For those interested in the offbeat and rare.

Years ago I copied the following article from an 1862 Memphis newspaper. This morning I chanced on it, but did not find the name of the paper or the date.

The spelling is uncorrected from the paper.

Hughes’ Breech- Loading Cannon

The curiosity of our citizens has been excited the last few days by the sight of a weapon displayed near the mayor’s office, which looks much like a cross between a cannon and a gun. It is one of Hughes’ celebrated cannon, of which we gave some account a while a go, when they were being cast at Street’s foundry. It is thirty inches long, weighs a hundred pounds, has a bore of an inch and a half in diameter, carries a one pound Minnie ball, is breach - loaded, mounted on two wheels and can be managed by three men. It is so arranged as to be capable of being fired from a hill side, with one wheel a foot lower than the other. And expanding gutta percha sabot at the breach prevents the escape of gas and the wearing away. It cost four hundred dollars, a six pound cannon two thousand five hundred, both complete with equipage. We are informed that on Saturday it threw a ball from the bluff opposite the Gayoso to President’s Island, three miles. Gen, Jeff. Thompson has ten of these guns, and on Saturday Gen. Price ordered ten of them. J. O. McAllister, Ayres Block, has addressed to us a communication on this gun as follows: “I wish to do something to defend our city. I will one of ten to buy ten of P. W. Hughes breach-loading cannon – sample to be seen at my house – at $400 each. I will also be one of one hundred to furnish five overcoats to soldiers free of charge. Let us come out and do something for our country at once.”