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George A. Custer's personally-owned standard-style five-button U.S. cavalry officer's fatigue coat, almost certainly from the Fort Abraham Lincoln period (c. 1873–1876), retaining its five original brass buttons (marked "E. A. Armstrong / Detroit") secured by their original stitching on the placket, plus three more buttons on each cuff. Sometimes termed a blouse or jacket, this style was introduced in 1872 and was custom-tailored, as was the case with virtually all officers' uniforms; The Detroit-made buttons lend credence to the Custer provenance, as he would have likely had the jacket made by a tailor in his hometown, Monroe, Michigan. In very good to fine condition, with some small moth holes.
The coat is illustrated in Bugles, Banners and War Bonnets by Ernest L. Reedstrom (Caldwell, ID: Caxton Printers, 1977, p. 290), identified as "Custer's 5 button blouse, Courtesy Dr. L. A. Frost Collection." It was obtained by Dr. Lawrence A. Frost in 1950 from Howard B. Berry, who declared in a notarized statement that it was one of the items which came to him in a trunk labeled "Col. Geo. A. Custer, 7th Cav." Reportedly, Dr. Frost's subsequent research determined that this trunk had gone missing around the year 1900 following a fire in the Custer family barn. Frost presented the items he had acquired from Berry to James Calhoun Custer—Nevin Custer’s son—who identified them as familiar pieces he had seen in his youth. He confirmed that his father had shown them to him and affirmed that they had once belonged to General Custer.
The coat also appears on a 1973 list by Dr. Frost of items from his collection which were for sale; a notarized 1993 affidavit from Elizabeth A. Lawrence states that she purchased the coat from Frost at that time. Photocopies of these documents are included. The coat was subsequently sold at auction in 1993 (Lot 274A, Brian Riba Auctions, 1993), and in 2012 (Lot 38581, Heritage Auctions, December 11–12, 2012).
The Western Americana auction of Jochen Zeitz.
