The 9-Inch Dahlgren of USS Minnesota and USS Richmond in New Hope, Pennsylvania

Nov 20

9-Inch Dahlgren Number 105 displayed in New Hope, Pennsylvania

Note: Photos in this post, unless otherwise credited, were taken by the Rev. Tori Sumner.

A US Navy 9-Inch Dahlgren smoothbore cannon is displayed as part of a memorial in New Hope, Pennsylvania. The cannon was manufactured in 1856 at West Point Foundry. It’s US Navy registry number is 105. As originally manufactured it weighed 9,177 pounds.

According to the appendix in The Big Guns, Number 105 served aboard USS Minnesota (pg. 243). The connection with USS Minnesota as well as later service aboard USS Richmond is described on an accompanying plaque. The Dahlgren had its trunnions shortened following the American Civil War. Some, but not all, 9-Inch Dahlgrens were modified in this way after iron carriages were introduced into the fleet. The carriage is an original US Navy Marsilly-style iron broadside carriage. As originally manufactured, the cannon would have had longer trunnions for use on a wood carriage.

This cannon may be a witness to the Battle of Hampton Roads when USS Minnesota fought her erstwhile sistership CSS Virginia and was almost certainly saved from destruction by the timely arrival of USS Monitor.

USS Minnesota's Captain G. J. Van Brunt report of the March 9th engagement with CSS Virginia included this description of the action.

"On (CSS Virginia's) second approach, I opened upon her with all my broadside guns and 10-inch pivot a broadside which would have blown out of the water any timber-built ship in the world. She returned my fire with her rifled bow gun with a shell which passed through the chief engineer's stateroom, through the engineer's mess room, amidships, and burst in the boatswain's room, tearing four rooms all into one in its passage, exploding two charges of powder, which set the ship on fire, but it was promptly extinguished by a part headed by my first lieutenant...

...This time I had concentrated upon her an incessant fire from my gun deck, spar deck, and forecast pivot guns, and was informed by my marine officer, who was stationed on the poop, that at least fifty solid shot struck her (Virginia) on her slanting side without producing any apparent effect."

Van Brunt, after watching his own ship's shot bounce off of Virginia and seeing Virginia and Monitor hammer each other seemingly without causing any damage would write "wooden vessels can not contend successfully with ironclad ones."

(Official Records - Navies. Series 1. Volume 7. Pp 10-12.)

The whole of Captain Van Brunt's report - as well as those of his gunner, carpenter, surgeon and indeed all of the reports concerning the Battle of Hampton Roads in the Official Records are well worth reading.

USS Minnesota’s service continued as flagship of the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron where the ship conducted operations against Fort Fisher.

Following the Civil War this Dahlgren seems to have been carried aboard USS Richmond. The 8-Inch Rifle displayed across the Delaware River in Lambertville, New Jersey also served aboard USS Richmond. A series of photos taken aboard USS Richmond in her final years are a fascinating look at the US Navy in the final years of wooden ships and may well show this Dahlgren.