APPRAISER: John, tell us about this liquor case apothecary collection that you brought in.

GUEST: This was a pre-Revolutionary War traveling wine chest that has been converted to a medicine chest, uh, for the Revolutionary War.

The pieces that were added-- it was, I assume, originally for a dozen bottles.

APPRAISER: Mm-hmm.

GUEST: And so they built the trays of non-matching wood and outfitted it to carry their small apothecary bottles.

We still have the remnants of the old, uh, bromides.

APPRAISER: How did it come to your family?

GUEST: Uh... (sighs) I guess generationally, I'm just a caretaker.

Uh, this was originally given to a female ancestor by George Washington as he was traveling to the Battle of Brandywine and had to lighten up on what they were carrying, and he said he would be back for it, and he never came back.

(laughs) So... APPRAISER: The Battle of Brandywine was, uh, 1777, wasn't it?

GUEST: Right.

APPRAISER: When the American forces were... GUEST: Right.

APPRAISER: ...defeated by General Howe.

Uh, it's interesting.

It's oak, has good hardware on it, a lock.

Liquor, as well as medicines at that time, uh, were kept under lock and key.

Uh, show us the central part there with measuring, uh, elements.

GUEST: Well, I guess that, uh, these were the prescription dosages.

Large vial.

(laughs) Small vial, wine glassful, a smaller wine glassful.

(laughing) APPRAISER: Our ancestors drank, a lot of us.

The temperance movement, that cut back on that.

And of course, in that period, uh, corn whiskey was 75 cents a gallon, and these are large decanters, uh... GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: We think they're Continental.

Uh, there are some cases like this at Mount Vernon, numbered and initialed by Washington.

And there is one, I'm told, uh, at, uh, his headquarters at Valley Forge.

But it is interesting if this was left off and then never retrieved.

Without proof positive on an attribution, something like this, because of its antiquity and, and, uh, interest as a 18th-century document, might be worth $2,000 or $3,000.

Of course, one hardly knows how to... GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: ...uh, give a value for George Washington.

Uh, he is so famous, the founding father, uh... If that could be proven, it might even be up in the $20,000 to $30,000 range.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: A wonderful document telling us something about the medicinal situations, as well as the alcoholic republic that, from which we all descended.

(chuckles)