Key takeaways

• Reproduction 12-pound field howitzer placed at Brice’s Crossroads
• Additional emplacements planned
• Project one of many being done by Brice’s Crossroads Foundation

LEE COUNTY, Miss. (WTVA) – One of the first steps toward bringing Civil War history to life has been wheeled into Lee County.

The Brice’s Crossroads Foundation has placed a cannon at the battlefield that straddles the Lee-Prentiss line.

The cannon is a reproduction 12-pound field howitzer, the same type of cannon that Battery B of the 2nd Illinois Light Artillery would have had at the Battle of Brice’s Crossroads on June 10, 1864.

“That was done by Tom Bailey in Georgia, who’s considered one of the foremost artillery experts on the Civil War,” said Graham Osborne, president of the Brice’s Crossroads Foundation.

A donor from Illinois funded the purchase and placement of the howitzer.

Expanding the Artillery Line

The howitzer is the first installment of a broader foundation project intended to enhance the interpretive experience for visitors.

“We are trying to mark the location of where all artillery units on both sides set up during the battle,” Osborne said.

This project began more than a year ago.

“We got four carriages first that needed to be refurbished and redone. And luckily, we had a great partner in Quail Ridge Engineering who did that at no cost,” Osborne said. “They volunteered their time and effort for that, and they’ve done a fantastic job. So, this is the first of the four that we have set out here.”

The plan is for the next cannon to complete Company B of the Illinois Light Artillery’s line.

“But the next two are going to be Confederate guns that are coming from the opposite side that are going to be representing part of John Morton’s artillery,” Osborne said.

How quickly they can get yankee and rebel guns to face one another again at Brice’s Crossroads will depend on donor funds.

“We have enough for the next barrel already, and the next carriage has already been completed by Quail Ridge,” he said. “We have two other carriages that need to be refurbished, and we need to get the funds in from the pledged donors.”

Osborne said he hopes to complete all three remaining pieces within a year, adding the emplacements will tell their own story.

“There doesn’t need to be any interpreter out there. There doesn’t need to be any historian out there. It has a powerful impact on the landscape,” he said. “I just don’t think there’s anything more iconic than on a Civil War battlefield than those silent guns.”

The cannons move the Brice’s Crossroads Military Park project into a new sphere.

“To where Civil War travelers, historical travelers, or just local people will be able to drive by and say, ‘Hey, that’s new. Let’s check it out,” Osborne said. “Our goal is always to get new people out here to the battlefield, but also people that have visited before to extend the time that they spend out here.”

Trails, Tablets and Preservation

Artillery is not where it ends. Osborne said they want to set up a comprehensive trail system, add historical fence lines, and continue the War Department Tablets Project.

For the trails, he said they suspect they have room for three to four miles of surface trails.

“We also think we have an additional four, five, six miles of hiking trails that can be used throughout this battlefield. There’s nearly 1,700 acres of this hallowed ground that’s been preserved,” Osborne said. “So that trail system is a very, very high priority for us.”

The first of the tablets are already up.

“Those are those color-coded red and blue, which gives the organization of different armies, different brigades that were here,” Osborne said.

He said that, with or without a guide, a visitor can easily find where there were Union and Confederate lines thanks to the color-coded tablets.

They are getting estimates on fence lines.

“This is another iconic look to all these historic sites,” Osborne said. “If we’re trying to kind of get into that level of battlefield, where we think that the story here, the opportunity with the acreage saved, that this could be one of the great Civil War sites in the Southeast.”

Like the cannons, the speed at which the projects can be completed is all dependent on donations.

Osborne said the price tag for everything could reach millions in cost.

“The way that things are moving, I would say that this is going to be a totally different landscape in just another two or three years. And then another two or three years after that. It’s an ever-going process,” he said. “So it might never fully be completed on a timeline.”

An Outdoor Classroom

Osborne said it is a huge victory to have what they have accomplished so far.

Osborne grew up in Pennsylvania with no ancestral ties to the Civil War, with his father hailing from England.

“My mom’s folks don’t come over to the 1890s,” he said. “I grew up in Pennsylvania, and I started going to events in Gettysburg, Antietam. Places in Northern Virginia like Manassas when I was young.”

He has had the Civil War fever ever since.

Osborne has been in Mississippi for 10 years now and described Brice’s Crossroads like an outdoor classroom. He added it’s a great spot to capture the attention of different audiences.

“It’s a perfect one-day battlefield study for that Civil War nut. But it’s also a great introduction to the Civil War for people that might not know that much because you have all kinds of elements going on,” he said. “You have the artillery here. You have the cavalry here. You have the infantry here.”

The Battle of Brice’s Crossroads is directly related to the critical Atlanta Campaign of 1864.

Orders were coming directly from Union authorities out of Atlanta to keep sending expeditions out of Memphis, Tenn., to keep Confederate troops too busy to disturb their supply lines.

“If the Union does not win Atlanta, it is very questionable whether Abraham Lincoln gets reelected,” Osborne said. “So that is where it is in the big picture. On the smaller picture, what we’re talking about here is that one of those expeditions, which outnumbered the Confederate troops two to one, was out here searching for these Confederate forces.”

Those Southern troops, rather than waiting to be found, engaged first, defeating them in a battle that lasted from around 9:30 a.m. to around 7 p.m.

A Confederate victory on the ground, Osborne said, the federal goal of keeping the push on Atlanta was still achieved.

“It was a moment that both sides, troopers from both sides, remembered really for the rest of their lives,” Osborne said.

To help keep the memory of the day alive for future generations, learn more about the Brice’s Crossroads Foundation at bricescrossroads.org.