hey cannonballguy

looked kinda rusty...now in Missouri there was an Arkansas artillery unit that came up to Missouri with General PRICE early in the war...firing small lead cannon balls....not to effective unless a direct hit on someone or something...switched to traditional canon balls later.
 

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Unclemac wrote:
> Hey cannonballguy....does this ring true to you? https://gma.yahoo.com/happens-potent...opstories.html

A commenter at that newspaper article already said what I was going to tell you:
"Well, if it didn't blow up after being heated and licked-by-flames lord-knows how many times by all the historical fires in that fireplace... it probably isn't going to blow-up now."

The ignition temperature of blackpowder is 572 degrees Fahrenheit... and LOTS of red-hot sparks go all the way up the chimney when you put another log on the fire. An explosive cannonball in those conditions would have detonated long ago if it was capable of doing so -- which seems to prove it was a solid ball, not a hollow explosive one. If it was a solid ball, there's a large chance it wasn't even a cannonball, but instead was a Sport Shot Put ball or a Mining-Industry rockcrusher ball. But we will never know what it actually was, because the police gave it to an army Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit, who destroyed it.
Chimney Sweep Finds 'Live' Cannonball in Georgetown Fireplace | Georgetown, DC Patch
In my own multiple experiences with EOD units and police Bomb Squads, they are very unlikely to publicly announce afterward that they've discovered they destroyed a harmless solid ball.
 

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