Dressed to Kill, Dressed to Till
1820s Royal Navy cocked hat, sword and related artifacts of Midshipman Augustus J. Crichton. The youngest of two sons from the union of Commander James A. S. Crichton and his wife Mary, Augustus James was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1812. He followed in his father’s footsteps, pursuing a naval career. While serving as a midshipman aboard SPARTIATE (74), “when coming down the Maintop…he miss’d his footing, and shocking to relate, fell life less on the Deck” on 16 January 1828 during the ship’s homeward voyage from South America. His cocked hat or “chapeau bras”, 1820 pattern sword and scabbard with sword-knot and belt were sent home with his other effects, along with a letter of condolence from the ship’s captain, Frederick Warren, a former shipmate and friend of the father. These artifacts were lovingly kept and passed down in the family. The cockade and button on the front of the midshipman’s hat is still covered with black mourning crepe, retained from the original funeral service and inside the hat can be seen the inscribed signature of the young midshipman above the name of his ship, "Spartiate", along with the label of the hatter from whom it was purchased: Nance of Portsmouth. Only a handful of hats from the Georgian Royal Navy survive today and this identified example is the only one known with mourning crepe still attached. All that remains of the leather sword belt are its gilt-brass fittings: a 2-piece clasp and 2 suspension mounts; the naval sword with shagreen grip, gilt mounts and straight, spadroon blade, still retains its naval knot and scabbard, although the latter is now missing a short section of the leather sheathing. With these objects is the 1 February 1828 letter that the “afflicted” James Crichton wrote to his eldest son George, then at Halifax, in which Warren’s letter of January 18th is fully transcribed. Provenance: by descent in family to Oliver W. Crichton of Wilmington, Delaware (d. 2012); acquired in 2013.
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