The Civil War Muse

Artillery Platform: 24-pounder Howitzer and 3-inch Ordnance Rifle (15 on map)

Tour Stop

Directions: This artillery platform [ Waypoint = N37 37.172 W90 38.414 ] held one of the 24-pounder Howitzers and was enlarged to hold one of the 3-inch Ordnance Rifles. It was located along the southwestern wall of Fort Davidson. Continue walking clockwise on the top of the fort's parapet.

Description: This artillery platform held one of the 24-pounder Howitzers and was enlarged to hold one of the 3-inch Ordnance Rifles. Just south of the remnant platform you should be able to see what remains of the pit of the dug to provide fill for enlarging the artillery platform.

Private Azariah Martin, Company H, 47th Missouri Volunteer Infantry, was in the south rifle pit when the Confederate attack began on September 27th. Shortly after the attack began, the men in the south rifle pit entered the fort through the sally port. Private Martin later described how he immediately went to help with the 3-inch Ordnance Rifle located on this artillery platform. [119]

"When I reached the inside of the fort, I turned to my left and went to the parapet at one of the southwest angles, near one of the guns of Montgomery's battery, which was mounted on a rather high embankment. I was firing into the enemy's line, then not over twenty yards from us, when a Confederate shell exploded on the parapet near the gun mentioned and a fragment struck a man at my left. He fell diagonally in front of me, grasping the right breast of my jacket with his left hand and at the same instant I felt something, like a blunt-ended handspike, strike my left hip. It was the fragment of the bursting shell which had first struck my comrade in the left side. His weight and the shock of the piece of shell striking me caused me to fall with him down the steep embankment."

Private Martin continued to describe the effect that the fire from the artillery had on the confederate attack from Shepherd Mountain. [120]

"The Confederates could not long endure our murderous fire at such close range. What manner of men could? They soon fled in every direction; taking cover in the creek bed,—from eighty to three hundred yards from us,—where they at once began a sharpshooting practice at us and our exposed gunners, which compelled the latter to leave their guns silent and lie idle until we drove the enemy into hiding."

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