Cannon
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One of the site’s eight guns was recovered on June 2, 1998. It was a six-pound, cast iron gun. The British broad arrow, cast into its barrel, designates it as a British cast gun. Its other markings reveal clues to its history, including its weight, when it was cast and who it was cast by.

The heavily encrusted cannon was chosen for excavation due to its position in relation to the seven other cannon discovered on the site. The eight cannon had settled on the bottom in a clump, but this particular cannon had rolled away from the other seven before any concretion had formed. This meant that the cannon could be recovered without disturbing the others. It measured 7 feet, 1 inch in length overall with a muzzle diameter of 8 3/8 inches and a bore diameter of 3 ½ inches. The other markings on the gun are also very informative. The letters “G” and “R” refer to King George (“George Rex”) and suggest that the cannon was manufactured during his reign, 1727 to 1760. The weight of the cannon is designated by a “17-2-2” marking. At the time this cannon was manufactured, guns were weighed in “hundredweights,” or 112 pounds. The “17” refers to seventeen hundredweights or 1,904 pounds. The first “2” refers to two quarters of a hundredweight (2 x 28 pounds), or 56 pounds. The last “2” refers to 2 pounds, making for a total weight of 1,962 pounds. At the time of its recovery, the cannon was estimated to weigh close to 2,000 pounds. Another number marking, “10,” is believed to be an inventory marking. The raised “A” maker's mark on the trunnion was identified by Ruth Rhynas Brown as indicating the Ashburnham Furnace in Sussex, Southern England. Brown suggested the cannon "was probably cast either for the war of Austrian Succession 1744-49, or the earlier period of the Seven Years' War" (Personal communication from Brown to Franklin, May 2000 quoted in Franklin, Marianne 2000, Site 8SJ3478, possibly the Industry: A British 18th-Century Shipwreck, Conservation Research Laboratory Research Report #10, World Wide Web, URL, http://nautarch.tamu.edu/crl/Report10/requests.html. Nautical Archaeology Program, Texas A&M University).



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