SPANISH FORT – With several years of preservation and restoration complete, Spanish Fort officials plan to soon put an old cannon found in the city on permanent display outside City Hall.
Mayor Mike McMillan said after a recent City Council work session that city crews will go to Florida to bring the cannon back to Spanish Fort.
“The cannon is ready,” he said. “We’ll go get it and then get everything ready to put it on display here outside City Hall.”
The gun was found at an unreleased location in 2017 and sent to a Florida state laboratory for restoration. Restoration experts in Tallahassee and local officials said they do not know how old the cannon is, how it came to be at the location it was found or where it was made.
Jessica Burns with the Florida Bureau of Archaeological Resources said the surface of the cast iron cannon was too corroded to find any markings that might indicate where it was manufactured or when it was made.
The cannon barrel weighs about 1,200 pounds, McMillan said. It is 8.75 feet long and is 41 inches around at its base.
Chester Patterson, Spanish Fort public works director, said Thursday, Jan. 27, that the cannon should be back in the city within two weeks. He said the cannon will be set up in front of City Hall between the entrances for city offices and the library, when the display area is prepared..
The city will build a pavilion to protect the iron gun from the weather. The gun will be mounted on a concrete base.
Cameras with a live, direct link to the Spanish Fort Police Department will also be mounted around the display to protect the cannon from vandalism, McMillan said.
Battles were fought in the Spanish Fort area in both the American Revolution and Civil War. In both conflicts, however, the fortifications that were built, where a cannon that size might have been set up, were not near the area where the barrel was found.
McMillan said some residents working with the city to dig up the cannon when it was found in 2017 also speculated that the gun could be older than the Revolution, since Europeans were in the area as long ago as the 16th century.
City officials and local historians said they hope to have a chance to study the cannon and learn more about its origins when the gun is returned.
