Interesting photo on ebay

[VaTrooper]

http://cgi.ebay.com/Civil-War-Era-Ti...QQcmdZViewItem

I can't get a good look at the photo with the programs I have but it looks like a quarter strap rigged Jenifer saddle. Thoughts? Can anyone clean it up a bit and repost it?

[Ken Knopp]

Great photo!! Not much to go on in the description but still, I love these when they pop up but without more information it is often difficult to make sense of them.
I tooled with it some, blowing it up, etc. I am not much on clothing but as to horse equipment, from my observations it does look like a Jenifer cantle, with coat straps hanging down the flank of the horse. The saddle has rather large, long skirts (like a Mac) and long quarter straps with an "O" ring rather than a "D". The saddle blanket appears to be some kind of dark, maybe wool material (difficult to tell really). I also note a "coach" or Pelham bit of some kind on a non-descript bridle with (possibly brass?) frame buckles and rossettes for hardware. While obviously not typical Federal issue "mac" equipment, a saddle and bridle of this kind could be an expedient Federal issue early to mid war however, equipment of this kind were also commonly available for purchase from numerous post war catalogs.
Our "trooper" appears to be wearing a sack coat of some kind (Federal?) and slouch hat. He and the horse do have a rather rough hewn, western Federal war time look about them but that is entirely speculation on my part. He could just as easily be an 1890's "logger", backwoods circuit rider, miner or one of the Hatfields & McCoys for all we know. Nice and rare photo type- really!


Ken R Knopp

[Jeff Prechtel]

interesting image.....here's the best i can do,
i enlarged it, cleaned it up, and ran a couple
of filters on it. Image has a lot of contrast in it,
so i couldn't get you much more definition out
of the saddle area.

[T.Kern]

Looks like a federal Jenifer. All mac rigged but for the tree. However, the couple existing in Pa have the quarter straps running through the skirt and underneath. I had a relic original, everything was the same as the mac but for the tree. Whether this is a post war image is up for discussion. Todd Kern