“The mob hid the cannon in the road ... but ... there was an old sow walking about. She went to the middle of the road and went to digging hog fashion. Low and behold, there lay the old barrel.” — Daniel McArthur¹

In 1838, a mob threatened to destroy the Latter-day Saint settlement of Adam-ondi-Ahman with a large cannon, capable of shooting a six-pound shot. Under the leadership of Apostle David W. Patten, the Saints organized to dispel the mob, which dispersed upon the arrival of a group of armed Saints. In the mob's haste to disperse, they buried the cannon in the road and trampled the burial site with their horses, in an attempt to conceal the location. The Saints searched for the cannon, but only discovered it once an "old sow" wandered into the road and began digging where the barrel of the cannon lay concealed. From that time on, the Saints referred to the cannon as "The Old Sow". The Old Sow became a fixture in the Nauvoo Legion, and the Saints would later carry it with them to Salt Lake City.^1,2

1. Cannon Being Memorialized has Colorful Pioneer History, The Church News Archives

2. John Corrill, A Brief History of the Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints, 1839, The Joseph Smith Papers, Page 38, Footnote 134