“This is one of the RAREST, most important American colonial hand carved signed and dated powder horn’s on the Planet. It is second to none, and is a collectors dream, and any museum would love to have it, especially in the Boston Area . The maker, “George Robert Twelves Hewes ” (Born August 25th 1742, Died November 5th 1840) was one of the people that dressed up as Indians and went to the docks at “Griffins Wharf”, in the Boston Harbor, boarded the tea ships, and threw all the Tea that they could find into the water, in what became known as the Boston Tea Party. George was also a central figure in both the Boston Masacre, and the tar and feathering of a British tax collector. Two years later, Boston was placed under ” Martial law” and this is when George made this powder horn. He was living in Roxbury, Mass, which was, and still is a neighborhood in Boston, and where is wife was from and where he was married. George was under the Command of Leonard Pitt, and he was also in the Battle of Lexington in 1776. George was also close friends with Paul Revere, had met and had drinks privately with John Handcock, and had personal and private meeting with George and Martha Wasington. This American folk art masterpiece has everything that you could ever want in an American powder horn. It is entirely in original condition, it has NO restorations of any kind. The color is the perfect coffee with cream shade that collectors strive to find. It has a name, date and location incised on it’s surface. If it’s isnt the finest ever known from that area and time period, it is certainly one of the top couple, in looks, quality, and historical significance. There is a lot of provenence available on George Hewes on the internet. It is all very interesting reading. The horn measures about 9 1/2″ long.”
The inscription on the horn;
George Hewes his horn
Roxbury July 17th 1775
God Armeth ye Patriot
along with the word ‘Liberty’ on a headstone, supposedly signifying the death of liberty.
The horn is in a very intricately inlaid box, which a historian/antique dealer indicated was made around 1850. On the inside lid of the box, in faded writing, are the words “This Box Made For George Hewes Horn”.
Inside the horn, a piece of paper could be heard to be moving around. With very thin, long needle nose pliers, I was able to grab hold of the paper and carefully pull it out of the horn… from the condition of it, it looks like attempts had be made thru the years with various objects to retrieve the paper.
On one side of the piece of paper was George Hewes’ autograph dated 1778 and Roxbury. The back side of the paper looks like the corner of an old letter. The piece of paper is obviously very old and extremely fragile.
You can see many similarities between this signature and one in his biography nearly 60 years later.
