US Navy 32-Pounder of 32 Hundredweight of USS Pennsylvania
A US Navy 32-Pounder of 32 Hundredweight salvaged from USS Pennsylvania
A US Navy 32-Pounder of 32 Hundredweight which was recovered from the wreck of USS Pennsylvania is displayed in Trophy Park in Norfolk Naval Shipyard. According to the research of Wayne Stark, USS Pennsylvania had two 32-Pounders of this type aboard in 1861, Registry Numbers 213 and 214, both of which had been made by Tredegar in 1846. Though the identifying marks on this cannon are no longer visible, it is probably 213 or 214.
The 32-Pounder of 32 Hundredweight is part of a system of 32-Pounders introduced to US Navy service in 1845.
USS Pennsylvania was the largest ship of the line and only "First Rate" built for the US Navy. Laid down in 1821 at Philadelphia, USS Pennsylvania made a single voyage to the Gosport Navy Yard in 1837. In the prewar period she served as a receiving ship. On April 20th, 1861, she was one of the ships burned to prevent capture by Virginia Secessionists. (The other burned ships included the steam frigate USS Merrimack.) This cannon was recovered during the salvage of Pennsylvania's wreck later in the 1860s. The cannon appears to have been reassembled from fragments for display.
Model of USS Pennsylvania at the Independence Seaport Museum in Philadelphia
Line engraving of USS Pennsylvania published in Gleason's Pictorial, 9 July 1853, showing the ship at anchor off the Norfolk Navy Yard, Portsmouth, Virginia, where she was the receiving ship. Naval History and Heritage Command: https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/nhhc/our-collections/photography/numerical-list-of-images/nhhc-series/nh-series/NH-42000/NH-42715.html
Harpers Weekly Illustration of the destruction of the the Navy Yard on April 20th, 1861.
