2022-01 Raynors HCA Auction
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 1/29/2022
An enormous American 45-star Naval Flag, 18ft-6in ft x 9ft-8in, made of very heavy cloth, stitched on stripes and stars, large sturdy rings, showing only occasional holes. There is a stencil ID, "U.S. QMD" with ink inscription below, "USS Allegany", and a second stencil, "M.G. Copeland & Co., Washington DC, Contract May 22, 1895." The flag has a 2001 statement of provenance stating in part, "... sold to me by the caretaker of the Joe Wheeler estate ... these items and the flag were given to Mr. Turner by Annie Wheeler before Annie Wheeler passed away in 1957. When war broke out between the United States and Spain in 1898, President William McKinley, in a move to help heal the wounds of the Civil War and reunite North and South, appointed a number of former Confederate officers to command volunteer units. One of these former rebels was Joseph Wheeler, popularly known as "Fighting Joe." On July 14, 1898, Wheeler and 803 other officers and nearly 15,000 men headed for Cuba aboard the Allegheny.
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