9,000 pound Confederate cannon recovered from CSS Georgia
Jeremy Gray | jgray@al.com By Jeremy Gray | jgray@al.com
on September 22, 2015 at 7:43 AM
9,000 pound Confederate cannon recovered from CSS Georgia
A team of marine archaeologists last week recovered a 9,000 pound cannon from the CSS Georgia, a Civil War ironside that has rested at the bottom of the Savannah River since 1864.
The Dahlgren rifled cannon was previously undiscovered by several high-tech, multibeam sonar surveys, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers wrote in a press release.
The ship must be moved for a $700 million project to deepen the river to proceed.
The CSS Georgia guarded against a Union naval advance into Savannah, for two years but never fired a shot in battle, except for an unconfirmed volley against a Union rowboat.
As Gen. William T. Sherman's troops advanced on Savannah in December 1864, Confederate forces scuttled the ship to prevent it from being used against them. The ship had never fired a shot.
The ironclad remained undisturbed for more than a century before a dredge struck and marked it in 1968.
In addition to the cannon, archaeologists are recovering leather shoes, wrenches, ceramic bottles, and an anvil.
"The range of artifacts that is coming up is staggering," said Jim Jobling, a project manager at Texas A&M University's Conservation Research Laboratory. "I'm very, very pleased," he said.
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