Bloomfield Auctions
Lot 10
Morton of Dublin A Cased Pair of 18-Bore Percussion from Flintlock Holster Pistols by Morton, Dublin, c.1785. The sighted 9” octagonal swamped barrels, proved & signed ‘MORTON DUBLIN’, with decorated tang. The bevel edged stepped locks decorated to the rear, signed ‘MORTON’, with scroll engraved ‘dolphin’ hammers and serrated edged drums. The lock plates have also been modified by adding 4 studs, to hold extra caps. Fully stocked in walnut with flat sided grips, horn fore-ends, vacant silver escutcheons to the wrists and base of butts. Brass t/guards with acorn finials and floral engravings to bows, brass ramrod pipes and ramrods (one with worm, one with powder measure). 14-3/4” overall. Both GWO. Cased in a brass bounded mahogany case with deep blue felt lining, patch box, wooden cap box, and balls. Included is a provenance note reading ‘This pair of ‘Horse Pistols’ were formerly the property of Cornet (afterwards Major General) Joseph Jerrard, bought about 1795, originally flint & converted to percussion – The arrangement on the locks for spare caps was an invention of Joseph Jerrads / F B J J 16 Jan 1908’ Research shows that the guns were bought in 1795, so they were purchased second-hand. It also reveals that Joseph Jerrard (born 1773) joined the 22nd Light Dragoons. They were raised in 1794, probably for the specific purpose of controlling the trouble which a frightened government realised was brewing in Ireland (they were disbanded in 1802/3, when things in Ireland had settled down). It would appear that Joseph Jerrard was recruited in 1794/5, and bought the pistols on his arrival in Ireland, possibly from another officer. While his future wife, who he met around this time in Ulster, had military connections, it is unlikely that the guns came from her family. Her family's sympathies were badly split, her stepfather being a Captain in the Newtownards Yeomanry, while two of her half-brothers and her brother-in-law (her sister's husband) were on the rebel side. They would have faced each other at Saintfield & Ballynahinch in 1798: one of her half-brothers killed at Saintfield. The young officer went on to become a Major-General and claims to have invented a fast-capping system, which he had installed on these pistols during the percussion conversion c.1825-1830: Essentially just 4 studs screwed onto each lock roughly where the frizzen spring had been located, and caps fitted onto these. See ‘A Directory of the Early Irish Gunmakers’ by D.J.W. Stroud, p.215.
