It is well documented that Guibor’s Battery of the Missouri State Guard manufactured canister projectiles and tins after the Battle of Carthage. These canister projectiles are well-known in southwestern Missouri and northwestern Arkansas and are locally referred to as barshot, but are more properly termed expedient canister. The projectiles were cut from iron bar stock found in Carthage’s local blacksmith shops. The ends exhibit evidence of being hot cut, probably using a blacksmith’s cutting chisel and hardy. The iron bar stock canister was recovered from Wilson’s Creek National Battlefield, at the south end of Sharp’s cornfield in the area where Colonel Franz Sigel’s men were routed by the Southern forces.
Image Courtesy Wilson’s Creek National Battlefield; WICR 30710
