This recreated gun battery marks the center of the Union lines. Between February and April 1862, eleven gun batteries were erected on Tybee Island. A battery was not located on this site, but the cannon on the left is an original from the battle.

The Battle of Fort Pulaski features the first significant use of rifled artillery in combat. Prior to the battle no one could predict the impact of these new weapons. General Robert E. Lee told Colonel Olmstead, the commander of Fort Pulaski, that federal guns on Tybee Island "will make it very warm for you with shells ... but they cannot breach your walls at that distance." The power of rifled artillery would prove Lee wrong.

The Union commander wrote, "The result of this bombardment must cause a change in the construction of fortifications as radical as that ... of the conflict between the Monitor and the Merrimac. No works of stone or brick can resist the impact of rifled artillery."

Spiralled grooves on the interior of rifled cannons imparted stabilizing spin to their projectiles. This tight spinning action dramatically improved the range, accuracy and hitting power of artillery.

Rifled Cannon (30-Pounder Parrott)
Range: 5 miles
(Key to diagram on lower left)
1 Projectile
2 Expansion skirt
3 Barrel
4 Rifling
5 Elevating Screw
6 Siege carriage

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Show me all markers in:  Tybee Island, GA  |  Chatham County  |  31328  |  Georgia  |  United States of America

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A Turning Point In History
Federal Batteries on Tybee Island
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5,275 Shots & Shells in 30 Hours
Shifting Shoreline
A Devastating Bombardment
Brooke Rifle
Federal Siege Batteries

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