Witt Siege Mortar Is One Of Eight Documented In US
by Mike Plunkett
When The Journal-News published a special supplement earlier this summer, locating the 11 trophy cannons in Montgomery County, one piece defied identification.
That puzzle has been solved.
The armament that has sat in the center of Witt Park for decades is a 7-inch BL Rifled siege mortar, used in the trenches during World War I.
According to Jodie Creen Wesemann, Museum Technician at the Rock Island Arsenal Museum, the Witt siege mortar is the eighth of its kind to be documented in the United States. The closest is in Phillips, WI.
According to an instruction manual published in 1895, furnished by the Rock Island Arsenal, "The 7-inch mortar is intended to be used in siege operations for the purpose of bringing to bear a vertical fire upon strongly entrenched and covered positions. It is used to supplement the curved fire of the siege howitzer by a vertical fire of medium ranges and to cover the field at shorter ranges than are accessible to the fire of the howitzer.
"This mortar is constructed entirely of steel, the body, including the trunnions, being made of a single forging."
The Witt mortar was manufactured at Watervleit Arsenal in New York, weighs 1,689 pounds, bears the serial number 53, and the initials of ordnance officer Joseph P. Farley (JPF).
In combat, the carriage would have been "mounted upon and firmly bolted to a wooden platform 11 feet long by 6 feet wide, which is embedded in the earth and sustained at the rear by anchor stakes," according to the instruction manual.
In Witt, however, it is embedded in cement. A plaque used to be mounted to the cement noting the piece was "dedicated to the memory of the Witt boys who gave their lives in the World War that we might live."
The plaque had been stolen and was missing for years until it was discovered in a local barn and donated to the Witt Museum where it is now displayed.
The Witt siege mortar was one of 11 featured in this year's This Is Montgomery County supplement to the newspaper, published in June.
The other 10 are the 12-pound Confederate bronze howitzer on the Historic Courthouse lawn in Hillsboro, 4.5-inch siege rifles at Nokomis Cemetery and Memorial Park in Nokomis, and a 30-pound naval Parrott Rifle at Library Park in Litchfield, all from the Civil War era.
World War I era pieces in the county include the Witt 7-inch siege mortar and a French 75 at Memorial Park in Nokomis.
From World War II are the 75 millimeter M5 at the VFW Hall in Taylor Springs, the M115 howitzer at Veterans Memorial Park in Raymond, the 57 millimeter M1 at the VFW Hall in Panama, the Quad 50 at Century Park in Irving, the M3A3 tank at Memorial Park in Nokomis.
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