03087 - Parapet of Fort Putnam; with stacks of ammunition, April 1865 [LC-DIG-cwpb-03087]
"We had but one gun to burst in March [1864], the 30-pounder Parrott at Putnam, which was used to fire upon Charleston. It 'gave up the ghost' at the 4,615th round, a remarkable number of shots to be fired from a single piece of ordnance." COL W. W. H. Davis
On September 7, 1863, the Union captured Batteries Wagner and Gregg on Morris Island in Charleston Harbor, SC. The Confederates built Battery Gregg to face the Federal threat from the south. The Federals "turned" the works to bombard Fort Sumter with siege guns.
As part of the modification process, Battery Gregg was renamed to honor of COL Haldimand Putnam, killed in the second assault on Battery Wagner on July 18, 1863.
By April of 1864, commander COL W. W. H. Davis reported that "Fort Putnam, [was] mounting ten guns, ranging from a 12-pounder howitzer to a 200-pounder Parrott, with a garrison of 5 officers and 100 men."
Stacked in the foreground are shells with metal rims made soft to take the grooves of the rifling from the heavy caliber siege guns.