Stolen muskets, pistols, and swords from the Revolutionary War have been recovered by the FBI
The 50 historical artifacts had been stolen in the 1970s.
Fifty historical artifacts — some dating as far back as before the Revolutionary War — were returned to more than a dozen museums and historical societies Monday after being stolen decades ago.
At the Museum of the American Revolution, federal and local investigators and representatives of 16 local museums and historical societies celebrated the recovery of artifacts that included flint lock muskets, pistols, and swords at a repatriation ceremony. The artifacts, some lost for decades, were on display as representatives from museums in Pennsylvania, New York, and Connecticut spoke of the historical and cultural significance of each item.
The recovery of the items was the culmination of a years-long collaborative investigation that included the FBI, the United States Attorney’s Office, Upper Merion Township Police, and curators and researchers who helped identify the artifacts.
In the 1970s, Michael Corbett absconded with dozens of artifacts from museums along the East Coast, authorities said. Last August, Corbett pleaded guilty to possession of stolen items, primarily antique firearms.
In December, as part of a plea agreement, he was sentenced to one day in prison, plus three years probation and a $65,000 fine, according to court records.
The investigation that led to the recovery of the artifacts was sparked by two Upper Merion Township detectives and the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office, which reopened a cold case investigation into antique firearms that had been stolen from the Valley Forge Historical Society Museum between 1968 and 1979.
The initial investigation led them to Thomas Gavin, who admitted to stealing artifacts from museums along the East Coast for two decades. In 2021, Gavin was sentenced to one day in prison for his thefts in part because the statute of limitations on many of the thefts had run out and some of the items he stole did not reach the $5,000 threshold for federal charges.
As investigators looked to find the other items stolen from the Valley Forge Historical Society Museum, they pieced together a trail that led them to Corbett, said Assistant U.S. Attorney K.T. Newton.
During the investigation, a confidential source turned over items believed to have been stolen from Pennsylvania museums, including an 18th-century flintlock musket and a 1775 musket. Investigators later executed a search warrant at Corbett’s home in Delaware, where they found antique firearms and other items they believed had been stolen from museums.
Investigators then began the slow, meticulous process of poring through sparse and often incomplete records and reached out to museums and historical societies that may have been missing artifacts to try to discern the origin of each item.
As part of his plea deal, Corbett turned over dozens of artifacts believed to have been stolen.
Among the recovered items were two guns stolen from the U.S. Army War College Museum in Carlisle, Pa. that were owned by General Omar Bradley, who led a regiment that won a decisive battle to defeat Germany in World War II and later became the first chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under President Harry Truman in 1949.
Many of the recovered artifacts had been assumed lost forever by museum curators.
Some of the items held a personal connection for the curators, many of whom came from families who lived in their towns and counties for generations.
A small Sharpe flintlock pistol marked “London” had belonged to Samuel Culbertson and had been in the family’s possession for 200 years before it was donated to the Tuscarora Academy Museum and was later stolen in 1979.
Culbertson turned out to be a distant relative of Jessica Guyer, curator for the Juniata County Historical Society’s Tuscarora Academy Museum in Port Royal, Pa. Her seventh great-grandfather was Culbertson’s first cousin.