FBI Solves 50 Year Cold Case Enabling Revolutionary War Era Firearm To Be Reclaimed And Put On Display
NOVEMBER 01, 2019
FBI Solves 50 Year Cold Case Enabling Revolutionary War Era Firearm To Be Reclaimed And Put On Display
Press Release
Today, the Museum of the American Revolution and the Pennsylvania Society of Sons of the Revolution and its Color Guard (PSSR) announced an agreement to publicly display a rare Revolutionary era American firearm that has been missing for nearly half a century. The Christian Oerter rifle was acquired by the PSSR in 1963 and placed on loan to the Valley Forge Historical Society. The rifle was stolen in 1971 when it was on display at Valley Forge Park and was only recently recovered through the efforts of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the United States Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The rifle will be on view at the Museum of the American Revolution from November 6 through March 17, 2020 as part of special exhibition, Cost of Revolution: The Life and Death of an Irish Soldier.
“We are thrilled to again support and collaborate with the Museum of the American Revolution to further the missions of both of our organizations,” said Ben Wolf Sr., President of the Pennsylvania Society Sons of the Revolution and its Color Guard. “We are delighted that it will be on display for people to learn the stories of those individuals involved in our country’s fight for independence.”
This American long rifle was made by Johann Christian Oerter (1747-1777), a master gunsmith whose workshop in Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley produced firearms for the American Revolutionary cause. Only a handful of signed and dated American rifles from the Revolutionary era have survived. Oerter’s work is recognized by arms scholars as among the finest and most important.
“It is deeply gratifying to be able to return to this rare artifact to public view after nearly fifty years,” said Dr. R. Scott Stephenson, the Museum’s President & CEO. “The Christian Oerter rifle exhibits exemplary early American artistry and is a reminder that courage and sacrifice were necessary to secure American Independence.”
Oerter was a member of the Moravian church, one of the oldest Protestant denominations in the world whose adherents settled in Pennsylvania in the 1700s. Moravian gunsmiths, who also worked in North Carolina during the era of the American Revolution, influenced the design of early American firearms.
This example of Oerter’s work was made in 1775 at the start of the Revolutionary War. Oerter engraved his name, the date and the location of the shop—Christian’s Spring—on the top of the iron rifle barrel. Christian’s Spring, known as Christianbrunn in the German language spoken by most Moravians, was located near present-day Nazareth, Pennsylvania. It is likely that the original owner neatly carved the name W. Goodwin in the rifle’s wooden stock. Museum curators are engaged in research to identify this individual.
The rifle will be housed in the Museum’s latest special exhibition, Cost of Revolution which tells the untold story of Richard St. George, an Irish soldier and artist whose personal trauma and untimely death provide a window into the entangled histories of the American Revolution and the ensuing Irish Revolution of 1798.
The Museum of the American Revolution, which opened to the public on April 19, 2017, is the successor to the Valley Forge Historical Society and has a nationally significant collection of artifacts including the tent that General George Washington used as his mobile field headquarters during the Revolutionary War.
About Museum of the American Revolution
The Museum of the American Revolution explores the dramatic, surprising story of the American Revolution through its unmatched collection of Revolutionary-era weapons, personal items, documents, and works of art. Immersive galleries, powerful theater experiences, and digital touchscreens bring to life the diverse array of people who created a new nation against incredible odds. Visitors gain a deeper appreciation for how this nation came to be and feel inspired to consider their role in the ongoing promise of the American Revolution. Located just steps away from Independence Hall, the Museum serves as a portal to the region’s many Revolutionary sites, sparking interest, providing context, and encouraging exploration. The Museum, which opened on April 19, 2017, is a private, non-profit, and non-partisan organization. For more information, visit www.AmRevMuseum.org or call 877.740.1776.
About the Pennsylvania Society of Sons of the Revolution and its Color Guard
The Pennsylvania Society of Sons of the Revolution is a hereditary society formed in 1888 to honor and perpetuate the ideals, courage and sacrifice of members’ ancestors who served in the cause for freedom through the American Revolution. The Color Guard, composed of members of the Society, is dedicated to the care, custody, and proper official display of the Colors, Flags, and Standards of the Society.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Announces Return To Its Rightful Owners Of Old Master Painting Stolen By Nazis
The 1639 Painting by Salomon Koninck Titled “A Scholar Sharpening His Quill,” Was Looted by the Nazis from the Schloss Family During World War II
Geoffrey S. Berman, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced today the return to its rightful owner of a painting looted by the Nazis during World War II. The piece, A Scholar Sharpening His Quill, painted in 1639 by Salomon Koninck (the “Painting”), was stolen from the children and heirs of renowned Jewish art collector Adolphe Schloss. Schloss was a prominent Jewish art collector in Paris whose large collection of Old Master paintings (the “Schloss Collection”) was regarded as among the most significant private collections of Dutch and Flemish paintings assembled in prewar France.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman said: “The campaign of cultural plunder that the Nazis directed against millions of innocent Jews was sadistic and unjust. That is why restitution in this case is more than returning a material good, but restoring a physical part of lost heritage. After nearly 80 years of being lost, this painting has been found and we are returning it to the Schloss family.”
During World War II, the Nazis created a division known as the Einsatzstab Reichleiter Rosenberg (the “ERR”) in order to “study” Jewish life and culture as part of the Nazis’ propagandist mission against the Jews. Principally, the ERR confiscated artworks and other cultural holdings of “the enemies of the Reich” on a massive scale, and registered and identified those artworks – even photographing them – thereby leaving behind a detailed record of the works that they stole. ERR records and photographs of art and cultural artifacts looted by the Nazis are digitized and available in an online database created by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, and this database includes a photograph of the Painting taken by the ERR during World War II.
Upon the outbreak of World War II in 1939, the Schloss heirs moved the Schloss Collection from Paris to Chateau de Chambon, a township in Southern France, in an attempt to protect the collection from looting by the Nazis. Due to its value and significance, the ERR made substantial efforts to locate and loot the Schloss Collection. In 1943, the Schloss Collection was ultimately looted by the ERR from its holding place in Chateau de Chambon. The Nazis took 262 paintings from the Schloss Collection, including the Painting, and transported them to a depot located at the Jeu de Paume, a prewar museum in Paris that was operated by the ERR during the war. Ultimately, the Painting was selected by the Nazis to be transported to the the “Führerbau,” Hitler’s headquarters in Munich, from where it and many other paintings disappeared in the aftermath of the war.
The Painting resurfaced in November 2017, when a Chilean private collector (the “Consignor”) attempted to sell the painting through a New York-based auction house. When the Painting arrived in New York from Chile, it was determined that it was the same Painting that came from the Schloss collection and had been looted by the Nazis. When the Consignor was informed of this, the Consignor stated that her father had purchased the Painting from Walter Andreas Hofer in Munich in 1952. Hofer was Hermann Göring’s chief purchasing agent and as such was a key player in the confiscation and looting of Jewish art collections during the Nazi era. In 1950, after being tried in absentia by a French military tribunal for his role in art plundering during World War II, Hofer was found guilty and sentenced to 10 years in prison.
The United States Attorney’s office filed a complaint seeking civil forfeiture of the painting on October 19, 2018, and Judge George B. Daniels entered a judgment of forfeiture on March 11, 2019. The United States today returns the painting to the Schloss heirs, and welcomes two members of the family to New York to accept the painting.
Mr. Berman thanked the FBI’s Art Crime Team for their assistance.
The case is being handled by the Office’s Money Laundering and Transnational Criminal Enterprises Unit. Assistant U.S. Attorney Thane Rehn is in charge of the case.