Live Civil War cannonball found. Post a coin from 1864.

From NBC News...

A bomb squad safely deactivated a live Civil War-era piece of ammunition after it was discovered in Maryland last week.

A homeowner contacted the state’s fire marshal after being given what seemed to be an unexploded cannonball that a family member found near the Monocacy Battlefield in Frederick, about 50 miles west of Baltimore. Officials confirmed that the explosive was live.

Bomb technicians moved the cannonball to Beaver Creek Quarry in Hagerstown, where they conducted “an emergency disposal,” according to the Maryland State Fire Marshal.

“As proven today, the finding of military ordnance from the Civil War is not uncommon in Maryland, and these devices pose the same threat as the day they were initially manufactured,” the fire marshal’s office said.

The battle of Monocacy occurred in 1864. Post a coin from 1864.

The cannonball.

 

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Awesome find.

 

This was dug up at Port Hudson Louisiana, it is a 22lb Parrott shell fired during the run up to the siege at Vicksburg in 1863. The firing pin was removed and the shell "de-militarized".

 

Cool.

 

yup yup IHC about the best I can do for 1864...

 

I have an 1863 and an 1865... does that qualify for "close enough?"

 

I don't have photos, but when I was about 10, I found an old cannonball about two-thirds the size of the one in Post #1. It was buried in a hillside leading to the bridge over the railroad tracks near the house where I was born. That was in Rockville, Maryland about 15 miles northwest of Washington, D.C. I traded the cannonball to the Good Humor man in exchange for a box of toasted almond bars.

 

Here are the "Big Three" 1864 cents. These were the last old U.S. coins I purchased before I stopped buying the old U.S. coin market.

Copper-nickel



Bronze



1864-L



The 1864 Small Motto Two Cent Piece



The 1864 Monitor Civil War token struck from very rusty dies.

 

Do you regret that now?☹️

 

Was that the Viers Mill bridge crossing or maybe the Rt. 28 bridge crossing? Just curious. I remember when the old Union graveyard was found near the old Rockville Courthouse.

 

People are always finding unexploded ordnance around Richmond. A few years back a fellow who was known for deactivating them was given a large naval shell, probably fired from a mortar barge or a gunboat in the James River-- to deactivate.
Something went wrong when he tried to drill it in his backyard, apparently. He was obliterated and pieces of shell landed on distant houses.
One of my patients brought in a nice Parrott shell show me (deactivated) which caused a bit of a fuss when he set in on the floor of the waiting room next to his chair.

 

Like cannonballs, Good Humor toasted almond bars are no longer made. For someone 10 years old, it was a good idea at the time.

 

It was the steel bridge on Viers Mill Road. Did you ever walk across the arch? What else do you remember about Rockville? The clock in the center of town in front of the Milo Theater? Murphy's 5 & 10? The Montgomery County Sentinel building with Ray's Poolroom in the basement (next to Maryland Motors)? The soda fountain at People's Drug Store? Rockville Drive-In on Rt. 355 (?) heading toward Gaithersburg? Dickerson Quarry? RMHS? Go Rockets!!!

 

I figured it was a 50/50 chance it was Viers Mill. I remember EVERYTHING you stated....and additionally, I remember getting in a fight with Mike Curtis at the Hot Shoppes in Wheaton Plaza, and then going to a Friday night "milk party" in Germantown the night before the RM/Wheaton game, when the Colts coaches showed up to inform him they wanted to talk to him. I remember the beer runs into LincolnTown in Rockville.
I remember Doug Davis and Wendell Pyle out lifting the York Barbell Team when they put on an exhibition at the Congressional Plaza Show. I remember Minnesota Fats putting on a pickup game exhibition at Ray's.
I had a soda fountain job at Peoples in the summer of 65 as a janitor, and then got the opportunity to be a cashier at the the 4 Corners store in Silver Spring.
Do you recall Charley Lake the MCPD motorcycle cop arresting 30 of us at Dickerson for drinking, after Bonnie Soper dived off the tower rock and broke her legs?
I am surprised you didn't mention the opening of the first McDonalds in the area, on the pike.
I remember the clock and the Bell Brothers lifting the goat up there.
I remember the St. Catherine Labore Carnivals at Viers Mill. and the $1 chance to last 30 seconds in the ring with the orangutan....who would believe these days that such a thing actually happened?

I am hijacking the thread. I apologize.

 

Well, I hope Sy aka @Skyman will accept our apologies for hijacking his thread, but how often do you "bump into" someone who remembers things about your hometown 60 years later?!

My sister dated Mike Curtis! I don't know what she saw in that flat-topped sucker! I can still see Coach Roy Lester driving to RMHS in his VW Bug. How many times did someone "candy stripe" the big, white anchor in front of Peary High School or the weekend someone "engraved" doughnuts in the Walter Johnson football field with their cars.

Yeah, I remember the nights that we used to play craps under a street corner light in Lincoln Park. Someone would yell "Cops!!" and we'd all scatter. It took me a couple of times to realize that no cops ever came. It was just a con to grab the money off of the blanket.

I started playing pool at Ray's in 1956, but I never remember Fats being there. It wasn't until Ray moved to his new location to Rockville Pike and named his place "Rack & Cue" that I played Willie Mosconi a series of exhibition matches in 1964.

I don't remember Charley Lake, but I do remember the Gaithersburg Sheriff (name withheld) who was the father of my best friend. Sometimes, when he caught a kid speeding in his hotrod, he'd challenge the person to a race against his '64 Plymouth Hemi. I also know who had a hand in burning down the "houseboat" at Dickerson, and the MCPD cop who helped us organize our senior skip day at Dickerson (again names withheld).

Yes, I remember Mickey D's and the 19c burgers. It was on Rockville Pike (Congressional Ave.) just west of Congressional Plaza and the Rockville Hot Shoppes. Mickey D's didn't have a drive-thru, but Hot Shoppes had the in-car service with girls on skates, and you could drive around and around all night long when gas was just 25c a gallon.

Whenever the "Firemen's" Carnival came to Rockville Pike near RMHS each July, we used to make our sneaky forays onto the property in the early hours of the morning to swipe packs of cigarettes from the concession game where you tossed a multi-faceted, multi-colored block for a chance to win packs of cigarettes. And, when the carnival finally left, we would search the blue-stone grounds for the change that people would inadvertently lose from their pockets while on the rides.

I don't recall St. Catherine's, but I do remember the carnivals at St. Mary's Church and School. Our house was just two blocks away over the wooden bridge on Stonestreet Avenue.

Yep, those were the days!

 

@charley & @cpm9ball

Leave the thread alone! Go get a room!