US Navy 12-Pounder Dahlgren Boat Howitzer at the Mariners’ Museum

Jun 15

A US Navy 12-Pounder Boat Howitzer, Heavy, is displayed at the Mariners’ Museum in Newport News, Virginia. It is mounted on a reproduction boat carriage. The howitzer could be quickly shifted from this sort of carriage in the bows of a ship’s launch to a landing carriage for use ashore. Similar slide carriages were also used aboard ships.

The registry number of the boat howitzer at the Mariners’ Museum is not easily read. The number has been obscured by scratches or other slight damage. The museum’s catalogue lists it as “Number 6”. However, the weight and date of manufacture at Ames (778 pounds and 1864) correspond to three possibilities in Bureau of Ordnance Records: Numbers 376, 385, and 386. Messrs. Olmstead, Stark, and Tucker provisionally identified the howitzer as Number 386. I got a fair photo of the area of the registry number and I am a bit hesitant to say I see “386” - or really any number after the “N”. However, Olmstead, Stark, and Tucker may have gotten a look in a better light or at different angles. I tend to presume they are correct unless I see good reason to say that they are not.

The Mariners’ Museum Howitzer (top) and Number 255 in Hanover, Massachusetts showing the appearance of a clearly legible Ames registry number.

If the howitzer is indeed number 386, that means that it served aboard the USS Clematis, a steam tug purchased into Navy service and commissioned in 1864. In 1876, Number 386 seems to have been at Pensacola and it was taken aboard the monitor USS Manhattan upon which served until removed at Norfolk in 1889. (RG 74 E112 See BuOrd Records.)

In April of 1876, USS Manhattan departed Pensacola and sailed to Port Royal, South Carolina. The was stationed at Port Royal until June 1877 when she sailed to Norfolk. The following year she was moved up the James River. (The iron hulled monitors were kept in fresh water when possible to preserve their hulls and limit marine growth.) She remained at various points on the James River (including as far upstream as Richmond) until the end of the 1880s when she was laid up at League Island near Philadelphia (see DANFS Entry.)