Captured British Carronade - Rockport, Massachusetts
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N 42° 39.485 W 070° 37.130
19T E 367321 N 4724117
A small cannon is displayed on the front lawn of First Congregational Church in Rockport, Massachusetts. Americans captured the Royal Navy gun after it fired on the steeple during the Invasion of Sandy Bay on the morning of September 9, 1814.
Waymark Code: WM16JCV
Location: Massachusetts, United States
Date Posted: 08/12/2022
Views: 2
On September 9, 1814, during the Invasion of Sandy Bay in Rockport, Massachusetts, a cannon ball struck but did not fell the bell tower of the First Congregational Church as part of an attack by the British frigate
Nymphe. Subsequently captured by the Americans, the short smoothbore, cast iron cannon is displayed on the target church's front lawn along School Street. A cast bronze plaque mounted to the east side of a low concrete pedestal on top of which the seized naval artillery rest reads:
THIS BRITISH CARRONADE
WAS CAPTURED DURING THE
REPULSE AT SANDY BAY OF A
LANDING PARTY FROM HIS
MAJESTY'S FRIGATE "NYMPHE"
IN THE EARLY MORNING OF
SEPTEMBER 9, 1814
A section of the steeple's post lives on at a narrow, three-story building on the southeast side of Bearskin Neck approximately 175 feet (53m) northeast from Dock Square and Mount Pleasant Street. The location is about 700 feet (210m) northeast from the church property on Main Street. The dark brown post is approximately 12 inches (30cm) wide, 10 inches (25cm) thick, eight feet (2.4m) tall, and secured by a metal collar wrap to a granite step. It serves as a center pole to support a shallow porch roof. High gloss shellac protects the wood. Mounted on the street-side, northwest face, six feet above the second-from-top step, is a 0.25-inch-thick (5mm), engraved aluminum plaque which reads:
This timber was one of
the original posts
supporting the bell
tower of the church of
Rockport. Installed in
1804, these posts
resisted the British
attack in 1814 and
despite a direct hit by a
cannonball remained
standing. Today, that
cannonball can be seen
at the Congregational
church and its point
of impact recreated.
On her website, educator and author Dr. Anita L. Sanchez offers a Teacher’s Guide to Invasion of Sandy Bay in which "a sleepy fishing village becomes the site of one of strangest invasions in American history - the battle is brief, fierce and, due to the poor marksmanship of both forces, bloodless."
On the 8th of September of that year [1814] the British frigate Nymph took one of the fishing boats belonging to Sandy Bay. Coming to anchor at night near the town, thick fog prevailing at the time, two barge loads with muffled oars, with the skipper of the captured boat for a pilot, rowed silently ashore. One barge landed at Long Cove, surprised and captured the sentinel, made prisoners of the small garrison, spiked and dismantled the guns.
The second barge’s crew proceeded to land on the western side of the Neck when they were observed by a sentinel about daybreak. He immediately gave the alarm by ringing the church bell. The members of the local company, the Sea Fencibles gathered quickly at the spot and directed a fire of musketry at the barge, the latter returning a fusillade of grapeshot. No injury was effected on either side.
In order to silence the alarm bell the barge crew fired a soldier shot at the belfry of the church. The ball took effect in one of the timbers of the steeple. The recoil of the gun, however, started the timbers of the boat to such a degree that it began to fill rapidly with water. There was no alternative. The men were obliged to land, their boat sinking just as they reached the shore.
– James Pringle; An excerpt from the book History of the Town and City of Gloucester, Cape Ann, Massachusetts; copyright 1892