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Provenance documentation on the other Schofield revolver attributed to Jesse James, sn. 366, and its holster and rig are also in the file. Jesse James’s widow is said to have indicated that sn. 366 was the revolver James set down moments before he was assassinated by Bob Ford.
A Dana Zeigler statement from 1998 is also included. They state that they purchased the revolver in 1975 from Bernice Gilmerr and that
her husband was a friend and fellow Mason. “Mr. Gilmerr had told me that Bernice’s two Uncles, William and Milton Shanton, had been friends with Jesse and Frank James. Both William and Milton Shanton would visit their brother John Shanton,
in Missouri. As a result of their friendship with Jesse and Frank James, they were given the 1875 Schofield, serial number 273, the floral carved holster, and a pocket watch. Mrs. Gilmerr further told me that William and Milton Shanton were friends of the James Brothers. Mrs. Gilmerr further told me that Milton had left the pistol and holster with her and her husband in 1923 and told that if did not return for them, it would go to them.”
Another handwritten document signed by Bernice M. Gilmerr in 1975 has a slightly different story
of how the Shanton’s got the revolver. It states that, “Milton Shanton had a shoe shop in Missouri beside of a gun shop. He purchased this Smith
and Wesson gun from this gun shop with the understanding it had belonged to the James Brothers. Mr Shanton never married so at his death his Brother William Shanton fell heir to the gun. In the last years of Wm Shanton’s life he had no home only staying with some one wherever he could
so he brought the gun to Roy and I and told him if he never called for it the gun was ours. He died and we still had the gun. Serial no on the butt of gun No 273. Sold to Dana Zeigler November 19, 1975.” Karshner in the Texas Gun Collector article noted above indicates Barbara Shanton said her aunt had listed the gun as purchased because she didn’t want her family to be associated with the James Gang.
farm in Missouri where Frank and Jesse James would hide out. Details on John (b. 1844) after his marriage in Ohio in 1864 are unclear aside from the fact that he appears to
have died prior to Milton. A John Shanton lived several miles outside of Butler, Missouri, in 1885, and this may have been where
the farm in question was located. Bernice Marie Voss Gilmerr’s (1902- 1994) mother was Minnie Shanton (1874-1946) of Ohio.
Jesse James, Outlaw:
Jesse James (1847-1882)
needs little introduction. He is
easily one of America’s most famous outlaws. In popular culture, James is widely portrayed as a Robin Hood figure, but the historical record reveals him as a much darker, more merciless figure who left numerous bodies in his wake in the 1860s, 1870s, and early 1880s. He has been the subject
of numerous dime novels, history books, articles, movies, television series, and more. He was both lauded and reviled in his own day and became
a classic western icon and subject of multiple
films in the 20th century and more recently “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” (2007) which shows James wearing a cartridge belt with two holsters with very similar designs and tooling as those that accompany the Jesse James attributed Schofields. Clearly the film crew did their research and was aware of one or both of these revolvers and their holsters.
Jesse James was born near Kearney, Missouri. His father owned six slaves but died when Jesse was still a young boy while in California preaching to ‘49ers during the Gold Rush. His mother remarried, and the family owned seven slaves that worked
on their tobacco farm prior to the Civil War. Young Jesse got off to a bloody start as a pro-Confederate guerrilla with his brother Frank during the Civil War. He was a teenager when the war began, but his elder brother went off to fight. Frank was a member of the infamous Quantrill’s Raiders which conducted the massacre at the famous abolitionist stronghold of Lawrence, Kansas, destroying the town and killing around 180 men and boys.
70 the family had indicated John Shanton owned a
Milton Shanton (1854-1911), then a resident of Kansas, died of typhoid fever while on a visit to his family in Ohio and was identified as a baker and single on his death certificate. The Chillicothe Gazette indicates William Shanton of Concord was listed among his survivors. He lived until 1945. The Texas Gun Collector article suggested