Ceramic Bottle & Possible Cannonball

[The Rebel]

Hey Guys.

Was out yesterday & nabbed these 2 items. The bottle was on the top of a filled in cellar hole that someone has used as a personal trash pit. Was cracked apart but with the help of crazy glue it's back in one piece. I seem to recall that these are beer bottles.

As far as the possible cannon ball, it was about 8-10" down in the hole with this hook & pc metal. It's 8" around & 2.2lbs. If not for a cannon perhaps a for swivel gun?

This year so far has been a complete bust in the LC dept., but I'm still in the race, just got to get to better sites.

HH,
Roger

 

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[trapperart]

Nice finds congrats

 

[Scrappy]

8" is approximately 2.5" bore, and at 2.2 lbs sounds legit. Likely British. Those can date to the 17th and 18th centuries. How old is your site?

Great find.

 

[The Rebel]

WOW! Really didn't have high hopes on it. No idea on the site as I was just driving by and saw a rock wall / structure. Really didn't pound it all that long as I was on my way home after a long day of tecting. Looks like I need to make a return trip!

8" is approximately 2.5" bore, and at 2.2 lbs sounds legit. Likely British. Those can date to the 17th and 18th centuries. How old is your site?

Great find.

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

The Rebel sent me a message asking me to identify his iron ball as an artillery ball, or not. I genuinely regret haing to disappoint a fellow relic digger... but it is definitely not any kind of artillery ball (a cannon ball, a grapeshot ball, a canister-ammo ball, etc.) Actual historical artillery balls were manufactured to be a "true sphere"... never out-of-round (for example, egg-shaped). Unfortunately, this ball isn't even close to being spherical. It's real ID is most likely a mill-ball, used in a tumbler barrel mill to pulverize coal or other materials.

 

[Worm-Slicer]

I saw that bit of deformity too and before even reading, my first thought was mill-ball.

 

[parsonwalker]

Sorry about the ball - keep looking tho, yours is out there. And what a GREAT bottle. We always called them "Ginger Beer Bottles?"

 

[HomeGuardDan]

Sorry to say...not a cannon ball it is most likely a mill ball or grinding ball. Solid shot simply will not deform or dent to that extent.

 

[The Rebel]

Might be shadows when I took the picture making it look that way. I'll take some more & post tonight.

 

[Scrappy]

The Rebel sent me a message asking me to identify his iron ball as an artillery ball, or not. I genuinely regret haing to disappoint a fellow relic digger... but it is definitely not any kind of artillery ball (a cannon ball, a grapeshot ball, a canister-ammo ball, etc.) Actual historical artillery balls were manufactured to be a "true sphere"... never out-of-round (for example, egg-shaped). Unfortunately, this ball isn't even close to being spherical. It's real ID is most likely a mill-ball, used in a tumbler barrel mill to pulverize coal or other materials.

That's great info Man. I assumed that it could have been out of round from impact so that's my mistake. Thx for the info

Cheers

 

[metalev4]

Nice ginger beer, good find.

 

[Bass]

Nice job putting the beer back together.

 

[The Rebel]

More Pics

As promised here are some more pics

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

Now it looks like a Black Walnut hull.

That was intended as a little levity, to soften the disappointment. Your find is still "significantly" out-of-round... more so than could be caused by mere rustcrust buildup. Cannonballs absolutely MUST be manufactured as perfectly spherical as possible, to avoid any possibility of jammimg in the cannon's barrel during loading or firing. To illustrate how precisely round/spherical they were, below are photos of actual cannonballs, and a Stand Of Grapeshot (9 balls per shot), and a cut-open specimen of civil war Canister ammunition (27-or-more balls per shot). You will see that they are all perfectly spherical, although some may show a slight casting mold seam line.

Sometimes we dig civil war Canister balls which look like they'd been sawed in half and glued back together in a "misaligned" way. That appearance was caused by the two halfs of the ball's ironcasting mold being accidentally offset from each other a little bit during the casting process. But each half of the misaligned-mold ball is still perfectly spherical.

The photo which includes real cannonballs in a stack was taken at the 1913 "50th Anniversary" at the Gettysburg battlefield. The men in the photo are actual Confederate veterans of that battle.

 

[The Rebel]

Thanks TCBG! No disappointment at all as it was a 50-50 shot, LOL!