A shiny ball that rested atop Missouri courthouse survived Confederate bullets and vandals who messed with it later

(Civil War Picket photos)

I’ve written about a few oddities since I launched this blog in 2009. There’s the tree peppered with artillery canister, a newspaper printed on wallpaper and a cannonball that legend holds was the first lobbed on Fort Sumter.

A visit to northeast Missouri this week brought a new member to the club of unusual items. Tucked inside the courthouse in Marion County is a copper sphere pocked with bullet holes fired by Confederates.

This shiny artifact in Palmyra has quite a history.

Visitors to the town will see a monument just outside the building remembering the Palmyra Massacre. Ten men, a mix of Confederate soldiers and Southern sympathizers, were executed by a Federal firing squad in October 1862 when a missing Northern sympathizer was not returned.

Bloody Missouri was perhaps the most divided state during the Civil War, and Palmyra was known for its sympathy for Southern secession. Federal troops occupied the town and chased Rebel raiders, made up of troops and guerrillas.

Confederate Col. Joseph E. Porter was on a recruiting mission in mid-September 1862 when he rode into Palmyra and freed about 65 prisoners from the old county jail. They seized the presumed Yankee informant; he was ostensibly killed while returning home.

The sphere sits in a corner of the courthouse, which itself is a trip back in time. Tile flooring leads residents and visitors to county offices with their function hand-stenciled onto the door windows.

The sphere was placed atop the second county courthouse in 1855 and witnessed the raid in which Porter and his men of the 1st Northeast Missouri Cavalry also seized weapons and ammunition. 

“As they left town, they decided to have a little fun, so they shot at it,” said the late local historian Corbyn Jacobs. The sphere contains several bullet holes and cracks.

The sphere sat in the basement for years after a new courthouse was erected in 1900. In the 1930s, it was placed on a pedestal on the front lawn. “It was abused and disfigured” over the years and disappeared until it was found by Jacobs in the late 1950s, according to an exhibit in the courthouse.

Years later, the sphere was reshaped and repaired and returned to the pedestal. “It took vandals just one night to destroy the efforts of many to preserve history. The sphere was dented and knocked from its base.”

The decision was made to put the ornament on a walnut base beneath the courthouse rotunda. It has been protected from further damage and ignominy since 1988.

Carol Brentlinger, curator for the old Marion County jail across the street, said she usually tells visitors to go check out the sphere.

“It is an unusual piece,” said the Heritage Seekers Historical Society member.

The jail she manages held five prisoners that Col. John McNeil, who commanded the Union’s 2nd Missouri State Militia, ordered executed for the presumed death of Andrew Allsman. Five more Southern sympathizers were brought from nearby Hannibal to complete the number to be shot.

Old Marion County Jail (Heritage Seeks Historical Society)

When no word came from Porter about Allsman, the 10 men were taken from the jail to the fairgrounds. Only three died instantly; the remainder were finished off with pistol shots.

McNeil was labeled the "Butcher of Palmyra," and despite his explanations, remained the subject of bitter feelings during and after the war. Porter, whom McNeil considered a bushwhacker, died in battle a few months after the Palmyra incident.