Confederate Coal Torpedo

[Steve Phillips]

This is a treat for all of you readers. I dont know if any of the pictures are going to be visible for you to see. I'm not computer literate. In fact I am totally useless. Never the less I have found a Coal Torpedo. This is the best relic I have ever found and I have found over 600 artillery projectiles.  I am not going to say where or when I found it. I thought it was trash and I planned to throw it away. I was cleaning off some other relics in my tumbler and just threw it in to tumble and clean up the other relics. After tumbling I saw the copper plug. I thought it was a broken piece of machinery or truck part but I set it down and looked at it off and on for about a day. The plug looked like the underplug for a Borman fuse. Finally it came to me what it might be so I went on the internet and found pictures of the three known examples. Jefferson Davis had one in his office and two more are in Canada. No others were known. I had it xrayed and could see the cavity for the bursting charge. On an xray solid metal looks white and a cavity looks black. I called a few friends and told them about the find. That night I stayed awake worrying about how I would unload it. I did not want to keep it live in fear of some idiot wanting to blow it up and I didn't want to drill it as I have over 2000 before. I did not think I could remove the plug without buggering it up. So I kept fretting about it untill I remembered the xrays. The xray of the plug showed black in the center which means there is a hole. It was stopped up and I thought it was solid and no hole. I picked out what was in the hole and was able to put a wire about the size of a pencil lead down in it. There was no powder so I'm glad I didn't have to drill a hole and mess it up. I am going to write an article along with Mr. Joseph Thatcher in the near future about my find. Mr. Thather  and his son, wrote the new book Confederate Coal Torpedo. His great great grandfather was Thomas Courtenay who invented the coal torpedo and was very succesful in sinking and damaging many yankee ships. If you don't have his book you can get it from Mike O'Donald.
If you can't see my pictures then somebody who is a better propeller head than I am can call me up and tell me how to get these pictures on here. 205-672-9310
Steve Phillips


From my Android phone on T-Mobile. The first nationwide 4G network.

[John D. Bartleson Jr.]

To All Interested,
     Steve asked me to post some of his C. S. Coal Torpedo images.
Unfortuanagely a low grade x-ray  was used and the exp;losive cavity did not show.
He did, however, insert a wire through the support plug to a dep;th of approximagely 3 inches.
I recommended that he take it to an industrial radiologist for a perfect image.
Regards,
John

[John D. Bartleson Jr.]

X-rays of Torpedo.
John

[John D. Bartleson Jr.]

Side view of above.
John

[Dave the plumber]

        Steve,     that is unbelievable that you found such a rare item.      Where did you dig it, and please entertain us with the story............

[Steve Phillips]

I don't want to say where I found it. Maybe I can find another but I doubt it.

[CarlS]

Now that's a really neat find!!!  Congratulations!!  It's not like you needed something else neat and rare in your incredible collection but you got one!

[divedigger]

great find!!

[Selma Hunter]

Steve -

Well done!  Many thanks for sharing - as you always have.

Lockridge

[R. J. in LA]

Steve, awesome artifact find, congrats!!

[Daveslem]

Wow, incredibly cool find! What a despicable weapon. The sinking of the Sultana was a horrible act, indeed.

[Pete George]

  "Horrible act"?  The offical US Gov't investigation said three of the ship's four boilers exploded.  Tell me how a coal torpedo caused THREE to explode.  The investgation said the three boilers exploded due to faulty hasty repair of recent leaks, and "careening" by the vastly overloaded ship.  (It was carrying 6 times more people than its rated capacity, and the engines were struggling much more heavily than normal, fighting against a Flood current, while traveling UPstream.)

  The sabotage claim has been debunked by serious scholars, mainly for the reasons given above.  Also, there's the fact that the supposed deathbed claim by a supposed Confederate saboteur was not reported until 21 years after his death, which occurred in 1867.  That is suspiciously very-very-late Hearsay reporting.

http://www.mycivilwar.com/battles/650427.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sultana_(steamboat)

Regards,
Pete

[Daveslem]

Sorry, Pete. I wasn't aware of the details. I had only heard of the coal bomb story. Thanks for the info.

[divedigger]

helluva way to end a war

[Lamar]

One of my partners at work brought in a Merrill carbine he'd inherited. It had a  "CS" carved in the stock, he thought it might have been captured.
I noticed a name inscribed on the patch box - a little digging shows the owner had been in the 3rd Tenn. Cavalry, his wife died in 1864, he was captured in late 1864, was held in either Cahaba or Andersonville, was on the Sultana, died from scalding on May 9 (12 days after the explosion). There was a pension issued under his name, so he must have had at least one child. Those were tough times.

That's a great find, Steve. I'm sure we'd all like the details about finding it after you make sure that well is dry.