The Banded 12-Pounder at the Powder Magazine
The Powder Magazine Museum in Charleston, SC. The banded and rifled 12-pounder is at right.
Preserved outside the Powder Magazine Museum in downtown Charleston, South Carolina is a banded and rifled 12-pounder. Many cannon received such conversions during the war, but this particular piece stands out because it was originally manufactured by and for the British during the reign of George III (1760-1820). Warren Ripley notes - as he describes this cannon - that some of these old English cannons were highly regarded by the Confederate defenders of Charleston, and it was sent to the Arsenal in Charleston for banding and rifling at the recommendation of General Beauregard. Ripley points out the presence of the King’s monogram, and he suspects the piece is marked with the “British Broad Arrow” denoting government property like the neighboring unbanded 12-pounder. (Ripley, Artillery and Ammunition of the Civil War, pg. 29-30). I will let the reader decide whether the use of such antique cannons highlights the resourcefulness of the defenders of Charleston , their resource-poverty, or the relative quality of British manufacture even from decades prior. I wonder what properties of this cannon made it worth rifling and banding before other heavier and newer smoothbores present at Charleston?
As Ripley notes, rusting and scaling has rendered it all but impossible to accurately count the lands and groves of the rifling. Like Brooke rifles, the band over the breech is composed of several smaller bands. The rear-most band shows a little bit of a gap before the next band forward. The cannon is missing its trunnions.
The Powder Magazine Museum is a small but fascinating museum. The building itself dates to 1713, making it one of the oldest buildings in South Carolina. It was built by the colonial government to be the powder magazine within the walled settlement of Charleston. For those interested in the early colonial history of Charleston and ordnance of that era - or a curious relic of the American Civil War, this wonderful museum is well worth a visit! https://www.powdermagazinemuseum.org/
Banded and Rifled 12-Pounder
Diorama depicted the magazine as originally built within the walled city.
Model of the walled city of Charles Town in 1713. The powder magazine is at the top-right of the walled portion. (The north-west corner)
A reproduction small brass cannon and a late 18th or early 19th century British 12-Pounder cannon missing its trunnions.
Gallery of the Rifled and Banded British 12-Pounder
The Fort Sullivan Flag
The steeple in the photos above is that of St. Philip’s Church. The Powder Magazine is just out of frame to the bottom left of this photo. With the exception of the People’s Building (built in 1910), the skyline of this portion of Charleston is very little changed since the Civil War. Visible in this photo are the cupula of the Exchange Building at far left, St. Philips, the Huguenot Church just past St. Philips, the roof of the Dock Street theater, the two small towers of First (Scots) Presbyterian Church (built 1814), and the white steeple of St. Michael’s Church (built 1751-1761).
