Winter finds

[Leroy Jenkins]

Some of my winter finds. I’m no huge collector, so I’m pretty stoked to add these beauties to my collection. All of this was in the same area, including the Native American artifacts. Any ideas on what they were used for?

 

[hemihampton]

I wonder how old that gun is? nice finds. LEON.

 

[Leroy Jenkins]

Not sure. It was in the same dump as the Old Castle Whiskey, Florida Water, and the Lydia E Pinkhams bottles. So maybe as old as them? They are from the late 1800s, early 1900s right?

 

[saratogadriver]

It looks a little like a smith and wesson model 1. If so, made for a long time, 1857 to late 1800s. I can't tell for sure though.

Jim G

 

[dsabo]

I've been doing construction excavation in very old areas surrounding Springfield, the home of Smith and Wesson for decades and have never found one. Great find although not worth much. Saratoga is more than likely correct.

 

[CanadianBottles]

Great finds! I don't think the gun is a Smith & Wesson, I was trying to find an exact match online and it's hard because there were a huge number of cheap .22 revolvers produced in the latter decades of the 19th century. You can see a bunch of pretty similar but not exact matches here: https://unblinkingeye.com/Guns/SSs/sss.html

The closest match I could find is a Norwich Falls Pistol Company "Spy" model, doesn't look like a perfect match but it's around 95% of the way there, so decent chance it was made by the same company.

 

[Len]

Hi Leroy,
You've got a classic batch there. ..The Native-Am. (?) stones are very interesting. One might guess that one with the shallow depression might be for starting a friction fire. Although, I don't see any burn discoloration, only an off center, reddish ring around the depression. A little more likely a base for something that suffered long term drip exposure. The shape of the depression itself, is probably the key. ..The round one--maybe case/cannister shot? Any fighting/battles in the area that you found them? ..Congrats on all your finds. You're in a great area for bottles, and historic mini-mysteries. Enjoy.