Thanks for the kind replies! I'm enthusiastic about military arms and appreciate everyone sharing their expertise. Typical of gun guys!
Acquisition is still unknown. We are caring for artifacts, renovating the building, and in my case being treasurer and in our spare time. We have tons of documents and limited time.....last time we cracked open a box we found a letter signed by Jefferson and Madison....
it may have been provided to us after WWI, we have a lot of Great War stuff here.
Tripod does not have a worm gear, I'll get detailed pics of the tripod tomorrow. I'm looking at pictures on line and am wondering if the tripod itself is an -A1 with a 1917 cradle...I'll get better pics.
Lucky, on the offer of the charging handle, thank you! I will contact you as soon as I'm on a laptop and off the phone! ETA- Lucky, can you e-mail me treasurer(at)varnumcontinentals.org ? thanks.
ETA- on a laptop...the gun belongs to the National guard and we undoubtedly have the paperwork on file. The curator has been at this for a year and I have been working here for 9 months. We have cabinets full of paperwork, boxes full of stuff....it takes a loooong time to go through them properly....in our office the walls are covered with paintings, prints, papers.....last week i started looking at them, one is an original letter from George Washington. Just there, on the wall. I walked past it a hundred times and never noticed. That's what this place is like behind the scenes. Personally I love it, of course. We have lots of odd things. For instance, we have some '03 Springfields that look like the so-called "Bannerman" rifles. '17 Enfield triggers, trigger guards, Krag sights, '17 Enfield upper bands (that part with the bayonet lug), buttplates without trapdoors. Out paperwork indicates that they were issued to us by the Army.