Artillery Shell Found At Middletown Home

MIDDLETOWN, NJ — A 40- to 50-year-old artillery shell was removed from a home on Deepdale Drive in Middletown Township Tuesday morning, according to Middletown police.

It was actually Dorianne Hennessy's children who found the shell on the embankment of Poricy Creek this past Saturday.

"Poricy Creek runs behind my house so we're always finding little souvenirs and artifacts back there," she said. "My kids found it in an area where a bunch of trees had been cleared away after Sandy. With this, we were like, we don't know what this is; everyone stay clear of it."

She called Middletown police and officers, along with personnel from the Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit at Naval Weapons Station Earle, arrived at the home Tuesday morning. They confirmed it was a shell and removed it. Pictures of the artillery shell can be seen here.

"They said it was a 155 mm artillery shell and it was post World War I," she said. "How it got there, they don't know. Someone suggested it could have been something shot off Sandy Hook years ago. I would love to know the history behind it."

The Sandy Hook Proving Grounds were used by the U.S. military to test ammunition from a period after the Civil War through World War I. The sandy soil of the Middletown area is rife with historical artifacts. Hennessy said she's heard of people finding musket balls, arrowheads and tomahawks and even brass buttons from British uniforms in the Revolutionary War, all along Poricy Creek.

The ammunition is estimated to be 40 to 50 years old and there were no explosives inside.

"It was empty and there was no danger to it. They took it back to the base and it will be scrapped like any other scrap metal," said Bill Addison, a spokesperson for the Naval weapons base.

"I wish we could have kept it," she said. "A little piece of history."