Originally published on Forbes.com Sept 12th, 2013
The Pejepscot Historical Society (PHS)has just announced that it has added Joshua Chamberlain’s Medal of Honor to its collection. It is quite appropriate for PHS to be the custodian of this priceless item, since it runs the Joshua L. Chamberlain Museum which is housed in the building where General Chamberlain and his family lived from 1856 until his death in 1914.
The Medal Of Honor
There is another Chamberlain Medal of Honor at the Hawthorne-Longfellow Library at Bowdoin College, where Chamberlain served as President for many years. In 1906, the Medal of Honor was redesigned. Initially holders were expected to turn in their old medals to receive new ones, but this rule was changed to allow them to keep both as long as they did not wear more than one at a time. The medal just donated to PHS is the original one.
Medal of Honor citations make great reading as they tersely define the nature of “above and beyond”. There is one that I would frequently read as I was out walking:
Citation: For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty as platoon leader, attached to the 4th Marine Division, during the landing and battle of Namur Island, Kwajalein Atoll, Marshall Islands, 1 February 1944. Severely wounded in the stomach while setting a demolition charge on a Japanese pillbox, 1st Lt. Power was steadfast in his determination to remain in action. Protecting his wound with his left hand and firing with his right, he courageously advanced as another hostile position was taken under attack, fiercely charging the opening made by the explosion and emptying his carbine into the pillbox. While attempting to reload and continue the attack, 1st Lt. Power was shot again in the stomach and head and collapsed in the doorway. His exceptional valor, fortitude and indomitable fighting spirit in the face of withering enemy fire were in keeping with the highest traditions of the U.S. Naval Service. He gallantly gave his life for his country.
As I looked up at the statue of Lt. John Power, I would always stop and almost wish that he had been satisfied with putting the demolition charge on the pillbox and had called a corpsman and gone home with a Purple Heart and a Silver Star or Navy Cross. He could have come back to Worcester, Mass and sold insurance and sent kids of his own to Holy Cross and maybe I would have seen him among the Purple Knights who go to the reunion every year after their 50th. Instead he stands there next to City Hall.
The early Medal of Honor citations were even more terse. Here is Chamberlain’s:
Rank and Organization: Colonel, 20th Maine Infantry. Place and Date: At Gettysburg, Pa., 2 July 1863. Entered Service At: Brunswick, Maine. Born: 8 September 1828, Brewer Maine. Date of Issue: 11 August 1893.
Citation:
Daring heroism and great tenacity in holding his position on the Little Round Top against repeated assaults, and carrying the advance position on the Great Round Top.
Little Round Top
Inspiring as Medal of Honor citations are, there are few where you can reasonably speculate that a different outcome might have changed world history. You can do that with Chamberlain’s though.
The significance of Little Round Top to the flank of the Army of the Potomac on the afternoon of July 2, 1863 was noted by General Governeur Warren, Chief Engineer of the Army. General Warren had no troops under his command, so Colonel Strong Vincent took the initiative to move his brigade there. Chamberlain’s 20th Maine took position at the extreme left of the brigade and hence the Army with orders to hold at all costs.
After repulsing several attacks, exhausted and almost out of ammunition Chamberlain ordered his men to fix bayonets and charge noting that they would have the advantage of moving down the hill.
One of the best speculative alternate history books ever written was Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore. It is in the form of a memoir by a time traveler stranded in our reality. His goal had been to study the great Confederate victory at Gettysburg that won the war for them, but his presence distracted the Confederates who had taken Little Round Top before Colonel Stong’s brigade had made it there in his own reality.
Finding The Medal
How the anonymous donor (AD)came on the medal is a great New England story. According to this story in the Times Record Chamberlain’s last living descendant, his granddaughter Rosamond Allen, left her estate to First Parish Church of Duxbury when she died in 2000 at the age of 102. The church held a book sale. Having been to many a church book sale, I am trying to picture it in my mind. Was it a few piles of books on tables going for a couple of bucks ?
I dabble in books a bit and am well aware most books, even if quite old, are not worth very much, but there will often be the odd unrecognized treasure in the pile. I imagine the anonymous donor spying a battered copy of Hard Tack And Coffee like the one that my family cherished in memory of our one Civil War ancestor – Private Patrick Lyons, Fifer, Company K, 22nd New Jersey who had the good fortune to muster out with his regiment less than two weeks before Gettysburg where his division would suffer 50% casualties.
Taking it home, the donor finds the medal in there. It was a generous act to then give it to just the right organization anonymously in honor of all veterans. It might be good to leave the story there, but I’m a tax geek and I can’t help but wonder if the donor is entitled to a charitable contribution and, even more interesting, how much that contribution might be.
A Minor Flaw In The Chain Of Custody
A Medal of Honor is the personal property of the recipient and the recipient can do as he pleases with it, except that it is illegal for the recipient or anybody else to sell the medal. I’m wondering if this casts just a little doubt on the ownership. First Parish of Duxury sold a book which happened to have the medal in it. The Church could not have legally sold the medal. We probably don’t want to think too hard about that, since we should be happy with where the medal ended up. Let’s assume that AD was the valid owner and to be more pedantic that the medal was a capital asset in AD’s hands and had been owned for at least a year. We have to further assume that AD will surrender enough anonymity to be able to get an acknowledgment from PHS.
What Is The Value ?
You might think that the IRS would argue that the medal can have no monetary value, since it is illegal to sell it. That position would be inconsistent with the position that the IRS and its Art Advisory Panel took in the Sonnabend Estate. The estate owned a montage called Canyon created by Robert Rauschenberg. Part of the montage was an honest to goodness real American bald eagle.
That is something else that it is illegal to sell. The estate valued the work at $0 but the IRS valued it at $65 million positing a hypothetical reclusive Chinese billionaire as a likely buyer. I don’t know if they would change their tune with the shoe on the other foot, but the Art Advisory Panel is supposed to do the valuations without knowing whether the purpose is estate and gift tax, where the IRS prefers a higher value or charitable contribution.
I asked my friend, Matt Erskine, who wrote a guest post on the Canyon controversy, for his thoughts on the value of Chamberlain’s Medal of Honor. Matt has a boutique law practice that focuses on “unique assets”. Matt suggested that a good indication of the value of Chamberlain’s Medal of Honor might be derived from the selling prices of Victoria Crosses, which are legal to sell. Rather than posit a hypothetical reclusive billionaire, we can just imagine Lord Aschcroft, who has cornered the market on Victoria Crosses deciding to diversify a bit. Here is Matt’s analysis:
What, then, is the value of donation of the Medal? Probably the only way you could value the donation is to compare the Medal to the sale of the highest military decorations for valor of other countries. The Victoria Cross, the highest military decoration in the United Kingdom for Valor, can be sold and, at auction, usually sells for between $245,000 to $315,000.
Even though the value may be lower because a Civil War Medal of Honor (they were given out much more frequently than they were later) they are roughly comparable in rarity. So a good start would be, say, $245,000.
The value, however, includes the unique title to the Medal, the provenance in the Art World jargon. Joseph Chamberlain is famous; an officer commanding during one of the most pivotal battles of the war, present at the surrender of Lee at Appomattox, and later President of Bowdoin College and Governor of Maine. There is even good title on how it came to the church sale.
The title of a Medal makes a great deal of difference. Where the medal is given to an officer, and the officer is well known, the price would go up considerably. For example, the Victoria Cross awarded to Captain Noel G. Chavasse, a medical officer (awarded posthumously) for service saving lives in Flanders during WW I sold for 1.5 million pounds ($2.36 Million).
Some Monday Morning Quarterbacking
Matt could not help but wonder what was up with Ms. Allen’s executor:
Another question, though, is the failure of the estate planner for Chamberlain family will be a lesson to others who hold family heirlooms that might be historically significant. The Church was the sole beneficiary, but no mention was made of the significance (or value) of the Medal when the gift was made, and the church obviously did not know what it was that they had when they put it up for sale. It shows a lack of gathering and transmitting the information about the client, and the client’s assets, that is all too common when dealing with artwork and other collectibles by estate planning professionals.
Thanks For The Heads Up
I have to thank my friend Mark Savolis, Head of Archives and Special Collections at the College of the Holy Cross for alerting me to this story.My interest in the Late Unpleasantness is mild compared to Mark’s. As the College’s archivist, he is responsible for the preservation of two medals of honor. Oddly enough, he and I had just been talking about how Holy Cross, a small liberal arts college seems to have more than its fair share of association with the Medal of Honor, when you consider how few have been awarded. Three medal of honor winners are associated with the college including one of Lieutenant Power’s professors, Father Joseph O’Callahan, for his actions while chaplain on the USS Franklin. Both Lt. Power’s and Father O’Callahan’s medals were left to the College. The third is Captain Thomas Kelley who was in the “Brown Water Navy” in Vietnam. Captain Kelley, I’m glad to say, is still with us.
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