John Moll signature

[Eric Kettenburg]

This is from Estate of Lawrence Newhard, S. Whitehall, Lehigh County Register of Wills file #218.  'Lawrence Newhard' as I understand Neihardt genealogy was Peter Neihardt's brother, and Lawrence's daughter Elizabeth married Johannes Moll's son John (II).  So, Lawrence Newhard was his father-in-law, dying in 1818.  Frederick Newhard and John Moll were executors of the estate.  Much of the paperwork is in other handwriting, but this small note appears to be that of John Moll (II).

 

[spgordon]

Yes, other signature, above Moll’s, is “Friedrich Neuhard.”

[utseabee]

Sorry about the quality of the pictures, but I think you can see the signatures. The bottom one are rubbings I took off the barrel. The signature is from an old barrel that a friend of mine has. Not sure if it was made by John Sr or John Jr. It appears to be signed John Moll Jan 18, 1812

[Eric Kettenburg]

Thanks for posting those!  Johannes/John Sr. died in 1794.  This would pretty definitely be his son John Jr. with an 1812 date. 

It remains unclear whether Johannes/John Sr. ever signed a rifle as "John Moll."  I know of two "Johannes Moll" barrels, which pretty clearly were he, but it's still a $#@* shoot trying to figure out if one or two of what appear to be the earliest "John Moll" signed rifles are the old man or his son.  Some of the later John Moll signatures look clearly different and less elaborate, but then the next debate becomes whether or not these are John II or John III (also a gunsmith as I understand it so far).

[johngross]

For what it may be worth, here's a John Moll signature on a rifle offered for sale. The seller attributes it to John Jr., circa 1820s.

http://www.am-firearms.com/cbp21-288.pdf

[KMac]

I have an old John Moll signed barrel dated December 30th 1806...
It seems his signature varied a bit.

[Eric Kettenburg]

Another dated barrel!  Thanks for posting that.  That is definitely John II in 1806.

[Eric Kettenburg]

This one is a rifle I have always 'felt' (just my opinion) is one of the earliest of the signed "John Moll" rifles.  It's also on the KRA Lehigh disc.

Note the loop in the "M" and the different angle of the lettering in the signature, the added decorative details.  Now that could jsut be a quirk, I don't know.  Also the extremely fancy Moll rifle on the KRA 'best of show' disc seems to definitely be the same John Moll who signed this rifle (below).  So are those two - the rifles on the discs - the old man anglicizing his name?  Or are they his son, who should have been old enough to sign rifles right around the time the old man died in the early 1790s?





Now this one is a restock probably of the 1960s-1970s, and this barrel I would fairly confidently wager is the old man.  I have seen one other rifle - also a restock, but a much older restock - with the exact same inlaid barrel signature.  The holy grail will be the day one of these turns up in a non-molested rifle.

[KMac]

The 1806 dated barrel is in an old stock with an iron banana patch patch and ram rod pipes - a later restock. Always wondered about those dated Moll barrels if the dates had any significance to the gunsmith, or something going on in the country at that time?