GUEST: This is a sword that belonged to my great-great-great-grandfather. He was in the Mississippi cavalry in the Civil War.
APPRAISER: Right.
GUEST: And I'm real curious, first of all, to authenticate it.
APPRAISER: Right.
GUEST And also to see what, what it might be worth.
APPRAISER: It is 100% original.
GUEST: Oh, great.
APPRAISER: In the field of Civil War collecting, these are the magic letters.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: When you have "CS" in the guard, that stands for "Confederate States."
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: To a collector, that's what you want to see.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: And he evidently was an officer.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: Because this is the staff and field officers' version, because of the letters.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: They call this a floating CS. It's a brass guard. The guard was cast, then they applied the letters to it.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: The sword itself was made right here in Memphis.
GUEST: Really?
APPRAISER: There was a firm called Thomas Leech and Company, also known as the Memphis Novelty Works Company. Very famous company in Civil War collecting. A lot of people will look at a sword like this and think, the blade's rusty.
GUEST: Certainly.
APPRAISER: The grip originally had wire.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: The wire's missing. The tip, broken off.
GUEST: Oh, it is?
APPRAISER: And a lot of people will say, "It's just an old, rusted sword."
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: But it's the history that goes with the sword, not so much the condition of the sword.
GUEST: When I got here, I thought, "Maybe I should have cleaned this up." But was it better to not do anything?
APPRAISER: Yeah, I'm glad you didn't, because there are a lot of reproductions of this sword.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: They manufactured quite a few reproductions of them.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: This one's not, but when you get into the cleaning aspect of it and the polishing...
GUEST: Uh-huh.
APPRAISER: It all sends up a red flag that maybe they're covering up something.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: But to a collector...
GUEST: Uh-huh.
APPRAISER: It's a beautiful piece. There are a lot of these swords that are in the attics, in the barns...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: And they need to get out there and see if, what they are.
GUEST Right, right.
APPRAISER: Because you never can tell when you're going to have a gem that doesn't look like a gem.
GUEST: Exactly. So how much of a gem is it?
APPRAISER: Well, if I was going to insure it...
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: I'd want to put $7,000 on it.
GUEST: Wow. (laugh) Okay. I've got chill bumps now. (laugh)
