- [Narrator] There is a one of a kind $1 bill here with a value that is priceless because of who signed it.

We'll examine a coat from the Civil War with a conservator and learn what it will take to prepare it for an exhibition.

And later, an old house museum is revealing some interesting, if not unusual stories from our past.

This is "Treasures Inside the Museum".

(uplifting classical music) (uplifting classical music continues) (upbeat classical music) (upbeat classical music continues) The Old Colony History Museum in Taunton is home to a collection of regional objects and archives that offer visitors a chance to explore the history of southeastern Massachusetts.

Exhibits here include military and fashion, industry and transportation, portraits and society.

Aside from these paintings, many of the treasures here were never intended to have a life beyond their original use.

While not pieces of fine art, they are nevertheless important items.

They can tell us what people were thinking, about the attitudes of society at the time and offer insight into the realities of daily life.

A gallery dedicated to the military history of the area includes weapons, uniforms and even an old canon.

But one piece stands out as particularly unique.

- A significant part of our collection is militaria.

We have a huge, huge collection of military related pieces.

Naturally means we have a large collection of muskets and rifles.

This piece is without a doubt the oldest firearm in our collection.

This is a fouling musket.

It was built about 1600 and brought over from England to the New World by a settler named John Thompson, when he came here in the 1640's.

It's typically used for hunting wild game.

But this particular musket was carried during King Philip's War, in which was a conflict that was fought between the European settlers and the indigenous of New England.

And that war began in 1675.

Now it's a quite large gun here.

It's made of beech wood, English beech wood and iron.

It's just under 90 inches long, weighs just about 30 pounds.

It's pretty significant sized weapon.

However, it wasn't particularly useful in combat.

It wasn't its purpose.

The problem was in the years leading up to the war, the English settlers were trading a lot of their weapons with the local indigenous for land, which meant that when war inevitably broke out, the settlers had to resort to pretty much anything they could get their hands on as a weapon, which was why Thompson, when he was in charge of a garrison house during the war, had this musket in his possession.

As I said, not ideal for combat.

It had a max firing range of only about 50 yards.

(upbeat piano music) It's a little over eight feet long, and if you were using it for hunting, you would simply find a location where you could rest the barrel of the gun.

A large boulder, a fence, a lot of hunters carried around a special tool.

It's basically a post with a Y fork on top.

They would stamp that into the ground, rest the gun on there.

And wild turkey and geese, you know, they move in groups.

So you'd simply wait.

One would come in front of you, you'd fire, you're gonna get one.

And so it was effective in the 17th century as a hunting rifle, but in combat, you're better off swinging this as a club.

I mean it, it really, really was not effective.

You can see here it's a flint lock.

That's not how it was originally.

It was originally a match lock and sometime before the the King Phillips War, it was converted to a flintlock.

And this is a pretty, as far as I know, one of the earliest examples of an American modified weapon.

(soft piano music) - [Narrator] So much of our nation's early history played out right here in the region known as Old Colony.

Exhibits include maps and some old period hats, including this one dating back to the American Revolution.

- This is a front piece of a canonnier's miter, which is a hat, back to the American Revolution.

And this was worn by a man named Toby Gilmore.

And he was born in Africa, sold into slavery and eventually was working for the Gilmore Family in Raynham, which is just one town over.

And at the time of the American Revolution, he enlisted, became a canonnier, which is how he got this hat.

And he served for a number of years.

He was at Valley Forge in 1777 and he survives the war.

This hat is bright red and it would, again, it would be the front piece to his hat because he was a canonnier and canonniers needed to be very visible on the battlefield.

The front of the hat has stitching here.

It says federalism and underneath liberty, which was not uncommon for people to add patriotic slogans to their uniforms just to sort of distinguish their commitment to the cause they were fighting for.

He actually earned his freedom by enlisting and fighting and he went back two more times.

So he reenlisted when he could've just gone home and been a freed man.

He gets married, he purchases some land, his family kept his canteen, his hat, they all, they kept it.

He had eight kids.

He lives to be 80 and lived the rest of his life in Raynham back here but as a freed man.

(soft piano music) - [Narrator] In another part of the museum, a 160 year-old coat has been carefully laid out.

- This project, it's a civil war coat that was worn by Ebenezer Peirce.

And unfortunately, Mr. Peirce was wounded by a cannonball and the cannonball actually blew his arm off.

And you can see that from the coat here.

This isn't damage that was done over time, but this was damage during an incident which makes this object a treasure, because first it's extremely rare to have a coat that survived, that went through this, but also that Ebenezer survived this and went on to have a long life and a very fruitful life.

If you lose the record of information of what an object went through, you lose the history and the significance.

Someone might look at it and say, "Oh, it's just a damaged coat", but it really isn't.

And that's why it's important that we document the science and the written documentation we have.

So with this object, it's been documented.

We have the history.

It was donated shortly after the event occurred.

(soft upbeat piano music) - [Narrator] The years have taken their toll on the old coat, and it will be up to the textile conservator to examine it and develop an appropriate plan to preserve this piece of history.

- Here, we have some insect damage that you see here, and these are soils and this type of soil, I really believe is from something else.

It could be from food, et cetera.

But you'll notice that there's insect damage on top of the soil.

That's because the snacks we love to eat, the insects also like to munch on those.

And those starches, particularly starches, are left behind.

And those starches attract different types of insects.

There's also some scattered splotching, soiling, which could be mold that is no longer active, but that's something to watch out for.

But mold, just because it's not active doesn't mean that it's not gonna leave soils after and change the color.

So as we move up here, we have the buttonholes, which the buttonholes have damage but that damage is likely as a result of the stress of the buttons over time just being buttoned.

We do have a button here that's damaged and likely the thread came out from that wear.

As we get here to the arm, we can see that really the significance of the damage that it was pretty much completely blown off.

What's always really quite amazing is having a label here.

And despite everything this coat went through, there's still a label inside, which is very interesting and significant.

You always love a label because a label can lead you on a whole path of discovery of where the object came from, how it was sold.

I think it says Boston.

Yeah, it says Call and Tuttle Boston.

So which would mean that is the manufacturer.

But what's also very interesting is that with this coat, most of the buttons have been maintained.

Given what it's gone, it went through and that how long this has been and the buttons are actually in very good condition.

- We're really excited to conserve the coat because of the damage it has suffered.

It's never been properly displayed, it's never been available for people to view it.

And it's such a fascinating story.

To have it in a box, you know, in storage is just not the goal.

It's not what we want.

- [Narrator] When conservation is complete, this Civil War coat will become part of a future gallery.

(thoughtful piano music) The Old Colony History Museum is also home to a number of valuable archives.

This vault is also where some one-of-a-kind, priceless objects are kept, waiting to take their place in future exhibits.

(thoughtful piano music) - The story started in 1988 on a Saturday which promised to be routine.

This gentleman walked into the museum intending to see if they wanted some silver that he was trying to deaccession for retirement.

As it turned out they didn't, but he was in a talkative mood, picked some historical subjects that he was interested in and then finally mentioned the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials.

And after a little bit of discussion, told us that he had in fact been at Nuremberg.

He was a GI in 1945 and '46, and he had been at that trial and had been a guard inside the courtroom.

(thoughtful music) I asked him if he had saved anything from that time, in his life and he talked about the fact that yes, he had and he had material from Nuremberg and one of them was a dollar bill that had been signed by 12 of the defendants at that trial, including Hermann Goring.

His mother had given him a dollar bill as a good luck charm to put in his wallet to carry with him through the war.

And that's all he had with him at the time that the idea of getting an autograph occurred to him.

This duty that McKenney had was a great duty because he was inside in the winter.

They had new uniforms, they had the best clothing, they had the best food.

They were told that if they had rule infractions of any kind, they were gone.

They were back to where they were.

So they were told not to talk to these guys and have no interaction.

And McKenney was very aware of that.

He said though, that over the months, he was there for seven months over the months that had been relaxed slightly so that he spoke with Goring about every day that he had the opportunity.

But he was still very aware, that he didn't wanna make a scene.

So he said he took the dollar bill from his wallet and a pen from his pocket, a fountain pen, and waited until there was a recess in the trial, which were frequent.

And he said to Goring, "General Goring", he always called him general, "General Goring, would you sign your autograph for my mother?"

Goring And McKenney had a conversation, a history well enough so that Goring knew that McKenney's mother was important to him.

And McKenney told me that Goring would often ask how his mother was doing.

So when Goring heard the request, he said, "Certainly I will, but I need to have a pen and pencil or a pen and paper."

And McKenney handed him the dollar bill and he said that when Goring looked at the dollar bill he looked at it and he held it up which was not what McKenney wanted him to do.

He held it up and he said to McKenney, "Look private, there's your Uncle George."

And then he took the dollar bill and signed it along the bottom.

If I take the dollar bill and I turn Uncle George so that he is looking toward the floor Hermann Goring has written right on the bottom H Goring 1946.

(solemn violin music) (solemn violin music continues) That's a tiny little piece of the Nuremberg story.

And we're proud of his keeping that dollar bill and believing that it was important enough to pass on to history.

We have a strong collection in many different fields, but we also specialize in a way in what I call small history.

And that's the individual stories of people who helped make those larger stories possible.

So that's why something like this is of importance to us.

It's a reminder that those people that you read about in history books and textbooks, they were people who walked the streets as we walked them, same streets, and who had experiences which are worth remembering.

(solemn violin music) - [Narrator] One of the main galleries includes a mix of portraits and paintings of presidents, people and places with connections to the Old Colony region.

- This gentleman here is one of Taunton's Revolutionary War heroes.

His name was David Cobb and he was a general by the end of his military service.

Prior to the revolution, he was a doctor in Taunton and he enlisted in the Continental Army immediately after the events at Lexington and Concord.

He served the entire duration of the war and by 1781 he had reached the rank of one of the aids to camp under General George Washington.

This is his painting, it's oil on canvas and it was done by an artist named John Vanderlyn.

Vanderlyn was a student of famed artists Gilbert Stewart.

It was common practice for major artists back then to have their students work off of copying one of their original works.

So this is effectively a copy of a Gilbert Stuart that was originally painted by one of his students.

The original painting of David Cobb is currently hanging in the State Senate chamber in Boston.

This piece was very recently conserved for use.

They did a lot of work on the painting.

They stripped off the original dark lacquer that was on the on the painting, which hid a lot of the really great details on the piece, particularly in the background and on the clothing.

They had to do some inpainting, effectively just filling in areas where the painting had rubbed off or chipped over time.

They relined the painting, attached a new stretcher so it's more secure to the frame and then did another, new coat of clear archive grade lacquer on top.

So it's basically as new as he's been since we got him about 130 years ago.

For me, it's all about preservation.

I mean, we want to keep the objects as close to when they came in as possible at all times.

That makes them, you know, that extends their longevity, makes 'em more available to the public and allows people to research and enjoy them for much longer periods of time.

So these next two objects that we have are two of Cobb's personal effects.

We have here his vest, which was cotton and has a floral embroidered design, as well as this nobby wood and ivory cane.

These were two of the only personal effects that were listed in Cobb's inventory when he died in 1830.

And we were fortunate enough that his direct descendants donated both these pieces to the museum.

And lastly, we have here, this is Cobb's General Saber.

It was presented to the Cobb when he was named a general in the local militia after the Revolutionary War.

It's an English made blade when then the blade is made of etched, britannia metal.

The guard and hilt are made out of brass.

The handle here is pure ivory and one of my favorite additions is a lion's head on the pommel for the blade.

Very well-crafted design for this piece.

Cobb is arguably the most well-known soldier from the Revolutionary War in this era.

Aside from his work as a soldier, after the war he was a judge in the local court.

He went on and served as a local judge through 1796.

Even after that point, he had nearly 40 more years of public service throughout the entirety of New England.

He's just one of the more major figures that connect to a very national, recognizable story.

I mean, you tell people about Washington, they know who Washington is.

They've heard about the siege of Yorktown and Cornwallis.

This man was here and saw all of it, firsthand.

- [Narrator] Only a small part of the collection is on display.

Unintended works of art and priceless treasures total approximately 13,000 objects.

And while many have been well curated, others still hold secrets yet to be revealed.

(upbeat music) (solemn music) Perhaps it was the cool breeze coming off of Narragansett Bay that first inspired this home to be built on a gentle slope, rising above the water.

Clouds Hill was originally built as a wedding gift for Elizabeth Ives Slater on her marriage to Alfred Augustus Reed Jr. Today, it's the Clouds Hill Victorian House Museum, often referred to as an architectural gem, with most of its original contents still intact.

Guests arriving here would've been received in the reception room, otherwise known as the Egyptian room.

(upbeat Egyptian music) - The room is very important in the history of of Rhode Island Interiors because for a complete Egyptian Revival furniture suite and in this case 10 pieces, is virtually unheard of.

- [Narrator] The Egyptian theme is carried throughout the room, including this music cabinet.

- The cabinet, together with the rest of the suite is in walnut and it was designed by the Boston firm on Tremont Street of Doe & Hunnewell.

It embellished, as you can see with a relief, a bronze plaque representing an idealized Cleopatra wearing a peacock headdress.

Again, the beauty of this interior is that all of the bills survive.

So we know that the decorator was, while working on this house, simultaneously working on the state capitol with H.H.

Richardson architect in Boston and Chateau-sur-Mer with Richard Morris Hunt in Newport.

That is to say McPherson and company.

So he had a pragmatic purpose with the cabinet and it was to hold musical scores.

So if we open the cabinet, you can see it's still serving that function today.

- [Narrator] The challenge in this room is preserving all of the original furnishings.

(Egyptian flourish) (melodic upbeat music) Upstairs on the second floor, it seems someone saw fit to paint over the original wallpaper in one of the bedrooms.

Determining what a room originally looked like often takes extensive detective work.

But in this case, Clouds Hill has stumbled upon a shortcut.

- We're about to enter the billiard room of Clouds Hill which is a classic man's cave, and it has a proverbial treasures in the attic supply.

And in this case, it's a rare series of documents that are actually reserve stock wallpaper samples for key rooms in the house.

And the papers are a really rich document because generally the great archives for wallpaper documents in our region be it historic New England or the Cooper-Hewitt in New York, have only swatches or cuttings of vintage wallpapers.

In this case, they are not just entire repeats, but entire reserve rolls.

And if you'll notice, one of the beauties of having these rolls is that they preserve and record the original model number for the paper and then the cipher or initials of the manufacturer.

In this case, Paul Balin Paris, who did the wallpapers of several bedrooms and also of the dining room.

And Balin was a manufacturer very active in Paris in the 1880's.

He did many continental commissions and in the United States he did surviving documents at the Lockwood-Matthews house in Norwalk.

But here, luckily in Clouds Hill, the original papers survive in their original settings as installed.

And then the extraordinary document of having these rich archives of supplementary stock, reserve stock for eventual replacement.

(uplifting piano music) - [Narrator] Throughout the house, there are original pieces that have been collected by different generations and are carefully preserved, including portraits and other artwork.

(uplifting piano music) Behind the main home is a carriage house.

A peek inside reveals a wagon that represented Rhode Island in the nation's bicentennial, and other examples of early transportation.

But one wagon here stands out from all the rest.

- This is probably one of the most interesting wagons in Rhode Island, certainly.

This is a Romani living wagon.

And the Romani tribe originated in northern India and spread out through Europe and came eventually to America.

And to this day, there is a New England Romani tribe by the name of the Stanleys.

This was built in the 1850's, for the then king of the Stanley Romani tribe.

I think the best thing about the wagon is the way it has been ornamented as it was constructed.

For instance, obviously you need brakes in a wagon and the brake pads on the back wheels here are actually turtles.

Of course, turtles went slowly, that slowed the wagon down.

And all of the cross pieces on the wagon have eagles heads at the ends of them.

Now you'll notice if you look at the center window on the wagon, it's beveled glass.

Beveling of glass was invented in the 1850's and it was horrendously expensive because it all had to be done by hand.

And originally all of the wagons windows were beveled glass.

There's one or two left, but that shows that it obviously was made for somebody who had enough money to be able to pay for the latest thing.

Inside the wagon has a stove with stove pipe.

The top of the stove pipe we had to take off to get it into the building.

It has a a big bed across the back and it has a flip down table.

So basically you could say in looking at this wagon, that this was the original RV.

- [Narrator] Discovering the treasures at Clouds Hill is like paging through a series of stories about our past.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat guitar music)