I meant to include this as a footnote in yesterday’s post, but… having forgotten to do so…
… and at the risk of sounding like a Fredericksburg Sesqui post from To the Sound of the Guns (… another great Sesqui-timed post, by the way, about the locations of guns on the battlefields)…
Henry’s Napoleon is still near Fredericksburg (closer to Chancellorsville, perhaps, but still near Fredericksburg)… maybe.
Sometime after the Battle of Fredericksburg, the men of the 2nd Stuart Horse Artillery laid the Napoleon to rest. According to George Shreve:
… we buried a “Napoleon” Brass Gun, which we had kept in use through all our service, up to that time, and which did splendid work, on many a field; but it was always considered too heavy for our flying batteries, especially as our horses were not always the best. We received a 3 in. Gun to take its place. We buried it amongst the pines, near the road, and wrapped it in an old quilt as a shroud, which the writer had carried a long time. So we bade farewell to our old “Napoleon” gun, and no man know the situation of the grave.
And there you have… the rest of the story.
Cenantua's Blog 
Bummer
December 14, 2012
What a perfect end to this chapter of the story.
Bummer
Craig Swain
December 14, 2012
Call me skeptical about the whole story. At this same time Lee was demanding the CS Ordnance department double down on production of 12-pdr Napoleons. The ANV is sending 6-pdr guns and 12-pdr howitzers (and bronze James rifles) to Tredegar’s melting pot for recasting into Napoleons. And these guys are just burying a perfectly good cannon …. because it is too heavy? There are certain rules for the use of Army equipment. One of them says, “when you are done, you will turn it in.”
Robert Moore
December 15, 2012
Of course, you’re citing a modern military rule, and that didn’t apply across the board back then. Just look at all the stuff a US soldier took home with him at the end of the war, including musket. On the other hand, a Napoleon isn’t a small item and I get the demand at the time, and find it a little odd that… to get the new 3 inch, they didn’t turn in the Napoleon. Still, I think the story is legitimate. Shreve doesn’t seem to go out there like J.E. Cooke or H.K. Douglas in his writings. Exaggerations and the like are certainly out there w/different soldiers, but why would he make-up such a tale about the Napoleon?
Craig Swain
December 16, 2012
No, I’m citing the contemporary military procedure. I can think of no point in the war that a battery was allowed to discard weapons in the manner described. We have plenty of accounts where batteries were directed to turn in older ordnance for new issue. Even defective or damaged ordnance was turned in to the depot for disposal (bronze could be melted down over and over for new castings).
Those guns were not the “battery’s” but rather Jeff Davis’s. And Jeff Davis, by way of his ordnance officers, would make sure the equipment was properly issued and accounted for. I would fully expect to see a paper trail of incredulous ordnance officials demanding the return of said Napoleon. And there are several cases of just such exchanges found in the service records of ordnance officers such as Hypolite Oladowski.
Besides, why would Shreve and his battery mates NOT want to turn the gun over to one of the line batteries? Why screw over your fellow cannoneers making them work with lesser quality equipment?
Robert Moore
December 16, 2012
Procedure aside, why would Shreve make this up? What would he gain? Keep in mind… he wrote this not as a part of a publication
Craig Swain
December 19, 2012
I can see him making up the tale in order to explain how he lost that quilt. Momma probably was none too happy when she found it was gone.
Bummer
December 22, 2012
Robert,
Haven’t heard from you recently, suppose it’s the holidays. Bummer and family wanted to wish a Merry Christmas to you and yours, Keep the good thought!
Bummer
Robert Moore
December 24, 2012
Thanks, Bummer. Merry Christmas to you and yours as well!