What’s on Bannerman’s Island?

The power launch which had brought us across the Hudson from Cornwall, New York, churned nearer to Polopel Island. I could see the square mass of the castellated warehouse looming out of the morning haze. The breakwater was awash with the tide, but we rounded the long southern arm and chugged between the guard turrets, passed a worn sign which proclaimed “Keep Out—Explosives—Armed Guards.” In quiet excitement I waited for the boatman to bring the launch alongside the wharf. I could wait patiently. Along with millions of passengers on the New York Central’s water level route up the Hudson, along with thousands of gun collectors who know the fabulous Bannerman arms business and its incredible catalog (which after 90 years is still a standard reference work for gun students)—I, too, had long wondered “What’s on Bannerman Island?”

The firm of Francis Bannerman Sons was a legend in the gun collecting field. Their 300 page catalog is a treasure trove of data on Civil War artifacts, everything from the binnacle of Admiral Farragut’s Hartford to the guns of the Kearsarge. Colt 1860 Army revolvers at $2.85 once appeared in this incredible catalog; and in the 1950’s I spotted a price tag reappearing on a coveted Gatling gun for a fraction of the actual value. Alas, the gun had been sold by the time I realized what had occurred; Bannerman had unearthed in their vast storehouses of ancient Civil War and postbellum arms, a forgotten Gatling gun and priced it in line with their original pricings. What else lay on their island warehouse in the Hudson?
Since that day in 1942 when I wandered into the long, narrow shop on lower Manhattan, the building at 501 Broadway with its antique “Bannerman—Firearms” and the gold bullion letters on the facade proclaiming “Army & Navy Outfitters” which has hardly changed in a half century; since that day when I bought a rusty Spencer rifle on their “Specials” table for $2, Bannerman’s catalog and company had been a moulding factor in my collecting of old guns. With the tremendous post-World War II interest in arms collecting, some other merchants have tried to imitate Bannerman, with more or less success. But it is not easy to imitate a legend. And legend Bannerman’s has become, largely because of the Island. Now I was to be the third outsider in a generation to set foot on the Island. The first was an Army colonel who visited the Island after World War II. The second man was sitting by me in the launch. Valmore Forgett, late PFC, Ordnance Corps USA, now owner of the Service Armament Co. I was there as a reporter. Forgett was there to see if he could avoid getting blown up.
Bannerman bought the island in 1900 from one Thomas Taft, who had bought the rocky crag in Newburgh Bay to keep it from being used as a depot for untaxed whiskey. Taft cut out the bootlegging and, when Taft was told that Bannerman had voted the Prohibition ticket, not to win but just to register his vote dry, the deal was made. Taft entailed the title with one condition, that no liquor be sold on the Island. This became one of the most ironic twists in the story of the Island Arsenal, for as it turned out, the condition should have read, “No whiskey shall be used here.”
On that Island, Francis Bannerman erected a rambling, castellated warehouse five stories high, rising some fifty feet above the level of the Hudson. He needed the Island to store 20,000,000 rounds of captured Spanish 7mm Mauser ammunition, as well as thousands of Mauser rifles captured in the SpanishAmerican War. Ultimately he moved other munitions to the Island, including case after case (possibly as many as a hundred thousand at one time) of Civil War Springfield rifles. Of most interest to Forgett professionally, were tons of Civil War and Spanish War artillery shells, corroded into dangerous condition. In addition, Bannerman, to build a foundation on which to place his arsenal, sank barges in the Hudson— barges filled with live Civil War artillery projectiles. As we disembarked and walked across the crumbling concrete walk, I noticed that the overgrowth of poison ivy was tangled about the nose studs of fused Parrott rifle shells.
The potentially dangerous condition of the age-old munitions stored on the Island became apparent to the Bannerman people recently, and they tried to locate

Imposing pile of Bannerman’s Island Armory is seen by New York Central passengers on route from Big Town up to Albany. Building is somewhat smaller than grotesque architecture makes it appear. Signs warn of fierce dogs on guard but recent caretakers shot them because they stole the Collie puppy’s food.

an ordnance expert who would deactivate the unsafe munitions. They contacted West Point’s Museum and were told, “Go see Val Forgett.” They also wrote to Aberdeen Proving Ground. “Only man in civil life we know who would tackle that job is Forgett,” they were told. Thus warmly recommended, the engaging proprietor of Service Armament Company was willing to risk life and limb to take a look. With an ever-present possibility of stepping on some ancient fuse rotten with verdi gris that would detonate from the pressure of a foot, we trod Bannerman’s Island.
The breakwater (composed of thousands of .45-70 musket barrels dumped in and mortared over) led to a north ground-level door. Beside the entrance I suddenly paused, scooped down into a tin box filled with the pine needles of decades, and pulled out a 1inch Gading Gun cartridge case that crumbled in my fingers from corrosion. That case, in “keepable” condition, would be worth from $5 to $10 to a collector. There must have been a hundred in the box once— now gone beyond recall.
Inside the first floor of the main warehouse, we walked past stacks of ammunition cases. These chests, each about two by one by three feet in cube, contained some of the 20,000 rounds of high explosive Spanish War cannon ammunition that Bannerman wanted deactivated. In addition, there were round metal canisters, Navy gray, holding an even two dozen two-pounder brass case cartridges. The shells were painted red, high explosive, and the fuses were of a type that is “armed” by the shock of discharge, ready to fire on impact. These shells were condemned, so the story goes, because they had been dropped once in transport. We shook one slightly—something rattled inside. I looked at the piles of ammo chests rising twice as high as my head into the dimness of the unlighted warehouse vault, and wondered how easy it would be to “shock” them a second time for detonation. I certainly did not envy Forgett his job.
We continued to probe. My gun-hunting instincts were all primed to find a 20-musket armory chest, or one of those chunky square boxes containing fifty New Model Army Colts, the way Uncle Sam used to ship them. But rust and dust covered everything. There was no system, no order, just chaos.
To the rear on the first floor, Island caretakers had laid out a hundred cases of .45-70 ammunition for one dealer order. More cases held tens of thousands of the brass-bullet Spanish Remington cartridge. Off in a comer by a rickety, dangerous stairway were three big chests, lids smashed. Each contained Spanish Mauser cartridge clips, once-bright with fresh nickel plate for

From gun shields on battlements Francis Bannerman surveyed Hudson River. Arms magnate once discharged a 37mm explosive round to demonstrate lot of ammo was serviceable and later received complaint from shore dweller.

tropical issue, now spotty and stained with age.
On the second floor we discovered more interesting relics. A pile of scrap resolved itself into a tangle of rifle barrels. We apparently had stumbled on to Bannerman’s “factory” area where, long years ago, skilled workmen had remodeled long Army rifles into cadet muskets for private military academies. In another section of this floor, we came upon hundreds of sword hilts—just the hilts and about a foot of blade, and scabbards chopped in half, all of the American Civil War pattern. North-South Skirmish fans would have liked that cache before someone chopped ’em in half. Further on, we came to artillery carriages, with the wood-spoke wheels smashed, and the bronze hubs missing. One trunnion cap remained; its fellow had been hammered off. “What is this, battlefield salvage?” I asked. “Heck no,” Forgett snorted. “A former caretaker was an alcoholic, and he took boatloads of brass over to the mainland to peddle for booze!” In sorrow, I counted Gatling carriages. Each was damaged, the guns gone, their heavy brass housings melted years ago. A few barrels, a damaged set of trunnion arms or two, some gears, a bent feed case—all that remained of a dozen fine Colt Gatlings.
I took the light and decided to pass to the highest point quickly, get the lay of the land, and then continue the search working down. The top was a huge “captain’s walk” ringed by a parapet and with gun shields set in embrasures, for the Navy quick-firers— light guns shooting the two-pound shell, that old Francis had bought from the Spanish War sales. Even these guns were gone, more probably unlimbered and sold for scrap, since they had no military value for over a generation.
The castle roof was tarred, and sagging. One side sloped a good four feet lower than the other, and I did not dare trust my weight to the middle. I edged around carefully, caught the view downstream where West Point’s gray granite barracks clustered on the hillside, saw farther down stream where Cornwall was a sprinkling of white window frames and blue roofs. Then I started downstairs. The three top floors were empty of heavy gear, the top two stripped clean. Through the concrete floors I could see daylight as the sun shafted through some window on the floor below. Wire net and rods showed where the concrete had sloughed off, leaving nothing but reinforcing metal.
The third floor level had a southern exit to a castellated walkway that slanted down abruptly to ground level. Strewn about and tumbled into the rank garden below, were dozens of U. S. Army white cork helmets. “Rudy Vallee bought 600 of those a few years back,” I was told. “His band wore them, and then they were auctioned off for charity.” Today—anybody want a pith helmet? They’re up there on the Island, rotting in the rain.
The second floor came in for another careful search. I shuddered to look at a carefully piled stack of Civil War army knapsacks, forming a huge cube possibly fifteen feet high and thirty feet on a side, which had begun to tip. A single rope passed in front of the pile, the topmost tiers of which had now sagged out as much as five feet over the base. The rope had frayed to a single strand or two. If that pile collapsed, it might have force enough to bring down the whole tottering old building!
Though Bannerman built for the ages, his castle has hardly lasted a lifetime. A reason why is found in Bannerman’s story of a potential customer. “A party came to us,” recounted the late Frank Bannerman VI “and wanted to purchase a large lot of military cartridges. The price was satisfactory and the sale was almost made, when he requested the privilege of using our island to repack the cartridges into nail kegs.” Bannerman refused. “We will not sell you the cartridges,” he told the revolutionary agent. “You haven’t money enough to induce us to break the law.” The ammunition buyer then went to another firm, bought the cartridges he needed, had the boxes wrapped in excelsior and packed in kegs of dry cement. The shipment was seized by customs officers, the ammunition impounded and sold at auction. “We were the pur-

Breakwaters at Polopel Island were pleasuredom for Bannerman family, who gaily disported in swim togs unmindful of barges of artillery shells which had been sunk to provide foundations for construction.

chasers,” Bannerman added smugly. “The cement we used in building our island storehouses, and the cartridges were sold to the President of Santo Domingo.”
El Presidente got a better deal with his cartridges than Bannerman got with the cement. It occurred to me that, if I were a revolutionary, shipping ammo in cement barrels as a disguise, I too would buy the cheapest cement I could find. To judge from the state of Bannerman’s castle, that is what happened. The 20inch thick main walls have developed cracks through which daylight passes, and weeds are starting to push their way into the building.
We walked outside again, and it was like walking out of the 19th into the 20th century. Piles of gummy knapsacks, chests of unfinished Krag Jorgenson rifle parts, rusted cartridge clips and broken artillery carriages were the heritage of the 19th century to the 20th. Outside, a shattered Civil War 3-inch iron rifle needed a thousand dollars worth of woodwork to make it useful. And, still looking up stream, defending the Island from the holiday boaters who often oar close for a look, a monster Dahlgren gun rested on its iron barbette carriage, frozen solid with red, immovable, but as grand in its silence as when it frowned from the gunwales of Flag-officer Farragut’s Hartford and challenged the Confederacy on the western waters.
I had brought with me several old Bannerman catalogs, two dating back to 1903 and 1905, and here in the shadow of the firm’s memories, it amused me to look through them and see what was once offered. Take the Hall rifles, for example.
“First American Breech-Loading Flint Lock Rifle made in America,” reads the 1905 catalog. After a thrilling description of the guns, calculated to speed the purchaser’s pulse, comes the kicker: “We expect to get $50 each for some of these guns . . . but for the present we will pack gun in case ready for express (buyer pays expressage) for $10.00 each.” Though this lot of Hall rifles has long since been sold, Bannerman has left us a story of how he obtained them. At the Government auction sale, 300 Hall’s rifles were offered. In 1873, Bannerman had bought such guns in unserviceable shape at 3Vi^ each. About 1900, he had paid as much as $8 a gun. Puzzled over the market value of these guns, Bannerman dreamed three days before the sale that he was in his Broadway store, selling a man a Hall rifle for $1.71. He took this figure as his bid. When the bids were opened, it was found that Bannerman’s competitors, Hartley & Graham, had also bid $1.71. Bannerman and H & G’s business friend, William Read of Boston, cut the lot three ways. Even at $10.00, Bannerman could afford to sell them.
The founder of this fantastic arms business (which, as early as the turn of the century, “requires 15 acres for storage”) was the sixth Francis Bannerman, a vigorous Scottish nationalist bom in Dundee, Scotland, in March of 1851. With his parents, he arrived in America in 1854, and grew up in Brooklyn, where his father ran a ship’s chandler store near the Navy Yard.
The business, managed by his father and later by Frank, grew during the 1870’s and 1880’s, but did not take on its character of a general munitions firm until near the turn of the century. In 1897, Bannerman moved to 579 Broadway, a spot that served as major outfitter for many of the Spanish American War volunteer regiments.
Young Frank had accompanied his father to the Government auctions which siphoned off the tremendous Civil War surpluses and, with native Scottish sagacity and some acquired Yankee acumen, became a shrewed bargainer in the surplus sales then being held in New York. A newspaper ad of about 1900 showed three steam trains and the heading, “Three train loads of army goods sold to Francis Bannerman,” with revolvers at .50 up, carbines at $1.00 up, muskets slightly higher.
Though Bannerman’s later catalogs intimated he had purchased guns at the end of the Civil War, his name is conspicuous by its absence from the Congressional report of sales made in 1870-71. Then a half million Springfields, plus tons of cannon and harness, were sold off to arm the French in the Franco-Prussian War. Though Bannerman may not have been personally active in those sales, his firm was to have a long association with foreign munitions houses. By World War I he had consolidated small arms storage and sales at 501 Broadway, with the Island Arsenal off Cornwall, a warehouse at the Erie Basin Stores on the Brooklyn water front, and a Belgian agent in Liege at 79 Rue Lairesse. “Our agent in Belgium” said Bannerman, “acted for the firm of Hermann Boker & Co. who supplied the U. S. Government . . . during the Civil War. He informed me he altered over 60,000 Austrian tube lock guns into regular percussion cap muskets . . . Consequently tube lock guns are now rare.” Concluded Bannerman with the “hard sell” approach, “Every gun-collector needs one.”
Not bothering to communicate the whole story to his readers, Bannerman neglected to tell them that he had commercial connections with the German-Belgian munitions firm of Adolph Frank of Hamburg. To judge from the overlapping offerings of identical muskets and rifles, Bannerman did a brisk business bidding in guns for ALFA and the European munitions traders, reserving a stock for his store. Collectors shudder to recall the picture of the Colt rifle musket in Bannerman’s catalog where, in addition to reassuring every collector that he needed one, Bannerman remarks that his Liege agent altered 50,000 of them to flintlock for the African trade, and they are “now rare.” There seems to have been considerable reciprocity between Bannerman in New York and the German and other foreign munitions brokers. Offered in Bannerman’s catalog as well as those of European dealers, were the identical souvenir trinkets—desk weights, ink stands, and button hooks, made from a variety of small arms cartridges and small-caliber cannon shells.
The small-caliber cannon shells, 37mm or Hotchkiss
PISTOLS, HOLSTERS, POWDER TESTERS AND LOCKS

No, 50.—Starr's Calibre 44 V. S. Army Revolver; fired with percussion cap, d shots, 8-inch barrel; can be loaded with loose powder and hall and fired with cap. We have brass bullet molds for these revolvers, price 50c. Revolvers are nearly new and cost IJ. S. Government upward of $18 each;

This revolver can be easily taken apart by the thumb screw back of the cylinder, so that the cylinder can be quickly taken out. loaded and placed back in position lor firing (Place the cylinder in with the cone opposite the hammer, press down the frame, insert the. screw.)
In these'days of modem weapons and factory-loaded cartridges* such a good,serv* iceable revolver as the Starr will be the means for obtaining a practical knowledge in loading with powder, ball and primer, as well as proving a pleasant and instructive pastime. With the free' dom of making up your own loads, for this revolver will shoot cither bailor bird shot,the cost of these home-maderevolver powder and bail loads will be about one-quarter that of factory Joads.*
They are good, accurate shooti n g revolvers { have alt been tested by U. S. Government inspectors. Price, $1.95. calibre 14. same as the above, exceptrfitat. they were used by cavalrymen and officers during the Civil War. They are in bad order; valuable as relics; we doubt if any can be put in serviceable order; we offer them as they are. Price, $1.25 each. The above illustration shows the way the No. 51 Start Revolver can be taken apart. Slightly rusted. The total length is 12 inches; weight, 2% poundaThe revolver can be carried at halfcock, thus guarding against a«ciaental discharge. By pulling back the trigger, the hammer is raised to fdll-cock, the cylinder is revolved opposite the bar* rel and the hammer fall strikes the cap and the bullet speedy on its way. one operation, merely pressing back on the trigger.

REVOLVERS AND PISTOLS.

Three trainloads of army goods bought by Scottish munitions king at turn of century included Rogers & Spencers for 25<t and various non-standard guns for which no market had existed earlier. At prices of nearly $5 for a Perrin and $6.50 for a Joslyn, Bannerman had hard time selling off many guns until collector interest increased in period of World War II.

Transformed Civil War muskets were poor-man’s shotgun in 1880s. Top is Colt Special Model cut to short rifle, but middle is Bannerman-Hartley-Daly-Great Western 1863 Springfield transformed to shotgun using condemned parts. Gun is nearly new, shows seam in barrel blue not visible if bright. Bottom is one of Bannerman’s 50,000 Colt Special Models shipped to Liege and changed to shotgun by correspondent M. Ancion & Co., now Ancion-Marx.

one-pounder projectiles, were souvenirs from Bannerman’s biggest commercial coup, when he purchased 90 per cent of the captured Spanish War material acquired by the United States in the Spanish-American War. Over 20 million rounds of small arms cartridges, plus a tremendous pile of other munitions already on hand, made the New York fire marshal take a dim view of the business, and so Polopel’s Island was purchased. To it came barge loads of munitions, including the Spanish Mausers. Many of Bannerman’s Mauser rifles were cleaned and repaired at Springfield Armory. The armory business was a little slow in 1900 since the Army boards were considering adopting a new magazine repeating rifle, ultimately the famous “03 Springfield,” and Bannerman paid the men. Bannerman then bought 14,000 guns and offered them at $10 each, with 7,000,-000 rounds of 7mm ammo. Master of the “hard sell” in a gentle 19th century sort of way, Frank wrote, “Any day our Agent may send us cablegram ordering shipment of the whole lot (for export). If you contemplate purchasing a good rifle do not put it off. Every one is pleased with the Mauser.” Some of his customers were more than pleased! they went stark, raving mad with joy. Surely only a madman would write, as one testimonial declared, “The Mauser is the only gun made for use in hunting big game, mountain sheep, elk, etc., at 1,500 to 2,000 yards. The .3030 rifles are not in it. The Mauser is superior to any American-made sporting gun.” Even for 1900, that was a real “gone” shooter.
Bannerman lived an adventurous life. The Mausers did not make him any money sitting in New York, and he decided to go abroad to sell them. Complained Bannerman frequently, “The American Government
does little or nothing to help their merchants trade in foreign countries.” He had shipped a sample Mauser and cartridges to King Alexander of Serbia, via American Express. But the King was assassinated and the transaction slightly delayed. The gun remained in the American Express office in Hamburg until Bannerman asked the new King Peter if he was interested. Said Bannerman, “The Serbian agent cabled ‘Yah!’ but no business could be done without samples.”
Quickly, Bannerman took passage for Europe, entrained to the Balkan kingdom with his rifle and cartridges. He met the Serbian agent in Liege and gave him the package of cartridges to smuggle through, while Bannerman decided to take the Mauser rifle to King Peter personally. At the German border the customs officer reached for the gun but the Scotchman, game to the last, cried out, “Nein Zoll, Deutsche Mauser,” (“no duty, German Mauser”) and showed the guard the “Loewe-Berlin” stamp on the gun. But the customs officer levied a duty of 72<*, which the munitions magnate gladly paid, and continued on his way to Serbia. The ironic finale to the excursion was that Serbia agreed to buy the rifles, but AustriaHungary refused to allow shipment, and the deal fell through.
Dealer in second-hand goods, Bannerman often tried his hand at manufacturing. In the 1880’s, he became associated with Christopher M. Spencer, rifle inventor then making a pump shotgun, first of its kind and one liked by Annie Oakley. The Spencer business fell apart in 1887, and Bannerman for the next twenty years listed the Spencer factory in his catalog as “for sale.”
By World War I Bannerman had grown to be the

Full-size illustration of the 60-Caliber Center-Fira Ball Cartridge for use in Springfield, Remington or -aduated sights Sharp's Cadet Breech-Loading Rifle. P. ice oi either . for single guns bailor blank cartridges, $1.80per 100, $15.00 per I 000. the best and lowest 80 U. S. Army Fencing Bayonets with whalebone blade and knob which bends when struck; kind used a: West Point during the cadet days of Generals Grant, Sherman, Lee and other famous generals of the Civil War.
This Fencing Bayonet will fit any of the U. S. Springfield cadet rifles except the calibre 45. With this socket aud the whalebone blade fencing drill can be executed the same as at West Point.
Socket and whalebone blade $1 the set.
NOT HIRING GENERALS.
Since the War tome of the private* have told with great relish of the old farmer near Appomattox who decided to gi*e employment after the surrender, to any of Lee’s veterans who might wish to work a few days for food and small wages. He divided the confederate employes into squads according to the respective racks held by them in the army. He was uneducated, but entirely loyal to the.Southern cause. A neighbor inquired of him a* to the different squad*:
“ Who are those men working there ? ”
“ Them Is privates, sir, of Lee’s army.”
** Well, how do they worfc? ”    ,
** Very fine, sir, first-rate worker*.”
** Who are these in the second group^J " Them i» lieutenants and captains and they work fairly well, but not as good workers as the privates.”
*• I sec you have a third squad, who are they ”
Them is colone's.”
“ Weil, what about the generals ? How dc they work ?" ** Now, neighbor, you’,I never be«r me -ay one word ag’in any man who fit in the Southern irmy, but I ain’t a-gwlne to hire no generals.”—Scribner'* Magazine.
Specialist at rebuilding long guns into short ones, Bannerman devoted a page of his 1905 catalog to short rifles which he made up for sale to cadet organizations. Piece second from top is typical of Civil War two-band rifle of Springfield type called by collectors "artillery rifle.” but Bannerman's catalog makes plain fact that he built these rifles himself and they were not Civil War issue. Interesting is Sharps cadet rifle shown. Not listed under Remington, cadet rifles is special gun Bannerman made up using .50 cal. U.S. Navy pistol actions.
largest house of its kind in the United States. A cooperative bidder with rival firms like W. Stokes Kirk and Hartley & Graham, he had a better sense of publicity and appealed more to the gun crank and collector than to the revolutionary agent. Though he spiced his offerings with phrases like “special bargain prices to government War ministers,” his primary appeal was to the curio collector. Remington revolvers, new at $1.85, he suggested could be grouped with brass drumstick holders (200), U. S. Marine brass shield (150), crossed sabers (100), and U. S. brass bridle monogram (100), or “All the above articles for $2.40, not including the board.” The happy purchaser was supposed to make his own mounting placque, drill a hole through the revolver frame, and bolt it to the board as a “den decoration.”
But Bannerman did turn out some unusual models of guns for shooting purposes. Cadet corps were outfitted with Bannerman cut-down Springfield rifles, or Remington single shot pistols converted to small infantry muskets. For the more delicate cadets, he offered “Quaker guns,” his own original design, using U. S. muskets with wooden barrels. Once he owned 125,000 Springfield musket stocks, and he could make up these items from time to time from spare parts. A thousand type 1903 rifles, bored .303 caliber with complete cartridge belts and bayonets, were delivered to the British as a gift in 1914 from their Scot friend. His Majesty’s Government said thank you, tried out the rifles at Hythe, found that the first shot would hit the mark, but found also that the second shot would not feed into the chamber. The big .303 rims jammed in the Mauser-type magazine. So they stamped all the guns “DP” for “Drill Purposes,” and not one of them saw combat. But the spirit was there. An old British soldier told me that the Bannerman Springfield was one of the most accurate rifles he had ever handled, with that .303 cartridge on the front-lug action, for the first shot. For the founder of the firm, the first shot was the last; the sixth Francis Bannerman died in 1918.
After World War I Bannerman’s firm kept active, and such deals as Civil War Smith carbines, which they sold by the thousands through Gimbel’s New York store for as little as 290, kept them in business. They bid in thousands of the Russian Nagant rifles and proudly proclaimed that buyers should order, “as our prices are half what the ammunition companies charge.” They even converted Russian rifles to .30-06, but few people care to talk about that nowadays. Such guns were definitely unsafe.
And through the years the Broadway store sold the Springfield rifled muskets, the Colt revolvers as “complete outfit, including flask, mould, caps, just $7.50.” But today, with the 501 Broadway address now cleared for a parking lot, and the Island crumbling into the weather, gun fans want to know what is left at Bannerman’s. The question is not easily answered. The New York store ran through the depth of a city block, had basements and sub basements, and from personal experience I know that something nobody expected always seems to crop up there. With the Island and the store, I still cannot answer the question “what’s left at Bannerman,” except to say “plenty.” Bannerman’s is full of surprises.
While Bannerman doesn’t have cases of muskets left, the impossible does happen. Said the Island’s caretaker, “We found a box of .50-70 rifles here last month and sent them down to the store.” And from the sub basements of the store, cases and chests of parts, accouterments, artillery components, and ammunition came in bewildering confusion. The old firm, ready for a facelifting, was re-established at Blue Point, Long Island (Box 26). An aggressive selling program has put more of the Civil War relics before the collector, and Bannerman’s is booming again. But they are still a little leery of that island. There is enough ammunition on that rocky crag to make it boom all by itself.