Tannehill Furnaces 0r T
annehill Foundry, in Roupes Valley, Alabama
f/k/a Hillman Bloomery
Hillman began looking for new iron-making opportunities, settling near rich ore deposits in the vicinity of Bucksville, where at the time
Jefferson,
Tuscaloosa,
Bibb, and
Shelby counties came together.
Bloomeries were early forges that made small amounts of wrought iron directly from ore for tools, plows, and cooking utensils. The builder, Daniel Hillman, was enticed to the area by Abner McGehee, a
railroad investor from
Montgomery. Hillman moved from the Hanging Rock Iron Region of the Ohio Valley, where he managed the Pine Grove Steam Furnace in Lawrence County, Ohio, and later the Cataract Bloomery on the Little Sandy River in Greenup County, Kentucky.
The Tannehill facility was targeted for destruction as part of Union general
James H. Wilson's raid into Alabama; it was attacked by three companies of the U. S. Eighth Iowa Cavalry on March 31, 1865, under the command of Capt. William A. Sutherland. Wilson's cavalry operation, which involved more than 14,000 troops, burned every Alabama furnace but one, the Hale & Murdock mill near
Vernon, in
Lamar County.
Tannehill Foundry. . . . . . Ruins of C.S. Naval Foundry Selma . . . Abner McGehee
http://www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/h-1616
There is also a UDC marker placed in 1977 but I was unable to copy it ?
Bonus
General Philip Kearney's horses
(Philip Kearney of the First United States Dragoons, Mexican War, 100 gray mares, purchased in Illinois with the help of Abraham Lincoln)
of his Civil War horses
Moscow, "his most celebrated steed" . . . "a high-spirited white horse"
Decatur, "a light bay which was shot through the neck at Fair Oaks or Seven Pines"
Bayard, "a brown horse", made famous by the poem by Stedman "Kearney at Seven Pines"
The Photographic History of the Civil War: The cavalry,
By Robert Sampson Lanier, free ebook
https://books.google.com/books?id=l...AB#v=onepage&q=moscow decartur bayard&f=false