Explosive Shell/Ball Fragment Help

[CONFEDR8]

Hello Guys and Gals,

My name is Zack. My buddy about a week back gave me an artillery shell fragment and I have tracked it do either a 32 or 42 pound Civil War artillery shell. I believe it is a yankee shell, but I didn't dig it up, so I am not sure. Can anyone break the tie?

 

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[TheCannonballGuy]

First, welcome to T-Net's "What Is It?" forum, the best place on the internet to get unknown objects CORRECTLY identified.

As my posting-name suggests, I've done deep study into civil war (and earlier) artillery projectiles. The thickness of a cannonball fragment (called its "shellwall" thickness) can tell us the unexploded cannonball's size. Unfortunately, the measurements in your diagram don't tell us the fragment's thickness. But based on those measurements, I estimate its thickness at approximately 1.25-inches. At that thickness, your fragment is from either an exploded 7" (42-Pounder) cannonshell or an 8" Mortarball.

To learn with certainty which of those two answers is the correct one, you could make a cardboard "template" to check the diameter of your fragment... but that would take some effort, and it'd be complicated to do it accurately. So I'll suggest a simpler alternative. Ask the guy who dug that cannonball fragment for the battle location it came from. If it came from North Carolina, the statistical odds highly favor it being a 42-Pounder (7"-caliber) cannonball fragment, not an 8" Mortarshell fragment. (The only place in North Carolina where 8" Mortars were fired onto land was in the Fort Fisher vicinity.) Did it come from Fort Fisher NC, or somewhere else in NC, or from some other state? Please let us know if he is able to tell you (with certainty) what battlefield it came from.

 

[CONFEDR8]

Ok, first off, thanks for responding and for the help. Second, the picture with the measurements is the thickness, and length. That is a picture taken like if you were to look at a cut-away, it would show the wall thickness and everything else inside. The second photo is showing what would be the inner wall. And thirdly, I already know where the fragment came from, and it is where I am going in a couple of weeks. It is the Wyse Forks battlefield over near Kinston, home of the famous C.S.S. Neuse II. I think this shell came from the New York Light Artillery division, but I am not entirely sure.

 

[CONFEDR8]

Also, what is the cardboard template? I have a ton of boxes that I can cut up and I can figure out what I have to do. It isn't that big a deal.

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

The cardboard "template" is made by cutting a PERFECT halfcircle into the edge of a (large) piece of stiff cardboard. You then hold the cannonball fragment's outer surface up against the edge of the cutout in the cardboard, to see if it fits snugly, or is too large or small to snugly fit.

In your case, get three pieces of stiff cardboard, about 12" long by 8" wide. Draw a 6.4"-diameter halfcircle on the long edge of the first piece, a 7"-diameter halfcircle on the second, and an 8"-diameter halfcircle on the third. Use a razorknife/boxcutter to SMOOTHLY-&-NEATLY cut out the halfcircles. Then, use the large pieces of cardboard to check which one your fragment's curvature fits best.

The red lines in your photo are oriented incorrectly for measuring the shellwall's thickness. They need to be oriented as a "Radius line." If you have access to a digital caliper, please use it to check the shellwall's thickness in several places, and tell us what the measurements are. In the photo, the thickness seems to vary a little bit, being slightly thicker on the left end than the right end. If that's true, measure in three places (each end and the middle), add up the numbers, and divide by three, to calculate its average thickness.

You mentioned the "New York Light Artillery." That unit's name indicates it was trained to use Field Artillery cannons (such as 6-Pounder & 12-Pounders), not heavy Artillery cannons (such as 42-Pounders and 8-inchers). Still, I suppose that Light Artillery unit could have been temporarily assigned to some Heavy Artillery cannons.

 

[CONFEDR8]

Ok, in the picture where it says 1.7 inches, it is truly 1.637 inches. Where it says 1.5 inches, it is truly 1.463 inches. Both were correctly measured, along the "radius line". There was a few different artilleries for the union at Wyse Forks, a ton of 3rd New York Light Artillery, 1st Michigan Light Artillery, and the 2nd Massachusetts Heavy Artillery, though supposedly they served as infantry during the battle. I will do the cardboard template later on and figure out everything about the shell.

 

[CONFEDR8]

Holy crap. I have tried 6.4 inch and 7 inch and they both are too small. I think it might be an 8 inch but first off, I have to check it with the cardboard. And 8 inches are mainly mortar right? If so, I don't know how it managed to get to Wyse Forks, the biggest weapon they might have used there is a 32 pounder, not an 8 inch cannon/mortar.

 

[CONFEDR8]

It has turned out to be an 8 inch shell.

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

I read your post which gave corrected measurements and I was logging on to reply that the new measurements (which average out to approximately 1.5" thick) mean your cannonball fragment is from an 8"-caliber cannon's roundshell. It is definitely NOT from an 8"-caliber Mortarshell. The shellwall-thickness measurements of various calibers of civil war roundhshells are listed in an original civil war US Ordnance Department document, viewable online, for free, here:
The Ordnance Manual for the Use of the Officers of the United States Army - United States. Army. Ordnance Dept - Google Books
See the chart for "Shells" on page 34.
That's where I got the shellwall-thickness info when your previous measurements indicated your frag's shellwall was about 1.25-inches thick. The chart says an 8"-caliber cannon (not mortar) roundshell's wall-thickness averages 1.5-inches. If your frag was from an 8" mortarshell, it would be 1.25-inches thick.

How far from the nearest navigable river (such as the Neuse) was that fragment found? The shell it was part of could have been fired from either an 8"-caliber Dahlgren Shellgun on a ship, or from a fort which had an 8"-caliber Columbiad cannon. Both of those "long gun" cannons are too massively heavy to be hauled around with an army in field operations... therefore, they were mounted in permanent fortifications and on warships.

 

[CONFEDR8]

Wow, that is awesome.

The Wyse Forks Battlefield is near a river, though I don't think it is deep enough to be navigable by ironclad, or any warship. The river is about 2-300 feet wide, it varies, and it is pretty curvy. If an ironclad managed to sail up the Neuse river, then the guns would have the range. The battlefield is less than a mile from the river, depending on where in the battlefield.

 

[CONFEDR8]

Also, there use to be a railroad running right through the battlefield, do you know if those guns were ever mounted to railway cars? I do know they use to do that with other guns and mortars.