Amber M.D. USA medicine bottle.

[FitSandTic]

Since things have been slow around here lately, I thought I would take the time to post a rather neat looking bottle my dad picked up recently. I have seen these in clear but this amber color seems to be scarce. I assume these are after the U.S. Army hospital bottles. It has a tooled lip and measures 9 1/4 inches tall by 3 1/2 inches wide. The base is embossed with 1000 cc as well. Any of you guys have any info you would like t add I would love to hear it! Happy holidays to all you guys and gals and I hope to see the activity on this site pick back up to what it use to be. [attachment=aa.jpg]

 

[epgorge]

Wow! Nice find!! Tell me the story on how your Dad found it and what did he pay for it. It is a Keeper. Read on.There is an abundance of info in the archives on the subject of the civil war bottles. This was THE bottle of the first United States Medical Department. The civil war was suppose to be a cake walk, originally thought, and up until the start of it, there was no U.S. medical department. The original bottles in the war were made in a Philadelphia glass house with great colors and strong embossments. As the war drudged on and got more expensive the bottles were produced in a Baltimore Glasshouse with weaker embossments and cheaper production. Those left over after the war and produced for the ranges and "Range Wars" of the Midwest and West were known as Frontier Bottles. Those bottles are "as rare as Hen's teeth", to quote a fella from these pages" as the Frontier was not good to them. They broke! The civil war bottles which I am assuming you have, are very valuable (some quite valuable, in the thousands) and the Frontier Bottle, though they are rarer to find, are not. An enigma to say the least. I have a Frontier Bottle but have never been able to buy one like your Dad found. I don't dig civil war sites so I could never dig one. I would say that is worthy upward to a Thousand American dollars, perhaps a little less or a little more. As time goes on they will only go up in value. There are quite a few colors starting with the amber and continuing with lighter colors, including citron and yellow. Those are very valuable as color usually is.Joel

 

[FitSandTic]

Hey epgorge, my dad picked this one up at a auction here in VA. It was a small grouping of bottles being offered which my dad got everything he basically wanted. Although the collection was a small one the rarity was there. I ended up picking up a killer mineral water from VA, a pontiled Clarke and White Saratoga, some great demijohns, and some other odds and ends. I also bid on a bitters bottle that was unlisted in Ring and Ham. I did not get the bitters but I did bid the bottle up over four figures. I knew the guy bidding against my dad, and he wasn't going to quit. It is difficult to win a unlisted bitters when your competition collects them and has deep pockets. I do not collect bitters so I was buying to trade it or resale it. From the reaction I got from collectors that I intended on trading with I ran the bottle up to its potential. I am excited to hear that you like my bottle and I am probably going to sell it. Your Baltimore attribute is one that I have to agree with, but I must admit that I am going on color comparison. I have a snuff that is a known Baltimore piece and the colors are an identical match. Even though the snuff is much earlier than the medicine, I feel the same sands would have been used for the area. I collect open pontiled utility bottles from all regions in America , so this really does not fit my collecting niche.

 

[annienme]

Beautiful bottle and very educational post ~ thank you! This is the first example of this bottle that I've seen in some 35 years in the hobby.

 

[RED Matthews]

Well that is a great bottle. I want one but they are always out of my budget range when I find them. RED Matthews