Finial Style: Point/Spear

Location Housed: Kentucky Historical Society, Frankfort, Kentucky

Measurements: 119" Height with the staff, 3" wide at the point

Recovery Location: Kentucky Historical Society

Finial Attribution: Unknown, 2016.00.197

Photograph Attribution: Kentucky Historical Society

Additional Information: This is the Point/ Spear found atop a flagstaff in the collection of the Kentucky Historical Society in Frankfort, Kentucky. The piece is made of iron and has a tapered iron base on the bottom of the staff.

In 2015-2017, the Kentucky Historical Society conducted a wall-to-wall inventory of their collections. This flag point/spear with the staff had no identification, therefore, the Society was unable to reassociate the staff with a flag. The Society attributes the finial to the dates 1850-1900. The author feels strongly the piece is Civil War period and is a flagstaff finial.

This point/spear is very unusual to the author. The author has not seen a similar piece in any private collections or in museums that have collections of Civil War flags and staffs. It is not believed that the piece is field cast, or blacksmith made.