About That Darn Cat-- Part 2: Why Did He Put the Cat in the Cannon?

Francis Butts, in his account of the sinking of the USS Monitor, came up with a really good human interest story and that had to do with a cat.

According to him, while bailing water out of the Monitor's famous turret, he plugged one of the two cannons in it with his boots and coat.  (Why he would do this with the ship in that condition, I wouldn't know.)  Then, he saw "a black cat... sitting on the breech of one of the guns howling.

"...I caught her, wrote the sailor, "and, placing her  in another gun, replaced the wad and tampion, but I could still hear that distressing howl."

He never explained why he decided to do that with the cat.  Was he trying to save it or maybe quiet the howling?

Archaeologists are keeping this story in mind as they drill out the insides of those cannons.

What if they find the bones of a cat in one of the cannons?

When I was talking about the sinking of the Monitor to my classes of 7th graders, the cat story drew more interest than any other aspect of the ship.

--Cat, Or, No Cat.  --Old B-R'er