The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-01-22
CANNON IN THE MELTING POT
OLD GUNS IN THE CHARLESTON
 NAVY YARD
That Are Being Turned Into Irou-Shot
 Guns, Too.

Only a few of the old cannon which
 have been accommodating ill the gun
 park at the Charlestown navy yard for
 many years past now remain there. For some time teamsters have been carting them off to the Fitchburg rail-
 road for shipment to Pittsburg, Pa.
 Some of these old cannon were cast at
 the Fort Pitt foundry near Pittsburg, to
 which they are now being sent. It
 seems a remarkable coincidence that
 many of them should be broken up and
 recast into other forms at the same place from which they were sent out | new over a quarter of century preVi-
 ous, and that many have never been in
 service. Some have lain undisturbed beneath the old trees on the park for years-and some even have spent their
 life there
 The old guns have been placed in the
 park as fast as they were turned over by the ships, and these, with some
 brought directly from the foundries, have formed the unique collection which
 for many years has been a feature Of
 the navy yard.
 The oldest of the guns was cast at
 foundry in Richmond, Va, in 1855. The
 others were from widely separated points, and were cast in the years from 1875 to 1894. The nine-inch guns came from the foundries at Fort Pitt, Pitts
 burg, Pa.: West Point, N. Y.; South Boston, (Silas Alger & So); Richmond, Va; Providence, R. T., (Builderso. The eleven-inch guns came from the Portland company; z. Chaffee Hinck 1pV Wi1liatr1 e Pnet0n Rl1il6prS' Foundry, Providence; Fort Pitt Foun dry, Pittsburg, and slas Alger & Co.,, South Boston. R. P. Parrott made the one hundred pounder Parrotts.
 While some of the old pieces were never mounted on board ship, many were and did good service. Many, no doubt, could tell much of historical in- terest if only they could speak. The four fifteeninch were taken from the old monitor Miantonomoh
 These immense cannon were cast in 1S64-5, three at Fort Pitt and one at South Boston. They were taken from the Miantonomah and brought to the gun park in 1871.
 The Tacony,' Kennebec Franklin, Osceola, Wassue Pawnee and Swata- ra turned over their eeven-inch guns to the yard. Some nine-inch guns were received from the Osceola, Vincennes, Sabine, Ticonderoga, Wabash, Ossipee, Hartford and Yantic. The Worcester gave up her sixty pounders. In 1869 the Ticonderoga had one sixty pounder, but it was finally turned over to the yard by the Ossippee, to which ship it had been transferred. The schoolship St, Marys, now at New York had two six ty-pounders and the historic old Kear- | sarge one which she turned over to the yard in 1880. This gun. however, was not in the Kearsarge's original battery.
 The number of guns of each class at | the yard previous to the sale was as follows: Seven seven hundred Parrotts, | seven sixty-pounder Parrott rifles. sev- enty-siX nine-inch guns, five ten-inch guns, one sixty-pounder reech-loading | gun, one eight-inch muzzle-loading ri- | fle eighty mine eleven-inch guns, four guns, one eight-inch sixty | five hundredweight gun, two thirteen inch mortars. fourteen thirty-two- pounder forty-five hundred weight guns; twenty thirty pounder Parrott rifles. The tifteen-inch guns weigh twenty-one tons each. The total weight of all the guns at the park was, 2,460,000 pounds.
 Fourteen of the nine-inch guns were put in order for the State of Massachu- setts, and twenty-three thirty -pounder Parrott rifles are reserved for Grand Army posts, municipalities, cemeteries and public parks, the idea being to make them serve in this way as monu- nents to the dead heroes of our wars. Many towns, too poor to erect monu- nents, have in this way obtained fitting memorials.
 The shot park is sharing the fate of tS neighbor Very few of the old shot md shell now remain in the park. They too have been sent to Pittsburg o share the fate of the guns. Like the runs few have been set up in distant Evening Transcript.