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THBTiffany Sterling Silver Presentation Sword to Captain W.A. Treadwell - 14th NY Heavy Artillery
About Seller
6270 Este Ave.
Cincinnati , OH 45232
United States
With offices in Cincinnati, Cleveland and Denver, Cowan’s holds over 40 auctions each year, with annual sales exceeding $16M. We reach buyers around the globe, and take pride in our reputation for integrity, customer service and great results. A full-service house, Cowan’s Auctions specializes in Am...Read more
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About Auction
LiveOct 30, 2018
Cowan's is honored to present the Magnificent Sword Collection of William Koch in its two-day firearms, militaria, and American history auction, with a focus on the Civil War. Cowan's Auctions dawnie@cowans.com
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- Lot Description
Tiffany Sterling Silver Presentation Sword to Captain W.A. Treadwell - 14th NY Heavy Artillery
35" curved, single-edged blade with 25.5" stopped median fuller and a narrow 19" fuller along the spine. 5.5" sterling silver hilt with sterling grip. Open-work English-style full-basket guard with flowing foliate scrolls and a spread-winged American eagle in the face of the knuckle bow with Columbia's shield on its chest and a ribbon of stars in its beak. The interior of the guard has a silver boarder soldered around the inner edge, terminating in a pair of opposed flat disk finials at the top. The guard is surmounted by a silver gargoyle head quillon with a silver relief-cast face of Medusa as the pommel cap. Cast sterling silver grip mimics the pattern of grooved wood on lesser grade sabers with the appearance of 7 wraps of wire cast into the grip. Blade is stamped COLLINS & CO in an arc over HARTFORD / CONN on the reverse ricasso, above which is etched on the blade TIFFANY / & Co / NY in a panel. Reverse of blade etched over more than half its length with flowing foliate scrolls and sprays with a US as the central panel and the full-length image of a staff officer in a double-breasted frock coat with saber and forage cap. The obverse of the blade is similarly etched with flowing scrolls of foliage with a panoply of arms as the central image and a full-length standing cavalryman with short jacket, tall boots, plumed hat and saber. The obverse ricasso is dated 1861. The sterling silver scabbard has a bannered plaque attached to the reverse at the throat that reads TIFFANY & Co / Quality / 925-1000 over an Old English "M" , the mark of Tiffany master silversmith John C. Moore. Mounts are heavy oak leaf and acorn clusters with a pair of suspension rings. On the reverse, between the upper mounts the following inscription is found: Presented in behalf of / Company "G" 14th Reg. N.Y.V.A. / TO / Capt. W.A. Treadwell / "Vera amicitia est-sempiterna" , the final line being the Latin motto: True Friendship is Eternal . A truly stunning Tiffany sterling silver presentation sword from the American Civil War.
William Augustus Treadwell (1834-1908) was born in Salem, Massachusetts on July 12, 1834 and entered the local Andover Academy in 1855, withdrawing after two years of study. Treadwell then moved to New York City with some acquired military skill and began drilling "several companies of militia," perhaps inspired by Colonel Elmer's Ellsworth's Chicago Zouave Cadets during their celebrated summer 1860 tour on the east coast. With the advent of The Civil War, Treadwell continued to drill volunteers and applied to the Governor of New York for a commission. Having been rebuffed, Treadwell made his way to the seat of war and acted as a civilian volunteer in the commissary department at Acquia Creek, Virginia. In the summer of 1862 he attached himself to the 95th New York during the Maryland campaign and, temporarily, found his way to the staff of General Abner Doubleday acting as a volunteer aide-de-camp while awaiting word of a commission. Treadwell was back in New York City In September when he received a captaincy in the 3rd Regiment, Corcoran Legion, a brigade of Irishmen - many of them recent immigrants - then forming in the Empire State. For reasons not entirely clear he was soon discharged on October 14 before the Corcoran Brigade was reorganized as the 164th New York Infantry in November 1862, although he may have still been with the regiment at late as November acting as drill master at Norfolk.
During the early part of 1863 Treadwell located to Washington, D.C., where, once more, he engaged in the instruction of new regiments. He may have also leveraged his contacts and returned to the Boston area in pursuit of an illusive commission as during this time the first African-American Regiment, the famed 54th Massachusetts was then being recruited. As it were, "owing to some misunderstanding between Senator Sumner and Governor Andrews of Massachusetts Treadwell failed to receive his commission."
During June 1863 back in Rochester, New York Treadwell was actively raising a new company - recruits and some two year veterans whose term had expired - and, at last, six months later on December 5, 1863 thirty-one year old William Treadwell was commissioned their Captain, the men mustering in as Company G., 14th New York Heavy Artillery. The large regiment was initially deployed in detachments with Company G and H assigned in December 1864 to Fort Hamilton in New York Harbor. The heavy artillery regiment destined to fight more like infantry remained unassigned to corps until April 1864 when the 14th NYHA became part of the Provisional Brigade, 1st Division, 9th Corps. U.S. Grant needed more infantry for his summer Overland Campaign before Richmond, planning to outflank Lee, forcing him to stretch and thin his lines in a war of attrition he could not win. The "heavies" would go down in history as the infantry fodder at the spear point of the plan. The 14th NYHA engaged in unrelenting combat during the bloody summer fighting at the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor and before Petersburg suffering at least 129 killed and 223 badly wounded, nearly a third of the casualties going down on June 17 alone - a black day marked by a series of uncoordinated Federal attacks against prepared earthworks along the Petersburg line. Even Grant could not sustain this kind of casualties indefinitely and after September the tempo of the fighting settled into the Siege of Petersburg. Captain Treadwell did not see the end of the war with the regiment being discharged on December 14, 1864 supernumerary. His Andover biography suggests that he had some subsequent association with Hancock's 1st Veteran Corps, and "was also tendered a commission in the regular army, but declined the appointment." Post-war, Treadwell became a newspaper man and from 1882 until 1898 was military editor of the New York Press. He later moved to San Francisco in 1900 and was briefly engaged in the mining business as Director of the Oriental & Masbate Golding Mining Company. Following the cataclysmic San Francisco earth quake in April 1906, Treadwell returned to New Orleans where he died on April 27, 1908. He had been a Mason, member of the Loyal legion, and GAR.
Provenance: From the Sword Collection of William KochVery fine. Blade lightly cleaned to bright with some scattered light pitting along the edge with all etching and decorations remaining clear and fully visible. Hilt fine with a lovely silvery tone, showing a small separation of the silver internal edge liner of the guard on the reverse, near the top, where the solder has failed. Scalloped red wool throat washer remains intact. Scabbard fine as well with some minor handling marks and scuffs an some scattered tarnish.Condition
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