The Other Old Sow Cannon by Zina Abbott

 

While recently teaching a Daughters of Utah Pioneers lesson on the discovery of Iron County, Utah, I learned of a story that caught my fancy and tickled my funny-bone. It was about a cannon named the “Old Sow.”

There are two historical cannons that were given that name. When I started researching for more details online, the majority of references dealt with a Revolutionary War cannon captured in a 1775 raid on Fort Ticonderoga by a militia made up of settlers from present-day Vermont called the Green Mountain Boys. they were led by Ethan Allen. Among the two hundred cannons captured—many of them twelve-pounders and eighteen-pounders—was a huge twenty-four pounder cannon they nicknamed “Old Sow.” This cannon played an interesting role during that conflict.

The other cannon named “Old Sow” that is featured in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint history was not nearly as large physically. However, it very possibly covered more ground than its cousin by the same name.

It is possible that this cannon saw military action during the War of 1812 and then landed in New Orleans. It is identical to the black carronades found on board the U.S. naval vessel Hamilton, a ship that sank in 1813 on Lake Ontario during the War of 1812.

There is more than one story of how the cannon was discovered by the members of the church and received its name.

In one version, when Illinois Gov. Thomas Ford disarmed the saints in June 1844, several women buried the cannon in a field to hide it from the mobs, and an old sow and her litter discovered it.

The version I read for my lesson on Iron County, Utah, was as follows:

In Far West, Missouri, sometime around 1836 to 1839, which was a time of intense persecution of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (known then as Mormons), a mob appeared at the McAllister home.  After grabbing the arm of nine-year-old John, the men threatened the mother that they would kill the boy unless she told them where they could find her husband. She responded by grabbing an axe and swinging it at one of the men. The axe barely missed rendering a killing blow, but only because the man managed to jump out of the way. The mobsters left the home and returned to their camp. Angry, they attacked a group of Mormon militia. As a result of the battle, three men in the militia, including their captain, were killed. As that was happening, a terrific storm arose, which forced the mob to retreat.

The members of the mob gathered their equipment, but left their cannon behind. They buried it in the ground. The next day, after the storm passed, a sow and her brood of piglets foraging for food rooted it out of the ground. When the Mormon militia returned to the area, they saw brass protruding out of the soil. After carefully digging up the cannon, once they realized what they had found, they kept it and took it with them when they departed for Nauvoo, Illinois, the next gathering place for members of the church.

abt. 1908-Veterans of the Nauvoo Legion with the Old Sow Cannon

Nauvoo blacksmith James Lawson purchased the cannon for scrap. After the cast-iron carronade was cleaned up and made operable, it was requisitioned for the Nauvoo Legion. An existing carriage was altered to accept it. Because of its origins, it was given the name of Old Sow Cannon. It, along with its well-worn carriage, was often used for ceremonial purposes and to call the Nauvoo Legion—the local, state-authorized militia unit—together. The Nauvoo Legion fired it to celebrate American Independence Day and other events.

When Governor Ford of Illinois and several others turned against the church, and the members were forced to leave behind the homes and farms they had built in Nauvoo, they took the cannon with them. The Old Sow Cannon traveled across the plains with Brigham Young, then president of the church, as part of the first wagon train of Mormon pioneers. They traversed uncharted territory which had been crossed by only a few wagon trains bound for Oregon. Although prayerful consideration led them to believe they should settle in the area near the Great Salt Lake Valley, they relied on the few maps created by John A. Frémont during his expeditions. They were unsure of the reception they might receive at the hands of the Native American tribes living in that territory. Having the cannon along gave them a sense of security.

Old Fort, Great Salt Lake City, 1848

Once they arrived in the Salt Lake Valley, the Old Sow Cannon became a makeshift speaker's platform. Apostle George A. Smith preached the first sermon in the Salt Lake Valley while standing on top of the cannon. For protection from the Native Americans in the region, the first homes in Great Salt Lake City were log houses built in a square and surrounded by a mud wall to create a fort. The Old Sow Cannon was mounted on the wall to provide protection.

Not only was Brigham Young a leader of a church growing in numbers amounting in the thousands, he was a great colonizer. As new members of the church from all over the world came to the North American continent, he recognized the Salt Lake Valley would not hold them all. Therefore, he sent exploration parties throughout the West to find suitable land for settlement.

After one exploration party in 1848-49 led by church leader Parley P. Pratt found iron ore and land suitable for farm in what is now Iron County, Utah, a large party of settlers were sought for and called on a mission to develop this land, which was originally named Valley of the Little Salt Lake. Because it was in Indian country, and they were uncertain of the reception they would receive, when the initial group of settlers left in 1850, the Old Sow Cannon went with the vanguard company. They traveled the route which took them over Beaver Ridge.

Hieroglyphics, Pass opposite Parowan 1872

An advance party of fifty people started into the valley on January 10, 1851. Upon hearing gunfire coming from the camp behind them, and fearing their friends had been attacked, they grabbed their weapons and rushed back to the top of the pass to come to their assistance.

As it turned out, it was a false alarm. The second group, upon seeing for the first time the valley that would be their new home, decided to celebrate by firing a salute of three discharges from the Old Sow Cannon.

The Little Salt Lake City was renamed Parowan, a Native American name. It remains the county seat of Iron County to this day. The Native Americans in that region had a healthy respect for that cannon. They called it Pe-up-carbine, meaning Big Gun. It was used to salute state occasions for many years.

Days of 1897 Parade-Old Sow Cannon's 50th anniversary of first arriving in the Salt Lake Valley

After the cannon was returned to Salt Lake City, it was again placed near the Southeast corner of the Old Fort. The walls crumbled over time and fell into disrepair, and the cannon became buried in the dust. Fifty years later when excavation began to build the Hotel Utah, the Old Sow Cannon was unearthed.

abt. 1908, Nauvoo Legion Artillery Veterans

Since the Old Sow Cannon's active service with the Utah militia was at an end, it became a mascot of the militia's veterans association. Sometime around the turn of the century, the carronade found a home in the Deseret Museum, and later, in the old Bureau of Information on Temple Square. It is now housed in the Church Historical Museum of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

At the time it was prepared for an exhibition in the 1990s, the museum invited Jess McCall, curator at the Fort Douglas Museum in Salt Lake City, to conserve the Old Sow Cannon. He identified the piece to be a short-barreled, low-muzzle-velocity carronade built for shipboard use rather than a full-size cannon. The bore will carry a twelve-pound solid shot. It was probably built between 1790 and 1810.

As for the wooden carriage, it was made between 1812 and 1820 for another artillery system and later modified to hold the carronade. Its original paint color—which has been restored—was blue-gray.

Since very few carronades of this size were cast, and only a few have survived, the Old Sow Cannon currently in the Church History Museum is extremely rare.

 

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Sources:

Jeppson, Ellen Taylor, “Early Exploration and Settlement of Iron County,” Tales of Triumph, Volume Eight. (Salt Lake City, Utah: International Society Daughters of Utah Pioneers, 2025), 178-180.

https://www.thechurchnews.com/1990/3/17/23262023/cannon-was-first-pulpit-in-salt-lake-valley/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nauvoo_Legion#/media/File:Nauvoo_Legion_12_pound_carronade.jpg

https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2019/05/05/kirby-joseph-smiths/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nauvoo_Legion

Association of Veteran Artilliarymen of the Nauvoo Legion, photograph by Johnson Photography Studio, Salt Lake City, Utah, 1908

https://www.battlefields.org/learn/articles/guns-ticonderoga