Served Cleburne Well: Battered Arkansas Confederate Veteran Coming to Atlanta History Exhibit
Old number 9: Vandals and thieves tried to diminish this Civil War cannon. The weathered survivor, displayed for a decade at a Georgia battlefield, will be a star artifact
Old number 9: Vandals and thieves tried to diminish this Civil War cannon. The weathered survivor, displayed for a decade at a Georgia battlefield, will be a star artifact
‘So you can say this gun is a survivor -- from the horrors of war and the ravages of vandals.’
(Civil War Picket) - A dinged-up 12-pounder howitzer that survived numerous battles, years of vandalism and theft from a city park will be returned next month from a Georgia battlefield to the Atlanta History Center, where it will be featured in a new exhibition telling a bigger story about the Civil War.
The gun, manufactured in Boston in 1851 for the Arkansas Military Institute, has been on loan for nearly 10 years to Pickett’s Mill Battlefield State Historic Site northwest of Atlanta. It’s possible it was used to mow down Federal attackers who futilely charged through a ravine toward Confederates waiting for them in strength.
“Captain Key’s howitzer is one of the most important artifacts /stories we have going into the new exhibit,” Gordon Jones, senior military and historian at the AHC, wrote the Picket in a recent email. “It’ll be a cornerstone of the Atlanta Campaign area, right up there with the U.S. Army wagon, Confederate flag that flew over Atlanta, Cleburne sword, plus more new acquisitions.”
Jones was referring to Confederate Capt. Thomas Key, whose Arkansas artillery battery served in the division of legendary Maj. Gen. Patrick Cleburne during the Atlanta Campaign.
The AHC in 2016 lent the gun to the state park as it prepared to move the “Battle of Atlanta” cyclorama painting from…