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Are these cannonballs?

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ohiosam

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Cleaning out my Mom's house I came across these 2 cast iron balls. The one on the left measures 2.5 inches the one on the right measures 2.9 inches. As a kid on of my older brothers told me they were cannonballs, not sure why my Mennonite ancestors would have had cannonballs but I'm not sure what else they might be. So I'll ask you guys, are these cannonballs.
cannonballs.jpg
 
I tend to think so. The other thing I can think of is grinding media for a ball mill.
 
Well I've always been skeptical about them being cannonballs. Just wonder what they might be. Not sure why we would have grinding balls laying around either. Oh well thy make good paper weights :wink:
 
What do they weigh?

I don't know that the diameters are all that wrong..., I seem to recall the Maryland Militia once had a galloper field cannon, and it fired solid round shot at about that size, 2.9 in.

What year did you first come across these?

LD
 
The 2.9" one weighs 3 pounds, the 2.5 weighs 2 pounds. They came out of a house built in 1861, the farm has been in the family since 1838. I first saw them when I was a kid(maybe ~1970) but they were there long before that.
 
Doing some Googling I found the most common cannon used by infantry during the Revolutionary War cannon was a 3 pounder with a 2.9" bore and was called a "Grasshopper".
 
I believe you have a couple of common forged balls
which you can buy from any good steel stockist dealing in hot rolled iron,used by blacksmiths or fabricators they come in many sizes (I have one in my garden as a finial on plant stand)
Sorry to disappoint.
(Pete)
 
Not at all disappointed if they aren't cannonballs. Always been skeptical that they were, but also never been sure what they were. If they are just iron balls I'd get ride of them. Just would like to know before they get thrown in with the next load of scrap iron.
 
I believe if you do your research you will find the Bore of the 3 PDR is 2.9 inches. The ball is 2.83 inches in diameter.
 
Possibly, but the cannon we had was iron not bronze as a "grasshopper" would be, and the carriage was a just as this photo of a Galloper and had the horse harness to boot. Grasshoppers had additional iron mountings for lifting arms that were placed in the ends of the trails, which added to the name.

As for bore size DD, thanks for the suggestion but I don't need to do any further research, as tolerances on paper are one thing, and applied to actual artifacts or reproductions of same often have variations, hence the previous phrase, "..., at about that size, 2.9 in." Thanks anyway.

LD
 
"Grasshopper" is a specific light 3 pdr Infantry support gun. "Galloper" is a carrage style that could accomidate many types of tubes.

The ball sizes for 3 pdrs usually run from about 2.77 to 2.82 for the 2.91 bore size.

I tend to agree that these are most likely milling balls, however they could potentially be grape shot for large bore guns. The Ordnance Manual of 1850 lists these grapdshot sizes

32pdr 2.90 inch 3.15 lbs
24pdr 2.64 inch 2.4 lbs
18pdr 2.4 inch 1.8 lbs
 
Looks just like one my dad came across down by the San Jacinto River doing tractor work about the time I was hatched. He used to keep it sitting in a molcajete by the kitchen counter.
 
I got one similar that I got allot of years ago when I was in the service. Mine is about 1" in diameter. I was out with EOD and they had a cannon round found in a farmers field. They said they turned up every so often and they would get it and blow it up just to play it safe. Anyway it was about 10-12" in diameter and about 16" high. When they blew it up it was filled with a bunch of these smaller round steel balls.
 
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