Historic USS Missouri gun moving ahead of schedule

The trip by rail of the 16-inch gun from the USS Missouri headed for Fort Miles in Cape Henlopen State Park is moving ahead of schedule. As of 3 p.m. April 5, the train hauling the massive gun was spotted in Seaford heading north to a switching yard in Harrington.

Officials say it will be in Harrington for a few days before being transferred to the Delaware Coast Line. Once it leaves Harrington, the train will head east and then south to reach Georgetown.

The rail car with the gun is expected to arrive in Georgetown Monday, April 9, or Tuesday, April 10, said Gary Wray, president of the Fort Miles Historical Society, where it be uncoupled and sit for nearly week in anticipation of a Monday, April 16 welcoming ceremony.

A website has been set up to follow the train's path by GPS tracking: go to http://home.comcast.net/~denniskarol/BigGUN.htm to view progress.

Bill Duveneck, Sussex County Amateur Radio Emergency Service emergency coordinator, placed the tracker on the gun prior to its crossing of the Chesapeake Bay on a rail barge from the Little Creek railroad terminal near Norfolk, Va.

The crossing was made April 3 to Cape Charles, Va., where the Bay Coast Railroad train took the rail car and headed north at 5:30 a.m. April 4. In Pocomoke City, Md., the gun barrel was switched to a Norfolk Southern train for its journey to Georgetown via Harrington to allow enough time for a Monday, April 16 welcoming ceremony in Georgetown.

The massive 116-ton gun is similar to one used during World War II at Fort Miles.

On March 8, a crew from Lockwood Brothers Inc. of Hampton, Va., used a 365-ton crane to lift the 116-ton barrel onto a trailer for a two-mile trip from St. Juliens Creek at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard through Portsmouth, Va., and Chesapeake, Va., to the the Old Dominion power station railroad yard.

According to Wray, the crane crew then lifted the 68-foot barrel onto a railroad car for a short trip to the Little Creek railroad terminal. The Little Creek terminal is the location of the former Little Creek-Cape Charles Ferry, which provided a link to the Eastern Shore of Virginia from the 1930s to 1964 when the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel was opened.

The next stage of the journey was a 26-mile tow across the Chesapeake Bay on a Bay Coast Railroad car float. The tugboat-rail system, started in 1885, is one of only two still operating in the nation.

Wray said an official welcoming ceremony has been scheduled in Georgetown at 2 p.m., Monday, April 16, and an unveiling ceremony in the park will take place at 1 p.m., Saturday, April 28.

The gun barrel is steeped in history as one of three remaining large guns from the USS Missouri, the ship aboard which the Japanese formally surrendered on Sept. 2, 1945, to end World War II. 
One of the most famous battleships in naval history, the USS Missouri provided firepower during the battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa, and later in Korea and Desert Storm.

The Fort Miles Historical Association raised $110,000 to cover transportation costs of the gun from Norfolk to Lewes.

The gun will become a key part of the Fort Miles Military Museum, a long-term effort to develop a World War II museum within the hidden battery at Cape Henlopen State Park. The USS Missouri cannon - the same size gun that protected the entrance to the Delaware Bay during the war years - will greet visitors to the museum.