This is the nose section of a 3” Hotchkiss artillery shell with fuse adapter and a paper label glued around the base. Portions of the paper label are missing, but the remaining reads (in ink), “of can[no]ns from [battle]e of Gettysburg”. Likely an early battlefield pick-up as the iron is rusted but not flaky or pitted, and the brass fuse has a dark patina.

This item is from the collection of the Peter Miller Post #551 of the G.A.R. The Post was located in York Springs, Adams County, Pennsylvania and is named after Private Peter Miller of Company K, 1st Pennsylvania Reserves who was killed in action at South Mountain on September 14, 1862 and is now buried in Sunnyside Cemetery, York Springs. A majority of the relics and souvenirs in this Post were recovered from the Gettysburg battlefield.

Little information is known about the Post other than it closed sometime before 1925. The items were recovered by long-time collector Tom Gordon and his father in the 1970s at the home of Civil War veteran and Miller G.A.R. Post member David Starry. The house was then in the possession of Starry’s descendants.

David F. Starry was born in Mummasburg (5 miles northwest of Gettysburg) in 1847, the son of Jacob & Elizabeth (Hummer) Starry. In 1860 he was living and working on the nearby Henry Hershey farm as a laborer. He enlisted in Gettysburg on October 16, 1862, as a substitute for Rufus King, overstating his age by three years, and mustered in as a musician (drummer) with Co. I, 165th Pennsylvania Infantry (aka "Drafted Militia") and served in the Suffolk area. They were discharged on July 28, 1863, in Gettysburg. He joined Company B, 21st Pennsylvania Cavalry as a Private from February 3, 1864 to July 8, 1865. David Starry, one-time president of the Miller G.A.R. Post, lived in York Springs until his death in 1925 and is buried in the Heidlersburg Cemetery (9 miles northeast of Gettysburg).  [jet] [PH:L]

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