This Sharps rifle bears no maker’s mark; it was made especially for John Brown. Brown carried this weapon on his Kansas campaign in 1856 and later presented it to Charles Blair of Collinsville, Connecticut. In 1857, Brown contracted Blair to forge pikes for the clandestine slave insurrection he was planning for Harpers Ferry.
John Brown wears a hangman’s noose for a necktie up in Heaven. I asked him about it, and he said, “Where’s yours? Where’s yours?”
His eyes were like glowing coins.
-Kurt Vonnegut