New York Button ... Need Help!

[KYshooter]

I dug this (unbelievably) on an old lot in my hometown in Kentucky today, right along an old major North-South roadway into town.

I know it's a New York button, militia, perhaps. The backmark is "Steele & Johnson." It still has a pretty unbelievable amount of gilt on the front.

I need some button experts to help me authenticate and date. Gracias.
[Full post and video will be up in the morning. ]

 

[Kenosha Kid]

1896 history of the town of Waterbury, CT reference :

http://books.google.com/books?id=C0...#v=onepage&q=steele & johnson button?&f=false

Steele & Johnson Mfg. Co. ~ 1852-1856 (sold to Waterbury Jewelry Co, who then liquidated in 1857)
Steele & Johnson Button Co. ~ 1858-1875
Steele & Johnson Mfg Co. ~ 1875-1920 (changed corporate title)

Nice find !

 

[KYshooter]

Yo, Keno Kid ...

My backmark is different from the one you pictured. Is that the later version?

Was this a militia button??

 

[Kenosha Kid]

Yo, Keno Kid ...

My backmark is different from the one you pictured. Is that the later version?

Was this a militia button??

The one I posted is listed as an "officer staff" button. Yours does look like it'd be an earlier version ... trying to locate a pic with the front the same as yours.

This site has a lot of different buttons with Steele & Johnson backmarks but just one NY button :

http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...d=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&source=www.google.com

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

KYshooter wrote:
> I know it's a New York button, militia, perhaps. The backmark is "Steele & Johnson."
> It still has a pretty unbelievable amount of gilt on the front.
> I need some button experts to help me authenticate and date.

Authentification: In addition to the Albert and Tice books on civil war buttons... we relic-hunters in Virginia have dug many hundreds of your exact version (with the Raised-Mark-in a-Depressed-Channel backmark) from yankee campsites and trenches.

Date: the rmdc backmark preceeds the depressed-letters backmark. Your specimen is definitely not a post-1865 button.

One other cool thing about your button (at least to us very serious button-collectors and historians): Steele-&-Johnson was one of only four major manufacturers of military-uniform bttons in the 19th-century. So, unlike in most other cases (such as Horstmann, Hyde-&-Goodrich, Jacob Reed's Sons, etc), your button's backmark tells its actual manufacturer, rather than just the business-name or a clothier of tailor or military-goods dealer who were merely selling the buttons manufactured by somebody else.

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

KYshooter also asked:
> Yo, Keno Kid ... My backmark is different from the one you pictured. Is that the later version?

Yes, Keno Kid's button has one of later versions of the backmark (but not the latest/final version). Keno's dates from 1857-to-1865 ...according to McGuinn-&-Bazeolon's book on dating button-backmarks.

> Was this a militia button??

Yes, it was issued to soldiers of the New York State Militia ...which was the largest of all state militias; therefore it is the most numerous State button found in civil war sites.

 

[Kenosha Kid]

Date: the rmdc backmark preceeds the depressed-letters backmark. Your specimen is definitely not a post-1865 button.

Thanks ! Anything I find with raised letters is listed as "pre-1865"; however, the exact dates aren't listed. Sorry, I don't have access to my reference books at the moment ... it's not a NY button but has the raised backmark.