The Civil War Dictator

I sent a cell phone picture of this baby to one of our sons with no words, and he immediately sent back, "Now THAT's a siege mortar."  How did he know what that was?  It's a guy-thing I guess... The next picture kind of puts it's size in perspective.  John is over 6' tall...

Yes, The Dictator is a siege mortar used at the 9 1/2 month siege of Petersburg by the Union army commanded by Ulysses S. Grant.  This puppy weighed in at 17,000 pounds (that's 8 1/2 tons!) and is actually a seacoast mortar. She used 20 pounds of gunpowder to throw a 218-pound, 13" cannonball almost 2 1/2 miles.  (Who was that man that picked up the 218 pound cannonball and slipped it down the throat of The Dictator !?! )  Mercy me!

A soldier in the 35th Massachusetts described a mortar attack: "In the daytime the burst of smoke from the Confederate mortars could be seen; a black speck would dart into the sky, and hang a moment, increasing in size, rolling over and over lazily, and the revolving fuze would begin to whisper audibly, as it darted towards us, at first, softly, 'I'm a-coming, I'm a-coming'; then louder and more angrily, 'I'm coming! I'm coming!;' and, at last, with an explosion to crack the drum of the ear, 'I'm HERE!' "
(Excerpt  from "The Last Citadel: Petersburg, Virginia, June 1864-April 1865", by Noah A. Trudeau)

Notice that that's a Union soldier talking about a Confederate mortar - and their's were nowhere near as big as The Dictator.  Perhaps this was the first Bunker Buster bomb?


Other types of fortifications were:

Actually, I think this was the opening of a tunnel dug by Pennsylvania coal miner / soldiers from Union lines under the Confederate lines 400 feet away.  8,000 pounds of explosives were packed in and detonated.  Union troops were told to charge AROUND the crater created and seize the Confederates ending the then month old seige.  278 Rebels were killed by the explosion, but the Union soldiers charged INTO the crater rather than around it and for the Rebels it was like shooting fish in a barrel.  Ah, the best laid plans of mice and men...  When all was said and done, almost 3,800 Union soldiers were killed, wounded or captured and only 1,500 Confederates.  And the seige went on.

The seige museum exhibits are really cool and deserve a bit of your time if you're ever in the neighborhood.  Museum's aren't the boring places they used to be when I was a kid!  No, really. Historians are doin' themselves proud.