WEBVTT

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GUEST: It's a Revolutionary
War drumhead. I first found out
about it probably when I was a

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teenager. My grandmother had it
in her house, on the back porch
in a closet. It says on it it's,

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"This little wallet is made from
a drumhead from the Battle of
Trenton," and it belonged to my

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great-great-great-
whatever-grandfather, who was
in the, um, German regiment fr,

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out of Baltimore, Maryland. So
I saw it a couple of times then.
My mother is an only child,

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so she got it when my
grandmother died. Then
we sort of lost track
of it a little bit...

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APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.

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GUEST: ...after my
mother died. My father
didn't remember about it,

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and so my brother and I
searched through the house
and found it in a box in a box

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in the closet. And so I've had
it for the last several years.

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APPRAISER: Archives like
this from the revolution
you don't see that often,
and specifically from

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this campaign. Lieutenant
Samuel Gerock was your ancestor.
Um, he was born in Lancaster,

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Pennsylvania, in 1754.
At some point, he moved
to Baltimore, Maryland,
area, probably because of

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his father's work as a,
as a minister. He joined
the German battalion,
which was comprised of men

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from Pennsylvania and
Maryland who were of
German ancestry. And as you
said, he was at the Battle

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of Trenton, which was
one of the first great
victories of the revolution
for George Washington,

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uh, when he crossed the Delaware
and, and captured the German
troops, the Hessian troops,

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that were in Trenton, and these
guys were German troops that
were fighting on the other side.

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He was at the Battle of
Princeton. You've got
some letters, um, from
his officers to him and

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his family. You've also got some
receipts, and some of those date
from '76 all the way through

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about 1786. So you've
got some that are just
postwar. And you've got
this great almanac here.

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We've positioned the
almanac like that so you
can see the printed almanac
page, which is sideways,

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but that sketch he did of the
Battle of Woodbridge and Amboy
in February 1777 is upright,

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so that you can see the cannon,
fence lines, the main road. You
can see the wood line, with the,

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uh, riflemen who were
positioned in there during
the battle, which is really
cool. I've never seen

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another depiction of that battle
before. Also in that book, in
between the printed leaves of

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the almanac, are, uh,
notes of his-- he kept
a diary in between. So
this is really cool. Um,

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it's a drumhead for sure,
made out of calfskin. And
the early rope-tension
drums they would have

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been using would have used
this head. And when it got
wet, with the heavy drumsticks,

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it could have punched a hole
in it. So it looks like he
repurposed it into a wallet by

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cutting it out. And then he
wrote in it where that drum was
used, at the Battle of Trenton,

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uh, Princeton, and throughout
the Jerseys during '76 and
'77. It seems in 1777 to '78,

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he ended up with rheumatism
and went home for a while.
So he was out of the
Army for a little bit,

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and then he ended up back in
the Army as an artilleryman in a
place that was known around the

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War of 1812 as Fort McHenry. So
he was stationed at that fort
during the Revolutionary War.

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GUEST: Really!

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APPRAISER: It wasn't
McHenry at the time...

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GUEST: Yeah.

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APPRAISER: ...but, um, that's
what it became. 1784 is when

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he moves to New Bern
area of North Carolina...

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GUEST: Right.

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APPRAISER: ...and had a
successful business. He
was a postmaster. He was,

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worked in the bank. And in
1818, he applied for a pension.
And that's a great place to

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find out information about
these folks, if a pension was
applied for. And luckily for us,

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he did, in that all of these
documents are mentioned.

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GUEST: Oh, good.

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APPRAISER: So during that
time period, in order to
get a pension, you had
to prove that you were in

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the service. And sometimes they
had muster rolls that would show
you were in, and sometimes they

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couldn't find those
muster rolls. Um, and
one of the things that he
presented, um, to the local

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court to prove his service are
these letters and the almanac,
because they're described.

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GUEST: Oh, okay.

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APPRAISER: And I think I
can read that description.

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GUEST: Okay.

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APPRAISER: So on April 15,
1818, when he applied for
the pension, one of the,

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uh, court officers wrote
this down in his pension
application, and it says,

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"He has laid before me sundry
papers bearing the evident stamp
of authenticity, which are, in

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themselves, sufficient to
enforce a like pension.
He has shown me an
interleaved almanac for the

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year 1777," which is right
here... (laughs) ..."in
the blank leaves of which
he kept a diary. And he

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noted the services he performed.
Also several letters addressed
to him as a lieutenant of

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the company of Captain Keeport,
and several receipts recognized
him in his military capacity,

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signed by the colonel of
the regiment, Nicholas
Haussegger." And that's
what you have right here.

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GUEST: Yeah. (laughs)

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APPRAISER: So one of the
cool things is, is that
we know these existed,

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and these are real, too, uh,
because they were used to
apply for the pension in 1818.

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GUEST: Right, wow.

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APPRAISER: We feel
that for the group,

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a conservative auction estimate
would be in the $10,000
to $15,000 range. For an

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insurance appraisal, we
would probably say in the
$20,000 to $25,000 range.

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GUEST (chuckling):
Wow. APPRAISER: Yeah.
Yeah, very cool stuff.

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GUEST: Wow.

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APPRAISER: Yeah, things you
don't get to see every day.

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GUEST: Yeah-- great, good.