This model was initially manufactured by Robbins & Lawrence for Sharps in Windsor, Vermont, and was later manufactured by Sharps in Hartford. Around 10,519 were manufactured. Model 1853s were used by John Brown, Henry Ward Beecher, and other abolitionists during the violent clashes between pro-slavery and free soil factions during the lead up to Kansas statehood earning them the nicknames the John Brown Model and Beecher's Bibles. "Bleeding Kansas" is considered by some contemporaries of the era and modern historians as a clear indications that the issue of slavery was inevitably going to be settled through violence not deliberation. Brown also used and captured some of these carbines during his raid on Harpers Ferry. This carbine falls within the range of the guns known to be shipped to Kansas but is not in the partial list published in "Sharps Firearms" by Sellers. It has a brass blade front sight, notch and folding ladder rear sight, standard Sharps markings, four dots punched ahead of the buttplate tang, and "AB Shaw/Co. C 13 Vol Cav/Cha[bliss?]" hand marked on the patch box door. A note included in the patch box indicates National Archive records list A.B. Shaw starting as a private in the 1st Virginia Cavalry, reaching the rank of lieutenant in the same unit by 1864, and as receiving a field commission for the command of Company C of the Chambliss Brigade.

Good with mottled gray and brown patina and mild pitting on the iron, aged patina on the brass, and some chipping and moderate overall wear on the heavily worn wood. Mechanically fine.