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Recently purchased this sling at an Antique Fair. It came with a Springfiled 1907 sling as later fitted to our No.4(T) sniper rifles (which is my area of expertise). The Civil War sling had that smell and authenticity about it so I couldn't let it go. Overall length of the leather is 69 inches and width is 1-1/8". Looks right, smells right and is stamped US but I am no expert in this era. So I thought I'd ask the experts to comment.
It's not a trapdoor (45/70), they had a double frog. (Two hooks)...this one I think is for the 50/70 rifle and even if it's one solid piece, many were done from two. It was hard and expensive to demand one long piece that would come from the best piece of one hide. They're still expensive at about $275-$300 USD and not easy to find. I haven't seen on in my area...ever. Here, this shows what rifle I'm talking about... Springfield model 1873 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
So, I too think it's right and you got lucky. How did it get there? Well, if you remember stories...during the black days of WW2, "Guns for England saw everyone and their son gleaning guns from everywhere to send over for defense of the UK. Literally everything came out from single actions to muskets. In 1939, this sling and the rifle it was on would have cost about $15 USD so no big deal...and when it was removed from the rifle, it sat on a shelf for...75 years. Now you have it.
As described, it is a US M1855 sling, adopted in that year to fit the US M1855 series of rifle musket and rifle with a 33 inch barrel. These slings were used as standard slings for the M1855, M1861 and M1863 rifle muskets and the 50-70 trapdoor and it was not unusual to see them on the 45-70 when needed.
There, that's better...