And what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
Saturday, April 28, 2018
Just two dudes enjoying the shade under a burst 300-pounder Parrot gun. Morris Island, SC, summer 1863
I was real close to there yesterday - at the site of Fort Johnson where a monument claims the first mortars fired on Fort Sumter. Was a beautiful day looking out to the fort in the bay and Morris Island to its right.
You wouldn't want to have been there when it burst.
ReplyDeleteI'll bet the sound was stupendous.
DeleteIf you were the gun crew it's unlikely that you'd have survived it.
DeleteIn that era, cannons burst often. It was particularly devastating when a large caliber gun burst on a wooden ship.
The Barrel was cast iron, the breech band was wrought iron. This design had a tendency to burst. See the Widow Blakely at Vicksburg.
ReplyDeleteI was real close to there yesterday - at the site of Fort Johnson where a monument claims the first mortars fired on Fort Sumter. Was a beautiful day looking out to the fort in the bay and Morris Island to its right.
ReplyDelete