Battery Gunnison

Battery Gunnison
Fort Hancock, New Jersey
Battery Gunnison in action, circa 1930s
Battery Gunnison
Coordinates	40°27′36″N 73°59′44″W / 40.460042°N 73.995484°W / 40.460042; -73.995484
Site information
Controlled by	US National Park Service
Open to the public	Yes
Site history
Built	1904
In use	1904-1948
Materials	Concrete
Garrison information
Occupants	Army Ground Forces Association

Battery John Gunnison, later called Battery New Peck, was a six-inch coast artillery battery located at Fort Hancock in New Jersey.

History

Battery John Gunnison was built in 1904 as a rapid fire twin six inch disappearing gun battery. It was named in honor of Captain John Williams Gunnison, a US Army Topographical Engineer, who was attacked and murdered by Indians during an expedition in Utah on October 26, 1853.^[1] The two M1903 six-inch guns, mounted on counter-weight disappearing carriages, were medium caliber weapons that could be fired rapidly at faster moving enemy vessels, such as patrol boats, destroyers, or minesweepers.^[2][3]

In 1943, the Battery was extensively modified both internally and externally for two M1900 six inch barbette (pedestal mounted) guns, two shell hoists and a modern and expanded Plotting Room. The guns were moved from (old) Battery Fremont Peck to Battery Gunnison's location gaining a better field of fire.^[4] The Battery was then renamed — Battery "New Peck." Initially, Battery Peck was named for Lieutenant Fremont Pearsons Peck, a US Army Ordnance Corps officer killed at Sandy Hook Proving Ground in a weapons testing explosion on February 19, 1895.^[5] The now-vacant Battery Peck emplacement was then modified as well, for .90mm M1 Anti-Motor Torpedo Boat guns(AMTB)^[6]

Following conversion, which ended summer of 1943, Battery New Peck became the "Examination Battery" for the Harbor Entrance Control Post (HECP) No.1, located on the roof of Battery Potter, also at Fort Hancock. The HECP was responsible for the safe passage of vessels into the New York Harbor as the ongoing U-Boat war and "the Battle of The Atlantic" raged off the Jersey Shore. Vessels that failed to follow protocol, or who acted suspiciously, would be ordered to halt, pending an investigation and inspection by the US Navy and Coast Guard. If the vessel failed to comply, it would be brought under fire via "Bring To" shots fired by Battery New Peck. These were warning shots using inert shells, fired well in front of the vessel to get its attention. If the vessel failed to comply at this time, Battery Peck would begin "Destructive Fire" with Armor-Piercing, High-Explosive (AP-HE) ammunition to neutralize the threat before it could get close enough to attack the harbor or scuttle in one of channels.^[7] The Jersey Shore was considered a full war-zone during World War II, and operations at Fort Hancock were on a "Shoot First - Ask Later" mindset in dealing with potential threats.

Battery New Peck was put into caretaker status following the end of World War II in 1945, and saw its final use in 1948, when a ROTC Coast Artillery class came to Fort Hancock and performed annual summer target practice. Although the coastal defense component of Fort Hancock's history ended in 1948, it remained on active duty as an Air Defense Artillery post from the early 1950s to 1974 with anti-aircraft guns, and later on, Nike Ajax and Hercules missiles. In the early 1960s, the two M1900 guns and carriages were removed from the Battery and brought down to a government storage facility in Maryland, pending their placement in a military museum that was yet to be built. The now empty Battery New Peck structure was used as a trap-shooting range for the Soldiers at Fort Hancock.

In 1974, Fort Hancock closed, and was ceded to the National Park Service as part of Gateway National Recreation Area. The two M1900 rifles and carriages were still in storage, as they had been at for nearly a decade; the museum they were to be placed at was never built. The National Park Service quickly worked with the US Army to have them returned, and the guns and carriages came home on a bitterly cold day in February 1976.^[8] Sadly, for the next twenty seven years, and stripped of all its original equipment save for the two shot hoists, sand, grit, salt corrosion and vandalism would take a heavy toll on the Battery and the guns.

Restoration and preservation

Restored 6-inch rifled gun on model 1900 pedestal mount at Battery Gunnison/New Peck

Battery Gunnison/New Peck would see all of that change in 2003. The Army Ground Forces Association (AGFA)^[9], a non-profit living history group, began to volunteer at the Battery. Now in their 13th year at the Battery, they have transformed the structure from two rusty cannons and vegetation overgrown dilapidated former concrete artillery emplacement to the most extensively preserved and restored seacoast battery in the United States. While other coastal batteries around the nation - Battery 519 at Ft Miles, DE; Battery Osgood-Farley, Ft. MacArthur, CA; Battery Worth, Ft. Casey, WA; as well as several others - have been well preserved, with some form of ordinance in their emplacements (non-correct display weaponry), or offer extensive museum displays of artifacts in the battery's rooms, only Battery Gunnison/New Peck is preserved and restored as a true seacoast battery.

Of all former concrete seacoast artillery emplacements in the United States, it is the only location to offer the full spectrum of ammunition service, correct weaponry, and a working range section. Both guns have been restored so visitors can traverse (turn) the guns, and articulate the breech blocks. Original Army spotting telescopes allow visitors to view and track ships on the horizon. Internally, the battery is lit with original 100 year old Army Corps of Engineers electrical fixtures. The powder and shell magazines are filled with inert (non functioning/non working) six inch shell bodies and powder canisters. In the Plotting Room, an M3 Plotting Board has been recreated, as have other pre-computer devices for tabulating mathematical solutions for the guns. Visitors to the Battery can talk to one another at all locations, as the telephone network has also been rebuilt, using vintage EE-91 Coast Artillery telephones.^[10]

Preservation plans for 2016 include the reconstruction of the Battery's two ammunition service bridges, as well as the staircase to the Battery Commander's Station on top of the emplacement. AGFA hosts several work weekends a year for restoration of the site, and holds two "living history" events a year, held in May and October. "Coastal Defense Weekend," held the weekend prior to Memorial Day Weekend, and "Fort Hancock Day," in October, which commemorates the founding of the Fort Hancock on October 30, 1895. All work days and living history events are posted by the National Park Service with the program guides getting updated quarterly for the spring, summer, fall and winter time periods.^[11] AGFA members are uniformed as members of the 245th Coast Artillery Regiment, which manned Battery New Peck in 1943, and give Lantern Tours, historical displays, and gun drills with the M1900s.^[12]

See also

• Gunnison Beach takes its name from Battery Gunnison.
• List of coastal fortifications of the United States

References

Further reading

• Gaines, William C. Defending the Narrows: The Harbor Defenses of Southern New York – Part I, The Muzzleloading Era, 1890-1950, Coast Defense Journal, Vol. 22, No. 4, Nov. 2008.
• Gaines, William C. Defending the Narrows: The Harbor Defenses of Southern New York – Part II, The Breechloading Era, 1890-1950, Coast Defense Journal, Vol. 23, No. 1, Feb. 2009.

External links

• Battery Gunnison
• Fort Hancock's Battery John Gunnison, US National Park Service
• The Army Ground Forces Association