STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
NPR News is celebrating 250 years since the founders signed the Declaration of Independence. We've been exploring culture, history and objects from those 250 years. And for the latest entry in our series America In Pursuit, we pursue a presidential treasure, once lost, now found. Here's NPR's Andrew Limbong.
ANDREW LIMBONG, BYLINE: In true American fashion, I want to tell you about a gun, a pistol that was near and dear to George Washington's heart until he lost it.
KEN COHEN: He says, yes, I mislaid it. The term he uses is, I mislaid it.
LIMBONG: That's Ken Cohen, curator of early American history at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History. The pistol made its way there after it ended up in the hands of a collector.
COHEN: But that it's a very dear item. It's been through several campaigns. He says that, too.
LIMBONG: It originally belonged to Edward Braddock, a British general in the French and Indian War, which is happening in North America in the mid-1700s. And serving under Braddock was a young George Washington, not as an official member of the British Army, instead, as a volunteer.
COHEN: It was a bit of a sore point for Washington that he was not given his colonial militia rank within the British Army. This was one of the sort of seeds of Washington's discontent with colonial status as sort of secondary citizens in the British Empire.
LIMBONG: But...
COHEN: He did have - also have a mentorship relationship with Braddock, who gave him this pistol.
LIMBONG: Braddock was shot in the Battle of Monongahela. Washington was there. Under Braddock's orders, Washington rallied the troops to retreat. A couple days later, Braddock died. Washington buried him.
COHEN: And so when you look at this pistol and you think about it coming from Braddock to Washington, they have this complicated relationship of mentor-mentee, but also limits and restrictions in terms of what kind of rank Washington can attain because he is a colonial subject and not a resident in Britain itself.
LIMBONG: The pistol itself is beautiful. It's got an ornamental flair to it with a flower etched on its handle. But there's also evidence of it being used in battle. It's a beautiful thing used for destruction. It's a gift from a beloved mentor in an army you'd eventually fight against. It's an item you cherish that you end up losing. It's a jumbled mess of contradictions and mixed feelings, like a lot of American history. Andrew Limbong, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF HANNEKE CASSEL'S "HECTOR THE HERO") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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