Hartshorn Memorial Cannon
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Hartshorn Memorial Cannon is a decommissioned American Civil War naval cannon that forms the centerpiece of the South Lyndeborough Village Common in Lyndeborough, New Hampshire. The cannon is named for John Alonzo Hartshorn, the town's second Civil War casualty and a former member of the town's Lafayette Artillery Company.
Prior to 1900, the Hartshorn Cannon saw service as a naval piece during the Civil War at Fort Constitution in New Castle, New Hampshire, and is believed to have remained there until substantial changes were made to the fort in the late 1890s. The black thirty-pounder Parrott rifle is approximately 102 inches (2,600 mm) long, weighs 3,495 pounds (1,585 kg), and was made at West Point Foundry in New York.[1] Currently it sits on a low granite base which probably dates from about 1902. When in use, it was capable of firing 29-pound (13 kg) shells with a munition charge of 3.25 pounds (1.47 kg) a maximum distance of 6,700 yards (6,100 m), with a flight time of 27 seconds. Typically, nine people were required to operate it. The Hartshorn Cannon's use as a naval gun is suggested by an anchor insignia inscribed near the base of its barrel. Inscribed on the cannon is the letter-number combination "R.P.P. No. 140 3495 LBS," probably indicating the inventor (New Hampshire native Robert Parker Parrott), order of manufacture, and weight of the cannon. Additionally, the year of manufacture (1862) and classification ("30 PDR") are indicated on one side of the gun, and the initial "P" is engraved on the other.[2]
The cannon and the Grand Army of the Republic
In 1900, the United States War Department offered Lyndeborough's Harvey Holt Post of the Grand Army of the Republic a cannon to place near its local headquarters, Citizens' Hall, with the stipulation that the gift be considered a loan. The GAR post petitioned the town to allow it to grade a spot on which to place the cannon, and the town granted permission for it to do so on March 14, 1900. The post received the cannon in 1902. That year, at a dinner attended by more than 200 people at Citizens' Hall, the GAR dedicated the artillery piece to the memory of John Alonzo Hartshorn.[3]
Hartshorn (pronounced HARTS-hurn, though New Englanders in this region usually pronounce it "HAHTZ-hun") was born on July 14, 1840, to Susannah Putnam Hartshorn (1816–1903) and her husband, John Hartshorn (1811–1878), a deacon in the Baptist Church. The younger Hartshorn grew up in South Lyndeborough in a house at the corner of what today is Citizens' Hall Road and Forest Road/Route 31. On May 20, 1861, he enlisted in the 2nd New Hampshire Volunteer Regiment, infantry division, and served as part of the Army of the Potomac in Virginia. On May 5, 1862, Hartshorn was killed during the Battle of Williamsburg in Virginia, becoming the second Lyndeborough resident to die in the Civil War.[4] Harvey Holt, the namesake for the GAR post, was the town's—and according to Lyndeborough's official town history, state's—first Civil War fatality, having perished during the First Battle of Bull Run.[5]