Expert: Ralph Salier - 1/26/2012

Question
QUESTION: Recently I found this two extremely heavy metal objects in the ground of my property, east of San Diego. I have no idea what they are, but my first guess was, Cannonball remanence from the Spanish-American War. They have a diameter of 4 to 4.5 Inches, presumingly of iron. But this is only a wild guess.

Here is a link with pictures from my Facebook Page:
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.3168604778654.159351.1371482587&type=1&

ANSWER: Mr. Nufer,

These are unusual objects.  I'm not sure that they are cannon balls because of the way they are split.  Typically cannon balls fragment rather then split since most are hollow with a charge inside.  Although they did make solid ones, you can well imagine what kind of a force would be required to split a solid ball.  A solid ball would distort before breaking.  Are they magnetic?  this would demonstrate that they are iron vs. some other material like basalt (a very heavy stone).  I don't think that they are meteorites since they don't have the irregular features and the "crust" typical for meteorites.  Since you live in San Diego, have you considered taking them to the San Diego Maritime Museum?  I would be willing to bet that there would be some one that can provide more info on these.

Are there any markings on these?  

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Thank you for your answer.
I also contacted and sent the pictures to the San Diego Historical Society. They are metal ( a magnet sticks to them ). They are about 10 pounds each. I can not find markings, but don't have very good eyes. I also considered the possibility of Indian Grinding Rocks and will continue to find the answer for the mysterious objects.

Answer
Mr. Hufer,  

Since they are magnetic, I do not believe that they are Native American in origin.  I spoke to a colleague earlier and sent the pics to him and he feels that these may be "shot" that may have been used like gun shot pellets. This is a good potential.  What would occur is that a ball casting would fail but the size would be close.  So they would have made a "shot bag" that would include several of these and fire this towards the target.  This would then act like shot gun chunks hitting its target with greater damage potential.  

I hope that this further information is of value.