This old cannonball caused a bit of a stir. NPS photo.
On the morning of April 21, 2009, a local homeowner arrived at the visitor center at Fort Smith National Historic Site in Arkansas with the best of intentions but the worst of plans—he was carrying an old cannonball he'd dug up in his garden.
Ranger Jeremy Lynch, the park's historic weapons specialist, recognized the object as a six pound cased shot (fragmentation ball) with what appeared to be a rusted but still intact fuse.
Old unexploded ordnance of any age can be unstable and is potentially dangerous, so this was not a great way for the park staff to begin their day. The good news from a safety and incident management standpoint is there were no other visitors in the park buildings or on nearby grounds at the time.
Fort Smith police were called, park staff were evacuated and a perimeter was established to keep people at a safe distance until the situation was resolved. The city fire department bomb squad arrived shortly thereafter and confirmed that the cannon ball might be "live." The bomb squad removed the object from the park and will arrange to have it rendered safe.
According to a report from the park,
The shell was found on the east side of the city on a steep bluff that is now a residential area. The site is well outside the Civil War fortifications that surrounded the town in the 1860's, but there were a number of skirmishes near this area and the bluff would have made a good target for practice.
Since regular readers of the Traveler are a savvy bunch, I'll include the following reminder for the sake of anyone who just happened by this site on a whim: If you find what appears to be an unexploded bomb, cannonball or similar object of curiosity, just let it be, ask everyone to leave the area, and notify the proper authorities. This is a good time to apply the "better safe than sorry" rule.
The clincher in the story at Fort Smith confirms that not everyone is aware of the above advice. The homeowner told park employees that he had taken his five kids to school that morning with the old cannonball rolling around in his van.
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Comments
The homeowner told park employees that he had taken his five kids to school that morning with the old cannonball rolling around in his van.
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just shows how much the park staff had probably over-reacted... Did they bring in the bomb sniffing robot while everyone huddled in the distance? Meanwhile the homeowner went back home to play with the rest of his "unexploded ordinance" collection. Too funny.
Over-reacted? I don't think so. This stuff is far too dangerous to treat it casually. I know of one serious, big-time collector of Civil War stuff who got a little too careless with unexploded ordnance and is now singing with the angels.
Yes over reacted, I am a manufacture of explosives, and can tell you that a 150 + year old frag projectile would be loaded with black powder. Black powder is not very sensitive to shock friction or impact. Not much you are going to do to make it explode without a large input of energy. That is why you can shoot it out of a cannon without it exploding. Some black powder from that period was made with NaNO3 if this was the case it was long ago rendered useless sludge. If it was made with KNO3 it may well still be capable of deflagration(very rapid burning and expansion of gases) but not detonation (reaction rate faster than the speed of sound, this is required to be considered a high explosive) and then only with a very large input of energy. Then again better safe than sorry. You wouldn't expect a park ranger to be an explosives expert
I am the man that this article was talking about. Lol! Just wanted to say that there were a lot of things left out of that story, and a lot of things added to make it more news worthy. I have quite a bit of knowledge about old ordinance too. The ball was solid shot. The ignorance involved was unbelievable. Down to how many kids were involved. LMBO! A few weeks after the incident, they lied to me and told me it was just an ornamental ball from an old rod iron fence from an old iron works factory. At this point I wanna know where my cannon ball is!!!
Over-reacted? http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-05-02-199541444_x.htm
"But in February, White's hobby cost him his life: A cannonball he was restoring exploded, killing him in his driveway.
More than 140 years after Lee surrendered to Grant, the cannonball was still powerful enough to send a chunk of shrapnel through the front porch of a house a quarter-mile from White's home in this leafy Richmond suburb."
Thanks for the comments.
Even though the risk of an explosion was small, this was good protocol for such situations. There was no reason to take any unnecessary risks, and given the park's location right in town, the response time for local authorities - and resulting inconvenience for people in the area - would have been short.
As Dan Hilton indicated, very few people have his level of expertise with explosives, so for everyone else, the best advice is to err on the side of caution.
This situation brings to mind a photo showing the following words in a large font on the back of a t-shirt: "I'm with the bomb squad. If you see me running, try to keep up!"
Telling people that these old cannonballs aren't dangerous just because you can't make them explode by jarring them is a questionable tactic. It's true that nearly everyone who has been injured or killed by the detonation of Civil War era ordnance was doing overtly dangerous things like trying to deactivate them. That said, no one should be needlessly careless with live ordnance of any kind. The explosive inside an old cannonball that hasn't been invaded by moisture is still extremely powerful and remains very sensitive to heat and friction. The smart thing to do is to be belt-rope-and suspenders careful.
Sounds like a good time to do an article on Fort Smith NHS ;-)
Semper Fi
Omar
I worked in visitor services, for a while, at a museum that topped the list for Washington D.C. terrorism targets. Our security protocols required us to treat every unattended package, camera-size or larger, as a potential threat. We would call out, and if nobody in earshot claimed the item, we immediately evacuated a discrete portion of the building, and called up the bomb dog. (We had our own, full-time.) This has been the practice since the museum opened, and each and every one of the thousands of times it's happened, the item was inspected and remanded to the lost & found. No camera has yet exploded.
It is an act of will and courage to actually follow a policy like that, especially after the third or fourth package in the same area in the same day. I am sure that the ranger's common-sense instinct was to stash the thing behind the VC and quietly call the bomb squad; that probably would have been fine. But let's honor Ranger Lynch for taking the appropriate precautions, and following procedures even when the danger was minimal.
Anonymous -
Excellent comments. It's easy to become complacent on matters of safety and security, especially in the kind of situation you described in Washington.
That is a good time to follow the better safe than sorry rule. There is no way that I'd be that curious!
yes i found a old cannonball in my back yard when digging up, more out there i'm sure, would they be worth something, and where do i bring it. thanks.
We're not experts on artifacts, so it's hard for us to say if they'd be worth anything. Based on the above story, the official advice would be to not take it anyplace, but leave it where you found it, and have someone with experience in such things come and look at it. Try your local phone book for the non-emergency number for your police or fire dept., give them a call and see if they can offer some advice. Better safe than sorry :-)
OK i live in Canada in a area where they were expecting the American to attack because of its strategic location as being the capital of Canada (at the time) Kingston. i live a good distance from the fort that still stands today and i found a 6 pound iron spherical shell. it has no fuse and dosent look dangerous. I think it was used for practice becaus it was found in a field. could someone give me any information on what it may be or what it may be worth. thank you
My husband way before we met found we believe too be an 8" cannonball with a fuse. I have recently been searching this item to actually determine if we are right and what we can do with it. It is just sitting in the garage and I am getting pretty worried being that we have 4 children and all the stories I have been reading. Any suggestions?
Trisha -
The official advice from most experts in such situations is to just leave it where it is, and give your local fire or police department a call and ask them to have someone take a look at it. Better safe than sorry!
I found what I think is a cannonball ,I was digging with a trackhoe on side of the Mississippi river seven ft deep in river sand,it weighs twenty point four pounds,can someone please tell me how to tell how old it is,it has no fuse and I think it is solid oh yea in New Orleans is where I found it.
If it has not blown up in 150 years, it is not going to blow up by you staring at it. If you put it in a BBQ or take an electric drill to it as the folks who were doing a poor job of disarming the shells in the past 50 years cited above did, you are inviting adverse consequences, but otherwise you, your family, neighbors and property are 100% safe. This is a fact that the well intentioned, yet ignorant about this subject, have chosen to speak about before taking the time to learn what they are talking about. I wish they would refrain from posting what sound like knowledgeable opinions when they don't know what they were talking about, but this is America and we have freedom of speech for all sorts.
Here is the fact-based truth: If you call the authorities, its going to be taken away and destroyed. They have procedures and thats what they do, rightly or should I say, wrongly. If you do not care about the piece or its historical relevance and just want it gone forever that is a very expeditious way to make it go away. Bye bye and you will never see it again for what that means to you or posterity. Otherwise, please take the time to Google someone knowledgeable in Civil War era artillery who will direct you to those who will safely remove, deactivate (if required), and preserve it. Some small bit of history is thus saved and after due consideration over time, you just might be proud of that.
"Not your average ..."
No problem with your suggestion to use Google or other sources to find someone knowledgeable about historic ordnance to deal with the question, although it's sometimes a challenge to sort out who is "qualified." Your approach could fall under the advice to just leave the item alone and "notify the proper authorities."
The main point of the story was what the average untrained citizen should not do, which is load such items in the family car and haul them around in search of someone who would know what to do.
I have one too!
How do you know when it's a real Cannonball and if it's loaded with black powder..? I have what is believed to be a 4 lb. Cannonball with a quater size round indention.
Hello, I have what I think is a cannonball that was found somewhere around Quenemo Kansas over 60 years ago. It has what appears to be have a round seam like a screw in plug about 3 inches across. It has been setting in a box for years and has little rust, is in good shape. Civil war vets used to have annual reunions in Quenemo until there was no one left. Judging by its condition I think this was never fired but was displayed with other items during the reunions. Old photos show large campsites set up with aging vetrans posing with there weapons as well as cannonballs in stacks. After this much time how dangerous is this thing?
I'm from Mississippi.....I find solid cannonballs in my creek often.....The ones my grandfather told me to watch out for are the ones with a hole/circle on top....Basically, those are what we modern folks call grenades. LOL. When you decide to become a collector of old stuff you really need to educate yourself on your subject. It pays to be prepared for the worst. Mostly, all you find is solid iron cannonballs but, it's that one occasion you find a grenade you may lose your life. Know the difference. I do. Never go in blind, as they say. Happy hunting.
who do I take my cannon ball to to get it checked
i have found 1 large and 2 medium size balls which appear to look like cannonballs but unsure so any help to identify them would be much appreciated