In the current issue (Vol XXX, No. 1) of the Middle Tennessee Journal of Genealogy & History there is an article re: Employees at the Confederate Percussion Cap Factory, Tennessee State Arsenal, Nashville, October 1861.

The sources for the article and my input is the Nashville City Directory 1860 and the War Department Collection of Confederate Records, Record Group 109, Entry no. 183, file no. 3899 U.S. National Archives.

The Tennessee State Arsenal was located in the "crypt or cellar" (basement) of the Tennessee State Capitol. The Nashville Republican Banner (31 July 1860, p3) stated that "We found the gun-racks and cases arranged in excellent order, and the swords, sabres, pistols, muskets, rifles and cannon in splendid condition..." after a tour by Mr. Herriges, the Superintendent of the Arsenal.

The Nashville City Directory, p. 43, said of the State Arsenal that "it occupies the North Crypt of the building and contains some 8 or 10,000 stand of arms besides several field pieces of artillery, &c., all orderly arranged in closed cases. Mr. John Heriges is the State Armorer." In the residential section of the Nashville City Directory, John Heriges is listed as "sealer weights and measures, res. corner Broad & Summer. I think he may be the John Joseph Herriges buried in the Nashville City Cemetery.

The chief clerk of the Arsenal percussion works was Joseph Woods Yeatman and S.W. Alexander was the Keeper of Ordinance & Stores. One was in charge of forming the caps and the other in charge of filling them. William Fay was the in charge of the gunpowder.

The article does not mention an explosion but states that Joseph Yeatman wrote to the Asst. Adjutant General on 20 Feby 1862 asking for assistance in dealing with six boxcars of ammunition stored at Murfreesboro. Apparently Gen. Hardeman had ordered the train unloaded, but Yeatman had no manpower to help sort and haul.

The article lists the employees of the Nashville Percussion Cap factory and their duties.