100 - Pounder Battery - Heavie

During an inspection in late April 1863, Brig. Gen. John G. Barnard recommended that a gun be placed at a high point on this crest, "surrounded by a wall of sandbags, and arranged to fire not only on Loudoun Heights [across the Potomac] but into either of the valleys east and west of Maryland Heights." To comply with Barnard's recommendation, Union soldiers mounted a 100-pounder Parrott rifle on this manmade platform. With the mountain cleared of trees, the gun easily covered a 360° target range.<br><br>Men from the 1st Massachusetts Heavy Artillery hauled this 9,700-pound gun tube up 1,200 vertical feet to this platform. From "200-500 men were required to haul one of these guns up the mountain." <br><br>The 100-pounder's supporting platform was the highest and widest manmade gun platform on the mountain. The gun's weight and elevation on the mountain probably made it the heaviest gun at the highest elevation east of the Mississippi during the Civil War.