1915 Colt M1911 124847 with rig and provenance

[Scott Gahimer]

I recently acquired a nice 1915 Colt M1911 from a dealer friend at a show. He told me he had some things back at the shop that went with the pistol. I was pretty impressed when I received those "things" yesterday UPS.

The entire rig is dated 1916. Johnny tells me it is an M1912 belt. The belt and pouch are both made by Mills. The holster is marked Rock Island Arsenal 1916 and T.C.C. on the back.

A quick Google search brought up a number of hits on Dr. Frank Whipple Snow. He was a 1902 Harvard Med School graduate and served with the British during WWI before the U.S. entered the war. Then he served with the A.E.F. in France. He also went back after WWI and served in Poland up until 1921.

I found this on a Harvard seb site about his military career. It reads just about like a DD form 214, listing assignments, dates of rank, and even awards and citations. Notice at the bottom...it mentions cited by Pershing.

http://books.google.com/books?id=I0c...0Snow&pg=PA887

http://books.google.com/books?id=I0c...2%2C628&edge=0

I found the A.E.F. Identity Card pretty cool. I've never seen one in person prior. Under his photo, it states the card was to be turned in upon relief of duty with the A.E.F. ...maybe that's why. The ID tags are aluminum...one as a Captain, the other as a LTC.

The little tag states Snow was issued the pistol in 1917 and served in France. It listed the fellow who inherited the rig from Snow back in the 1950's and the fellow who acquired it in 1975. The dealer did not specify who he received the rig from, but I will follow-up with some more questions now. I hope to be able to trace the recipient who inherited the rig in the 1950's as a relative...perhaps son-in-law or something like that...through my inquiry with the Historical Society. They told me they could provide a complete geneology on Snow, complete biography and even numerous newspaper articles and his obituary. So I am hopeful.

The Historical Society from Dr. Snow's hometown in MA has a boatload of information on him to provide for me. The fellow I spoke with said they were preparing a book on the city and Dr. Snow has an entire section of the book dedicated to him and his local service to the community. He brought the Red Cross to their community among other things.

More photos to come after this post.

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