SBR Artillery for California Forts / Gunbarrels Bound For Mississippi River Museum from South Bend Replicas

SBR Artillery For California Forts
South Bend Gunbarrels Bound For Mississippi River Museum

SBR Artillery For California Forts

Two California fort restorations moved ahead recently with acquisition of reproduced artillery from South Bend Replicas, Inc., of South Bend, Indiana. The cannons, called "gunnades," were recently produced on special order for Sutter's Fort in Sacramento, and Fort Ross, north of San Francisco, under direction of Michael C. Tucker, of the California Department of Parks, which administers both historic sites.
     Gunnades are a type of early 19th century ordnance closely related to carronades, a type of naval artillery named after the Carron Foundry, in Scotland, where those were originally produced in the late 18th century.
      Carronades had no trunnions, and were affixed to specially designed carriages by means of a pin passing through a lug cast onto the undersides of the barrels. Conventional guns had trunnions. Gunnades were in the configuration of carronades, but had trunnions instead of lugs, probably as an accommodation to carpenters and other persons used to working with conventionally mounted guns.
    In the combined period represented by both forts - 1812 to mid-century - it was not uncommon for fort armament to include guns salvaged from ships. California state records hold eyewitness accounts of carronades at Sutter's Fort and Fort Ross, and surviving originals from Sutter's Fort have trunnions.
     At SBR, the guns were produced in 9-pounder (approximately 4-inch) caliber, with muzzles cupped oversize in accordance with original carronade custom, and in barrel weights of about 750 pounds. Consistent with SBR practice and California Park Department requirement, the guns were cast solid, the bored oversize and brought back to caliber with steel bore sleeves. Carriages for the Sutter's Fort guns were produced in the SBR shop.


Above: With barrel lengths of 45 inches, weights of 750 pounds, and four inch bores, carronades with trunnions, or "gunnades" await shipment from South Bend, Indiana to the California Department of Parks for incorporation into ongoing restorations at Sutter's Fort and Fort Ross.


Copies of research material to assist later local construction of the Fort Ross carriages were provided to the curatorial division of the Park Department. John Sutter, a German/Swiss entrepreneur who left Europe in 1835 and arrived in California by way of Kansas, Canada, Hawaii, and Alaska, established his fort in 1840 under Mexican citizenship. Between 1841 and 1849, the fort served as a temporary refuge for California settlers including, after a Sutter-dispatched rescue effort, 47 survivors of the tragically fated Donner Party. Fort Ross was established in 1812 by Russians and native Alaskans to provide crops for Alaska and trade ties with Spanish California. THEN AND NOW - MAY 1987

South Bend Gunbarrels Bound For Mississippi River Museum

     Gunbarrels to be used in the reconstruction of the forward section of a Civil War gunboat in Memphis are being produced by South Bend Replicas, Inc., of South Bend, Indiana.
     The gunboat will be one of many exhibits in the new Mississippi River Museum, now under construction in Memphis. Scheduled to open in 1981, the museum will provide a comprehensive overview of the history of the river, with visitor traffic expected at a rate of about 750,000 persons per year.
     Carriages for the guns are being built by Ashe Ordnance Works, a North Carolina firm also specializing in antique ordnance, but mainly as carriage wrights.
     Before construction of the guns and carriages was under-taken, a team of personnel from SBR, Ashe, and the museum assembled in Vicksburg, Mississippi, to study the guns of the U.S.S. Cairo, sunk in 1862 at the siege of Vicksburg and raised a century later. Two of the larger of the Cairo's guns were selected to be reproduced: a 7-inch rifle, and an 8 inch smoothbore. The rifle is just over two feet in diameter at the breech, with an overall length of about 11 feet; the smoothbore measures slightly less. The reconstructed ship will carry three guns of each type, and a seventh will be mounted on a bluff overlooking the gunboat exhibit.

Gunbarrels for Mississippi River Museum

With barrel lengths of 45 inches, weights of 750 pounds, and four inch bores, carronades with trunnion, or "gunnades" await shipment from South Bend, Indiana to the California Department of Parks for incorporation into ongoing restorations at Sutter's Fort and Fort Ross.

Other historical restorations equipped with South Bend ordnance include Colonial Williamsburg, the sailing ship Pride of Baltimore, the Mackinac Island sloop Welcome, DuPont's Hagley Museum, and several forts including Fort Conde and Fort Pillow, in Alabama and Tennessee respectively.

GUN WEEKLY
Friday, January 4, 1980