unlike later dark lamps, the curtain cannot be fully dropped.  The thick glass chimney has a ground upper edge and the reservoir is large-capacity made of glass with a polished pontil.  The construction of the lamp indicates it's age, as the burner sets on top of the glass reservoir and is an early pre-kerosene, non-adjustable dead flame wick type used for burning camphene. Before kerosene and coal oil, camphene was very popular from the 1840s through the Civil War, being cheaper than whale oil. 

The top of the lamp opens with a twist, revealing the chimney. The bottom of the lamp has a quick removal feature allowing for quick wick lighting and trimming.  Lamps of this nature have the function of illuminating a specific area in front and behind simultaneously or keep a single beam before the holder.  The blackout function was popular with people who did not want to be seen at night such as smugglers, grave robbers, police and thugs.  Less colorfully, they were also used in taverns, aboard ships and in stables. 

This is the finest blackout lantern I have ever had for sale and the condition is absolutely superb and complete as most of these lamps were converted to cheaper kerosene in the mid 1860s 

Sylvester Magee Last American Slave and Last Union Veteran's Autograph

Yesterday the world’s oldest living man died.  He was Walter Breuning born 21 Sept 1896 and he was 114.  But I want to talk about a man who was even older and covered more territory.

This man’s name was Sylvester Magee and he was born in 1841 and died in 1971.  Yes that right, he was 130 years old.  Born a slave and worked on a plantation in Mississippi, he escaped to freedom and joined the Union army, in 1863. Although he had no documentation of his war service, he was admitted to the VA hospital in Jackson in 1966 for pneumonia and later discharged.

Records in the probate division of the Chancery Court in Covington County, Mississippi, dated February 1859, show Magee and his father, Ephriam were owned by slave-owner Hugh Magee. Magee insists May 29, 1841, was his birth date and that he was sold to Hugh Magee’s father who died in 1859. Magee said he obtained freedom after the fall of Vicksburg and served with Union troops.

He wasn’t totally forgotten; President Lyndon Johnson sent him special greetings for his 124th birthday in 1965.   He remained obscure until an article Jet Magazine, 11 May, 1967 was published and then Time Magazine, wrote an article about him and other long-lived individuals in their Friday, Jul. 14, 1967 issue. 

I recently acquired Sylvester Magee’s autograph along with a cover letter from his friend and lawyer.  The second sheet was an affidavit, signed and sealed that the enclosed was indeed, Mr Magee’s signature.  There it was in red ink as bold and clear as you could ask.  A fine red X.  Yes, Sylvester Magee was illiterate but clear of mind.  His mind was so clear that the VA admitted him as a Union veteran and the VA representative was astounded as to the clarity of his memory of the Civil War.

Normally I wouldn’t trust an inscribed X on a document, but this one was written just before Mr Magee became famous and came with impeccable documentation.  The title of World’s Oldest man is passed from one to another, never held for long and the holder always passes it on to the next.

Magee held several titles simultaneously:  Worlds Oldest Man, Oldest Union Veteran, and Oldest Living Ex-Slave   One additional oldest might possibly be Oldest Confederate Veteran.  He had been a Confederate conscript according to the book Black Confederates by Barrow, Segars and Rosenburg, published in 2001.

Sylvester Magee passed away in 15 October 1971 and his obituary was carried in local newspapers as well as Jet Magazine, 11 May 1971.

Commemorating the 150th Anniversary of Fort Sumter at South Coast Antiques.

Today is the 150th anniversary of the firing on Fort Sumter, so I decided to do a post with a bit of historical information not available anywhere else.  Governor Francis Wilkinson Pickens was governor of South Carolina from 1860 to 1862.  He presided over the secession of South Carolina and it's admission to the Confederate States of America.

Governor Pickens authorized the firing on Fort Sumter by SC militia, which is well known as the start of the Civil War, but he also authorized the first shot fired in the civil war when he sanctioned state militia artillery to fire on the Union vessel Star of the West 9 January, 1861 during its attempt to bring supplies to Major Anderson's blockaded garrison at Fort Sumter.  His wife, Lucy Pickens witnessed the bombardment of Fort Sumter from atop a home in Charleston.

Governor Pickens was a life-long politician and diplomat.  He was Minister to England, a state representative several times and later a state senator.  Under President James Buchannan, he served as minister to Russia from 1858 to 1860 where they became close friends with Czar Alexander II, who was the godfather of their child.    Finally he was Governor of South Carolina during secession and the early part of the Civil War.

His wife, Lucy Pickens was a master socialite of the 19th century, captivating everybody, even the Czar of Russia.  She was so well known in South Carolina and through America, her face appears on the South Carolina Confederate $100 dollar bill as well as a CSA $1,000 bond.  She was the consummate southern bell and captivated everybody with her intelligence and charm.

This letter was written by Governor Pickens, with an official State of South Carolina letterhead frank to his wife on 4 July 1861.  The letter is short and terse, very unlike typical communications of Victorian couples.  I can only expect that Gov Pickens was distraught and upset.  Perhaps she was in an area of the coast that was threatened by Union invasion and he feared her capture.
We have this letter for view here at South Coast Antiques and Gallery.

Both Francis Pickens and Lucy  Pickens are interred at Willow Brook Cemetery, Edgefield, Edgefield County South Carolina, USA.  Visit their grave sites by clicking on the links.

* Update 28 July 2015 *

A reader recently asked a question about the Lucy Pickens letter and it got me reexamining the envelope, which had previously eluded deciphering despite my familiarity with mid-19^th century documents.  So, reinvigorated I went online and pulled up a few other letters written by Gov Pickens from the exact period for comparison and found that he had used runners to deliver letters in some cases. 

On the envelope, I could read “Xxxxfield” which did not match anything I could think of at the time of the first post back in 2011.  But, now I also realized that although his estate was called Edgewood, it was just outside of the town of Edgefield, in the county of Edgefield, where he built his mansion in 1829.  So relooking at “Xxxxfield”, I then understood it was the small town Edgefield, the population of which in 1860 was only 518.  His large estate and mansion was just outside of town and known by everybody in town, cleared up any uncertainty as to destination. 

Next up was some additional instructions written in the lower left hand part of the envelope.  I decided to use some comparisons of other Pickens letters in hopes of at least getting a feeling for his handwriting by sampling.  By pulling up a contemporary letter sent by Gov Pickens to General Beauregard, which was also hand-delivered, it indicated, “By Mr. Green” which meant that this Mr. Green would take it to the general.  It wasn’t a destination, it was a delivery instruction. 

Now since that I knew the letter to Lucy Pickens had to travel a good distance and not by mail.  Scouring period railroad maps, I found no railroads ran by Edgefield from Columbia, a distance of 57 miles, nor were there any convenient rivers that would give an easy steamboat trip, so any travel would have to be by road. 

I then understood the marking read, “By next boy” with a flourish at the end, just like the Gen Beauregard letter.  This letter would have to be hand carried also, by coach or by rider over a long road.  This letter had no stamps and no cancellation, not even a frank marking, which is another reason why I think it was carried by courier – “By next boy”, e.g. by the next runner to Edgefield.

 ------------------------------------------------

                               

                              Mrs F. ??. Pickens

                               Edgefield 

   By next Boy

-----------------------------------------------

Now at least some of the mystery has cleared away, although why Gov Pickens was so abrupt may never be known.  The letter was dated the morning 4^th of July 1862 so I wonder of Lucy was supposed to attend a party that night in Columbia.  If so, she probably didn’t make it.  What a shame, Lucy Pickens was one of the great luminaries of the south and her attendance at a party would have made it sparkle. 

Now don’t think that the Confederates didn’t venerate the Founding Fathers, they did.  In fact, the first few years of The United States of America, the United States was unified and operated under the Articles of Confederation.   Eventually the Articles were replaced and the new US Constitution was ratified on June 21, 1788.   Yes, the USA was a confederacy originally and yes, they broke away from “the rightful government of Britain”.  So the government and states of the CSA had every reason to observe celebrate the original American Revolution.  But that’s another story for another time.

I’d like to thank the reader for reminding me of unfinished business with the Lucy Pickens letter as it led me to reread and rediscover its destination.  Sometimes a little time must pass for the dust to settle and the handwriting becomes clearer. 

Historical reenactment , the whole "hardcore vs farb" debate

There are people out there who wear out dated clothes, they don obsolete even antique uniforms or fashion to recreate earlier times.  They spend a great deal of time trying to be accurate, getting the right accessories and to have the right "persona" for their "impression".  Historical reenactment can recreate the middle ages, the renaissance as well as the Victorian era and the American Civil War.  It covers many ages and many countries, but it always has an interest and reverence for the past.

Sometimes squabbles break out as to who is more correct to the era and egos can be inflated or bruised by a few comments.  Each and every reenactor spends time and money to make their impression as good as they can.  Sometimes even reeneactors lose touch with what they are doing.  I recently turned up a comment on line that really brought home what it is truly all about:

Cody Allen Dillman made this really excellent comment on Facebook Yesterday.
My 2 cents on the whole "hardcore vs farb*" debate, I imagine a group of Civil War veterans coming to a modern reenactment. They wouldn't go "This stitch is wrong" or "You're using the wrong cut jacket". They would come up with tears in their old weary eyes saying "THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! Thank you for remembering us and what we did." Feel free to disagree.

That my friend, sums it up as far as I am concerned.  Reenactment is a way to honor and remember the past.


*farb is a term of derision about less-than-correct or slipshod costumes, equipment or deportment in an impression.  It gets tossed around a lot.

Rare Vietnamese Silver Dolphin Tea Strainer at South Coast Antiques

Vietnamese Coin Silver Tea Strainer at South Coast Antiques

 This is a very interesting piece we got in the shop a while back.  It is a silver tea strainer.  There are several unusual features about this item, a few of which are apparent and a few which take a little time to unravel.  First of all it is a coin silver piece made in what is now Vietnam.  That alone makes it somewhat uncommon as few of them were made and fewer still made it to the U.S.  More unusual yet is the route it took to get here, but that is for later.

Vietnamese Coin Silver Tea Strainer at South Coast Antiques

Vietnam has always had a number of silver smiths, although they generally made works for wealthy locals and for items for export to British India.  This piece was made during the French colonial period of southeast Asia, which ran from the 1880s to the mid 1950s.  This piece is marked “MY NGHE VM, HANOI, HTX.TINH HOA A.S.X., 0.900” and weighs just over two and a half ounces.  What we now know as Vietnam was broken into two areas called Annan in the south and Tonkin in the north.  The French made Hanoi the capital of Tonkin in 1902.

I date this piece to being from around 1910 to 1930 or so based on the fact that French Indo China (and later Vietnam) was involved in a series of civil wars, rebellions, invasions, communist states and the like from the 1930s to circa 1975.  During this period I don’t expect that occupying Japanese and later the communists would have allowed a western export luxury good trade in Hanoi.

The quality of work shows great expertise in engraving and chasing on this piece that does not appear in later pieces from Vietnam, so I think it must be from the middle colonial period.  This piece is a highly orientalized baroque style dolphin with a swinging silver basket above the dolphin’s mouth.  The dolphin is held by the tail with the body to the side and the tea is poured from the tea pot with the tea passing through the strainer before the tea make it to the cup.  Any tea debris is caught by the sieve.  When you are done pouring the dolphin body is swung under the strainer, catching any spare drops before they can fall onto your fine linen tablecloth.

Detail Showing Location Soviet Mark Vietnamese Coin Silver Tea Strainer

at South Coast Antiques

Now comes “the rest of the story” …  There is one small additional mark found on the edge which is a tiny lozenge which bears closer scrutiny.  The mark has a capital M followed by a star with a hammer and sickle inside and after the star is the number 875.  This mark is a from the Soviet Union era and was used starting first around 1959.  Now the question comes as to why this piece was marked decades after it was made with a Soviet assay mark. 

Detail Showing Marks on Vietnamese Coin Silver Tea Strainer at South Coast Antiques

 The answer might lie with Soviet – Vietnamese relations since WWII.  The USSR has been infiltrating China and Southeast Asia since the 1930s and after the Second World War, provided support for rebellious parties chafing under colonial administrations.  When Vietnam was officially partitioned in the mid 1950s, the north became a communist state with Hanoi as its capital.  I won’t go into the whole story of Soviet Cold War in Vietnam, but at least that amount of back ground is necessary to understand why there would be a later stamp from another country on a Vietnamese silver item.

Detail Showing Soviet Mark on Vietnamese Coin Silver Tea Strainer at South Coast Antiques

The Soviet assay stamp would only be applied if it were sent to the USSR with the intention of resale or later export.  All Soviet silver goods are marked with a distinctive stamp indicating the place assayed and the purity of the silver.  Now this piece is already marked as being 900 silver, but the Moscow assay mark shows a purity of only 875.  The reason behind this must be the fact that the Soviets still used the fractional value system left over from the Czarist era and hence no stamp for 900, only for the next lower value of 875.  The next higher stamp is 914 under the Russian system, hence the difference in valuation.

Why did the Soviets have a vintage Vietnamese tea strainer in Moscow?  Perhaps it was part payment for the material and weapons provided by the Soviets to North Vietnam for decades.  It also might have been an item that would be been sold in elite party-only stores in Moscow.

So this is a lot of text for such a little piece of silver, but that is the charm of collecting.  You learn a little geography, a little history, a little politics, and a little bit about the manufacturing process.  This is why collecting is so contagious – there is something there for everybody.