A Mere Trifle

Capt. Rodman, having successfully cast a 20-inch gun, and the test showing it to be safe and strong as a smaller cannon, is now at work on a pocket-piece for the President, the ball of which is to weigh 3,000 pounds, to have a range of six or seven miles, of two feet and a half diameter, while the gun itself will weigh somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 tons. It is supposed, if the Warrior, or any other English ship, should be struck by one of the balls from this little joker, it would be difficult for the future historian to tell the precise spot where the English vessel was last seen or at precisely what instant she disappeared from mortal view. Capt. Rodman is now finishing six 15-inch toys for the new Monitors, three or four 20-inch playthings, beside Old Abe’s pocket piece, the 30-inch joker. The story that a guard is set over this gun every night to keep it from being picked up and carried off by some thief, is pronounced a canard.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 10, 1862, p. 2