December 10-13, 2024 Firearms & Militaria
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 12/10/2024
Benjamin Hurd, Jr. was born in 1749/1750 in Charlestown, Massachusetts, the son of Benjamin Hurd (1718/19-1808) and Grace Estabrook. Like his father, he pursued a career as a merchant and is sometimes mistaken for Benjamin Hurd of Boston, who was a “leather dresser” and bookbinder (d. 1818). Many of the records of Charlestown were lost when the town was burned and it has been sometimes stated that he was the town treasurer (1772-1776) and a selectman prior to the Revolutionary War, but this was more likely his father. Likewise, the record is unclear whether he or his father was chosen in 1773 to be a member of a sub-committee appointed by the town’s “Committee of Inspection” that oversaw the collecting and burning of all tea in the town on 31 December 1773, but he was most definitely a member of the Minute Company organized in Charlestown the following year. Originally an outgrowth of the three fire companies in the town, all of which agreed to meet separately to learn the manual exercise. A consolidated Minute Company composed of members of the three fire companies was to be commanded by Captain Joseph Hopkins, Lieutenant Nathaniel Frothingham and Ensign John Austin, the elected officers. Other “gentlemen” not members of the original fire or “engine” companies, where then invited to join on 2 December 1774. Hurd and this company were almost certainly involved in the defense of Charlestown Neck during the 17 June 1775 battle of Bunker Hill and during the burning of the town that day, the Hurd mansion of brick and its outbuildings were destroyed, a loss estimated at L 1,775 pounds, 19 shillings and 6 pence—the highest amount recorded among the collective property losses in the town. A Benjamin Hurd shows up on a company paylist for October 1775 under one “Poole”, but it is uncertain if this is our Benjamin. Hurd returned to Charlestown after the British evacuation of Boston in 1776 and became a leading merchant —specializing in West India goods—and also invested in real estate. He was inducted into Boston’s St. Andrews Lodge in 1777 and became a Master in 1794, serving as High Priest of the General Grand Order from 1806-1816. He died in 1821 and is buried in Phipp’s Street Burying Ground in Charlestown. Each man of the Charletown Minute Company was responsible for providing himself “with a good gun and bayonet, with a iron ramrod” or risk being fined three shillings. Hurd’s fusil or carbine certainly fills that specification. The fusil or carbine has an unmarked round three-stage barrel with bayonet lug mounted on top, near the muzzle. The lock is a commercial type of the period and unmarked. The American-manufactured brass furniture includes a shaped wrist escutcheon inscribed "Benja / Hurd jr /1775", a Land Pattern-style buttplate with tang inscribed "Charlestown / No. 16", a flat, pierced sideplate, and a cast triggerguard with simplified acorn finial and brass sling swivel. There are four fabricated brass ramrod ferrules, the foremost is trumpeted, and a brass band around the forend tip. The full-length stock appears to be cherry and has profile of British influence and there are relief-carved panels around the lock and sideplate. Complete with an iron ramrod that appears original to the piece. PROVENANCE: by descent in the Hurd Family until sold as lot 754 at Northeast Auctions, 22 AUG 2010 where purchased by James L. Kochan and later sold to Steve Hench; Hench Collection until sold at Morphy Auctions on 30 OCT 2019 as lot 1146, where reacquired for Kochan Collection until present, during which period the unrelated bayonet that now conveys with the fusil was acquired (fitting it extremely well and matching in patina).CONDITION: Dry, untouched and in "as found" condition. Barrel and lock retain a heavy brown patina and are in their original flintlock configuration. Brass furniture retains a dark unpolished patina, while stock has its original finish and a dark, dry surface. Shows some scattered marks from use, chipping around lock, and minor losses and cracking along fore-end. It would be hard to find a better military arm associated with critical events leading up and during the Siege of Boston.