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The Lost Frémont
Cannon (Mountain Howitzer)
It was of the kind invented by the French for the
mountain part of their war in Algiers; and the distance it
had come with us proved how well it was adapted for its
purpose. We left it, to the great sorrow of the whole party.
Frémont, January 29, 1844, near
today's Bridgeport,
CA.
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Yes, it is no longer
lost, and it was right
where Frémont said it was, but read what
follows to be convinced.
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February, 2011: an account of the parts
recovery.
Updates on the recovered iron tires
below.
One more point identifying the carriage as the
1st US Model
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 The
project continues, 2011: a link to a
Coleville, CA website with additional
information on the recovery site of the howitzer
parts, some good imagery of the parts recovered,
and even
a flyover of the recovery site.
And, May, 2012.
The Fremont Howitzer Recovery Team is still
at it. The
team is now working under the direction
of Dr. James M. Allan, a Research Fellow at the
Archaeological Research Facility of the
University of California and Director of the
Institute for Western Maritime Archaeology.
Fall
2012. A newspaper article in the Las
Vegas Review Journal and an article in
California
Surveyor magazine on the recovery of the
howitzer parts.
But this website is still the only source
that actually identifies the recovered howitzer
carriage parts (since 2007) and connects them
directly to Frémont.
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Howitzer
carriage parts found.
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Herb Kuehne of Kirkwood, CA tells us
of Frémont's cannon parts
that have been on public display at the
Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest Ranger
Station in Bridgeport, CA since 2006.
"The person I talked to didn't know too
much about the Frémont cannon
parts."
On more recent inquiry, February 22,
2007, Herb was told:
We have the cannon pieces on
display in our visitor's center now.
They are in a handsome wood and
glass case. I do not have a write-up
on them yet. Feel free to stop in
and see them.
Erik S. Pignata, Information
Assistant, USDA-FS
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See a larger photo sent by Russ
Gray of Reno.
On a subsequent visit to Bridgeport in April,
2008, Herb took photographs and measurements of
the display cabinet, which contains an
assemblage of forged iron parts and three iron
tires.
The display case label reads:
These
artifacts are the
remains of the gun
carriage for
the famous mountain
howitzer abandoned
during the
second surveying
expedition of John C.
Frémont in
January 1844. The
artifacts were recovered
by the
Frémont Howitzer
Recovery Team under the
direct-
ion of the U.S. Forest
Service,
Humboldt-Toiyabe
National Forest,
Bridgeport Ranger
District.
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Herb's email query sent to the Bridgeport
Ranger Station on May 11, 2008 requesting more
details and information on the location of the
find brought the following response:
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I
understand and appreciate your
interest in Fremont's Cannon. Please
rest assured that there are
continuing scientific investigations
being conducted by a team lead by a
qualified archaeologist. Due to the
sensitivity of these on going
investigations and Archaeological
Resource Protection Act
restrictions, I am allowed to say
that the area of interest is within
50 miles of Bridgeport.
 David
J. 'Jack' Scott
District Archaeologist
Bridgeport
Ranger District
Humboldt-Toiyabe National
Forest
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See the
recovery area
and follow
Frémont's
1844 route.
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But this "fifty-miles radius" can be
narrowed down very considerably: indeed, it
seems there is no secret to it at all.
On June 24, 2010 I received the following
additional information from Russell Gray of
Reno, NV:
 My
son and I stopped at Bridgeport Ranger
Station to check out the display. I took
some pictures and noticed the rims had
tags attached to them, all faced
away. By lying on the floor I was able to see
one tag that reads:
USFS/#TY 5127/Iron Tire 1/Deep
Creek."
The the photo of the tag does not show all
written--the camera could not get all that
the eye could see. The other tag on rim two
says the same thing except for "Iron Tire
2."
The third tag is not readable although, I'm
sure it says "Iron Tire 3." I'm not quite
sure what #ty site means, and although it
looks like a 5 in picture, on the other tag
the camera reads "site."
Regards, Russell Gray
So the public display at the Bridgport
Ranger Station already provides that officially
withheld information--"Deep Creek." This is
also stated in Toiyabe National Forest
history compilation by Richa Wilson,
Regional Architectural Historian, USFS
Intermountain Region, Ogden, Utah, December 24,
2009, from information provided by Bridgeport
Ranger District archeologist Mark Swift in
1998.
Fremont abandoned his cannon on
Deep Creek and not in Lost Cannon
canyon.
Which is exactly where Frémont said
it was left in his government report.
29
January, 1844: "We followed a trail down a
hollow where the Indians had descended...we
reached a little affluent to the river at the
bottom [Deep Creek] ...The principal
stream [West Walker River]
still running through an impracticable
cañon, we ascended a very steep hill,
which proved afterwards the last and fatal
obstacle to our little howitzer, which was
finally abandoned at this place."
The descent route into Deep Creek in
Frémont's words
and mapped from Russ Gray's examination of
possible routes in 2011
Download Frémont's full account of
leaving
the howitzer in
Deep Creek canyon January 25-29,
1844.
The Walker River was named by Frémont
for Joseph R. Walker. Here one hundred and
seventy-five years of lore and legend
surrounding Walker's 1833 route across the
Sierra is dispelled.
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Latest news, February,
2011.
We have long suspected, from a
conversation with a third party in
the late 1990s, that the late
Francois "Bud" Uzes of Granite Bay,
CA would figure promently in the
story of the howitzer carriage
discovery. Here are letters from
Bud's sons Ron and Russ with the
story of the discovery and recovery
of the parts from the lost
howitzer.
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Are these the
remains of Frémonts lost
howitzer? With no prospect of
additional information from Bridgeport in the
near future, we have undertaken to make our own
assessment of those items currently on
display at the Ranger Station.
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The parts from the photos are shown
here in their correct upright position.
They have been identified by
Lt.
Col. Paul R. Rosewitz , a long
time friend and contributor to this
website, as the right side:
axle strap (lower
U),
trunnion plate (upper
2.7" U),
axle band, and chin
bolt of a pre-Mexican War
US-made copy of the 1828 French
mountain howitzer carriage built at the
Watervliet Arsenal in West Troy, New
York in 1837.
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See
Paul's identification from the
original plans.
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 The
round axle strap is the key to the earliest 13
US carriages. Based on field experience,
carriages built after the Mexican War had a
square axle, as shown in the schematic at
left.
See a larger photo sent by Russ
Gray of Reno.
Important: This is the only
surviving example of the first US Army
mountain howitzer carriage.
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 NOTE:
Colonel Rosewitz is a leading
military historian on the mountain
howitzer, having researched the
National Archives, and military
archives and museums around the
country and in Europe. He has
published much on the mountain
howitzer, including a master's
thesis, and is expert in M1835
mountain howitzer drill (he owns
one!). He is currently (May, 2008)
Night Chief of Operations, HQ ISAF
(NATO), in Kabul, Afghanistan.
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  At
left we have used a later prairie
carriage (square axle vs. round) to show the
correct placement of the recovered parts,
because there is no known survivor of a pre-1851
carriage. At right is an 1827 drawing of the
French carriage from which the twelve 1837
Watervliet carriages were copied. Note the
2-piece frame, and lack of chains to the cap
squares. The French tube has the trunnions below
bore axis, whereas the US virsion has the
trunnions on bore axis.
 It
is perhaps revealing to see that the trunnion
plate in the display is still bolted (and
nutted) to the axle strap--the axle
band still captive. The  capsquares,
which covered the upper surface of the
trunnions and secured the tube
(barrel) to the carriage, have been removed from
the key bolt and chin bolt,
indicating that the 225 lb. bronze tube might
have been deliberately dismounted from the
carriage previous to final abandonment, or by a
mid-19C discoverer. The wooden parts have either
completely disintegrated or have been burned
away. To be Frémont's howitzer, the
removed tube would have been one of the first 12
ordered cast by Cyrus Alger in Boston: thirteen
were were actually cast and delivered, and there
were no others cast until 1845.
This U-shaped
axle strap configuration is very important,
because it eliminates later carriages with US
Army design modifications, and so a number of
local Civil War era howitzers.
 But,
Paul adds, "three tires are a puzzle! The
pack carriage, drawn by thrill,
had only the two wheels. There is no Army record
 of
a mountain howitzer limber arrangement (4
wheels) before 1845."
On July 20, 1843,
Frémont recorded that "the shaft of the
howitzer carriage broke" and had to be mended:
and again on Aug 6th. Shaft can only
refer to a thrill, one of the pair of
poles by which the pack carriage was harnessed
and drawn. Paul notes further that, "in 1845 and
they were still struggling with the design of
the shafts, or thill, to pull the
howitzer behind a horse."
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See also Craig Swain's To The Sound
of the Guns blog for more on the US
mountain howitzer.
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The three
tires:
Col. Rosewitz updates this (Baghdad, Feb.
2011)
"I think I have to change my
original assessment in regard to the three
tires. I went back to the 1841 US Army
ordnance manual to compare the specifications
to the photos of the recovered forestry
artifacts. I stated earlier that the wheels
would not have rivets to hold the tires to
the wheels. This is in fact true of the 1848
information that carries through the life of
the Mountain Howitzer carriage after the 1848
standardization. Looking again at the 1841
ordnance manual specifically reveals the
following description of the wheels:
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Wood parts: 1 nave; 12 spokes;
6 fellies
[fellows];
6 dowels.
Iron Parts: 2 nave bands; 6
clout nails; 1 tire, fastened by
12 nails, 2 nave boxes (cast
Iron) fastened each by 4 pins 1
inch long.
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 So,
the first carriage (1837), based directly on
the French carriage (1828), before we
redesigned it in 1848, had nails not bolts.
That would be in line with the recovered
parts. The thing I still have not found are
actual measurements of these tires or the
diameter of the wheels.
The next entry in the manual
says:
"This carriage, being
intended for use in countries where wheel
carriages can not generally travel, it is
not provided with a limber. The howitzer
and its carriage and ammunition are
usually tranported on pack horses. When
Circumstances permit, they may be
transported in a wagon or a cart, or
temporay shafts may be adapted to the
trail of the carriage."
So, These could very well be the
howitzer tires. As far as three of them being
found, the explination could be 1. there was
an extra wheel, 2. they rigged some kind of
limber for it, 3. they double shod it as
suggested, 4. they were hauling it in a cart.
I think the cart idea is remote*, there is no
real mention of the use of a limber or cart,
and to double shod would be very out of the
ordinary, but could have been done. It is
only speculative. I guess if they can slip
one into the other you might be able to
reinforce that idea."
*November 25, 1843, Wallawalla,
Frémont: " The howitzer was the only
wheeled carriage now remaining." Ed.
Are these parts from Frémont's
lost cannon?
Based on the early U-section
(vs. square) of the axle strap,
Yes.
Where it
the tube (barrel)?
Still unrecovered? See the Letter
from Ron Uzes .
Here are the stories relating to the
provenance of the "Frémont 's Cannon"
1837 howitzer tube in the Nevada State Museum in
Carson City.
Frémont's narrative
and map are very specific that the
howitzer was abandoned on the east side
of the W. Fk. of the Walker River on January
29th, 1844--where they "were often compelled to
ascend the highest and most exposed ridges, in
order to avoid snow, which in other places was
banked up to a great depth."
Accounts
of early settlers, suggested that the
howitzer  had
been previously found and moved. James U. Smith
gives an account of how the reported cannon
discovery in Lost
Canyon along "with abandoned wagons"
caused later surveyors to corrupt the name
canyon to cannon: Lost Cannon Creek, Lost
Cannon Peak; Lost Cannon Canyon. Only a side
shoot, Little Lost Canyon, remains as a vestige
of the original name. If so, the recent recovery
may relate to the storied Pray Cannon,
and the Nevada State Museum Cyrus Alger tube
cast in 1836. We show here, (for the first time
(I think) that these two are one
and the same.
Question: why was this valuable piece of
ordnance not retrieved within months?
There were five men that left Frémont's
2nd Expedition at Sutter's Fort in early March:
Oliver Beaulieu, Philibert Courteau
[Descouteau, Des Couteau], Baptiste
Derosier, Thomas Fallon, Samuel Neal, Joseph
Verrot. All knew the location of the
howitzer.
On November 24-26, 1845, when his divided 3rd
Expedition party rendezvoused at Walker Lake,
Frémont had returned to within 30 crow
miles of where he had abandoned the howitzer
only nine months earlier on January 29, 1844.
But, mindful of his experience of that year, and
noting that snow was already "deep on higher
ridges," he sent the bulk of his party south to
map Walker Pass under Theodore Talbot and Edward
Kern (guided by Joe Walker), and with a flying
column of select men, he turned north to the
Truckee river and made a four day crossing of
the Sierra to Sutter's Fort for supplies.
On July 6, 1861, an article in the Daily
Alta California, San Francisco, reported of
the howitzer that:
 It
always was an object of wonder to the Indians
in that vicinity. They burnt the carriage and
carried off most of the irons. but the cannon
was too heavy for them to manage. Old Peter
Lassen, who was with Frémont at the
time it was left, just before his death,
tried to get up a party to go after it.
Lassen, who died in 1859, was, in fact,
not with Frémont in 1844: but
Lassen's neighbor Sam Neil was. From
April 14-24, 1846, Frémont was at Peter
Lassen's upper Sacramento Valley ranch on Deer
Creek making observations for longitude by
portable transit instrument for one of the three
astronomical stations upon which the monumental
1848 Frémont-Preuss map was based.
And Sam Neal was there.
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See More About the Howitzer
that Predates the Recovery of the Carriage
Parts
At the Presidio at San Francisco there are on display a
number of beautiful 17C Spanish cannon from the Spanish
fortification "Castillo de San Joaquin" overlooking the
Golden Gate (now under south end of GG Bridge). They were
cast in Peru and Mexico--some very beautiful. One, the "San
Pedro," still has the vent spiked by Frémont
from 1846. Another, the "San Domingo," was successfully re
vented.
Here a close up of the spiked vent of the San Pedro, said to
have been done with some "butcher's steels" provided by
Capt. Phelps. Other accounts say they used "rat tail files,"
which are very similar to butcher's steels--both file-hard
and cannot be drilled out. I'm not sure if it should be
"butcher's," or Butcher's," as one of the large exporters of
such things from Sheffield was a manufacturer named Butcher
(later Wade & Butcher).
Bibliography:
 Ordnance
Manual for the Use of Officers of the United States
Army, Washington, J. & G. S. Gideon, printers,
1841 (in New York Public Library). For identification
of the first US model (pre Mexican War) carriage see pages
5, 21, 42, 62-63.
Board of Army Officers, Instruction
for Mountain Artillery, Washington, 1851.
Cline, Gloria Griffin, Exploring the
Great Basin, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 1963
(and University of Nevada Press reprint 1988).
Fletcher, F. N., Early Nevada--the
Period of Exploration, 1776-1848, Reno, 1929.
Frémont, Brevet Captain J. C.,
Report of The Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains
in the Year 1842, and to Oregon and North California in the
Years 1843-'44, Printed by order of the Senate of the
United States, Gales and Seaton, Washington.
1845.
Frémont, John Charles,
Geographical Memoir Upon Upper California, Senate.
30th Congress, Misc. No.148, Wendell and Van Benthuysen,
Washington, 1848.
Frémont, John Charles, Memoirs
of My Life, Belford, Clark & Company, Chicago,
1887.
Gibbons, Lieutenant John, The
Artillerist's Manual; Introduction for Field Artillery,
Horse and Foot, New York, 1860.
Graham, Clara. My daughter made
these
pages when she was about 12
years old. I have always kept them. Wonderful
imagery!
Hinkle, George and Bliss, Sierra
Nevada Lakes, The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc,
Indianapolis-New York, 1949.
Jackson, Donald, The Myth of the
Frémont Howitzer, The Bulletin of the Missouri
Historical Society Vol. XXII, No. 3, April, 1967.
Jackson, Donald, and Spence, Mary Lee,
The Expeditions of John Charles Frémont, Vol.
1, University of Illinois Press, 1970.
James, George Wharton, The Lake of the
Sky - Lake Tahoe, George Wharton James, 1915.
Knight, Edward H., Knight, American
Mechanical Dictionary, J. B. Ford and Company, New York,
1874-1879.
Kuehne, Herb, photographs and
measurements taken of the Ranger Station display at
Bridgeport, CA April, 2008.
Lewis, Ernest Allen, The
Frémont Cannon -- High Up and Far Back, The
Arthur H. Clark Co., 1981.
Preuss, Charles, Exploring With
Frémont, Translated by Erwin G. and Elisabeth K.,
Gudde, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman,
1958.
Reveal, Jack L. and James L, The
Missing Frémont Cannon--an Ecological Solution,
reprinted from Madrono, V.32, No.2, April 1985.
Rosewitz, Paul R. Lt. Col. US Army,
invaluable correspondence, photo facsimiles of original
military documents, 2000-2008.
Russell, Carl P., Frémont's
Cannon, The California Historical Society, No. 36,
December 1957.
Scott, Edward B., The Saga of Lake
Tahoe, Sierra Tahoe Publishing Co., 1957
(1964).
Smith, James U.,
Frémont's Expedition in Nevada, 1843-44, Second
Biennial Report of the Nevada Historical Society, Carson
City, 1911.
Talbot, Theodore, The Journals of
Theodore Talbot, Metropolitan Press, 1931.
Townley, John M., The Lost
Frémont Cannon, Guidebook, The Jamison Station
Press, Reno, 1984.
Uzes, Ron, letters February,
2011.
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