A Cannonball From the Alamo Has Emerged 190 Years After the Battle, Found Buried Near a Church

The four pound bronze cannonball may have been fired at the Alamo by the Mexican Army.

Archaeologists at the Alamo have uncovered a rare intact cannonball likely fired during the 1836 siege and battle.

The four-pound bronze projectile was found about three feet underground outside the Alamo Church on March 5, 2026, one day before the battle’s 190th anniversary. Researchers say the find is unusually valuable because it was discovered in a clear archaeological layer tied to the battle period, not as a loose relic removed from its original context.

The discovery does not add anything particularly noteworthy to the history of the Alamo, but it provides another tangible piece of evidence to one of the most famous battles in North American history. In a site shaped by war and looting, and more recently, frantic tourism and construction sites, an intact battlefield object still sitting where history left it is a rare find indeed.

A Battle Still Buried in the Ground

The Battle of the Alamo took place on March 6, 1836, during the Texas Revolution. Texian rebels had occupied the former Spanish mission complex in San Antonio. For 13 days, they held out against a much larger Mexican army led by Antonio López de Santa Anna.

When the final assault came, Mexican forces overran the compound. Nearly all of the roughly 200 defenders died, including figures later turned into frontier legend, such as Davy Crockett, James Bowie and William B. Travis. The garrison’s brave last stand and its ultimate destruction became a rallying cry. “Remember the Alamo” followed Texian forces to victory at San Jacinto on April 21, 1836, when Texas won independence from Mexico.

This famous piece of American history has often been told time and time again in different shapes and forms, whether it’s bronze statues, oil paintings, or patriotic slogans. However, many of the finer details of what went down at the Alamo are not necessarily known. This is where modern archaeology comes in. It deals in objects still anchored to the ground: small, physical traces that can show where soldiers stood, where weapons fired, and how the siege unfolded. This cannonball is one of those traces.

“I have chills now, just thinking about it,” the Alamo’s Director of Archaeology Dr. Tiffany Lindley told Stories Bigger Than Texas: The Alamo Podcast. “March 5th is when we pulled it out of the ground. I don’t think words can express the feelings that we all felt.”

Kolby Lanham, senior researcher and historian at the site, described the moment in similar terms on the same podcast: “That’s a literal artifact from the Battle of the Alamo, and you’re holding it for the first time since the battle happened. That is a pretty wild thing to think about.”

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The Bronze Clue

The cannonball is solid bronze. This not a trivial detail.

According to Alamo researchers, the Mexican Army generally used bronze cannonballs, while the Texian defenders primarily used iron ones. However, the choice of munition was not that clear-cut. Weapons and ammunition could be captured and reused. In times of crisis, you fight with whatever you can get your hands on. But the material gives historians a strong clue, suggesting the cannonball was fired at the makeshift fort at the Alamo rather than from it.

“We can’t say with 100% certainty that it came from the Mexican Army, but I would say 99% because largely the Mexican Army is using bronze cannonballs and largely the Texans are using iron cannonballs,” Lanham told Stories Bigger Than Texas: The Alamo Podcast.

“Doesn’t mean they didn’t capture each other’s stuff and use it, but I would say with a fair amount of certainty that this is a Mexican Army cannonball and it was likely fired at the Battle of the Alamo — or it could have been during the 12-day siege.”

Fox News adds another important detail: Lindley said the cannonball came from a layer dating to the siege, when Mexican forces were bombarding the Texian position from an artillery battery on the northeast side of the compound.

That location fits the find. The cannonball was discovered near the northeast corner of the Alamo Church, in an excavation unit outside the building. Lindley described the deposit as clean, meaning the soil layers were still readable.

“It gives us an, almost with certainty, exact time period – and that’s the Battle,” Lindley told the Alamo podcast.

For archaeologists, context is everything. A cannonball on a collector’s shelf may be dramatic, but it has lost much of its scientific value if we can’t trace its exact origins. A cannonball found in place can sometimes tell us much more.

“Due to significant utilization of the site post-battle, the looting of the site in the immediate period following the battle, and previous utility installation, many artifacts — especially those this large — were taken off site,” Lindley told Fox News Digital. “Once an artifact is removed from its original deposition, it loses its context and, for researchers, it becomes less significant. … The context of this solid shot is what makes the find significant.”

The Violence of the Siege

The cannonball was not the only piece of battlefield evidence to emerge.

Over the past year, archaeologists have also found four exploding shot fragments outside the Alamo Church. Three are bronze and one is iron. Researchers believe they came from howitzer rounds: hollow shells filled with gunpowder, designed to explode and scatter fragments.

“These are howitzer rounds,” Lanham said on the Alamo podcast. “They’re fired from a small, stubby-style howitzer gun. And these howitzer shells are different than the cannonball . . . That’d be a solid bronze ball. These are hollow inside with gunpowder — they explode like a grenade. We’re hoping to take these pieces, measure them out and hopefully try to piece them together to give us an idea of what size it was.”

Researchers now plan to study the fragments and the solid shot more closely, including their size and possible trajectories. They were likely fired by the Mexican Army.

A Famous Site Still Produces New Evidence

The current discoveries come during a major, multiyear preservation and construction effort known as the $550 million Alamo Plan. The project includes preservation work on the Alamo Church and Long Barrack, a new collections center, a visitor center and museum, and an educational venue. The future Alamo Visitor Center and Museum is scheduled to open in 2028.

The site already draws more than 1.6 million visitors a year. In 2015, the Alamo and other San Antonio missions were designated a UNESCO World Heritage site. For many visitors, the chance to watch archaeologists at work has become part of the experience.

“There was a visitor who once said, ‘I’ve been to Pompeii, but this is cooler!’ And I almost had a heart attack,” Lindley told the Alamo podcast. “As an archaeologist, Pompeii is the epitome of cool. So I was so excited to hear that visitors are really connecting to what we’re doing and they’re enjoying seeing us.”

More than 250,000 artifacts have been found at the site, most of them humbler than a cannonball. These include things like ceramic pieces, musket balls, adobe floor fragments and glass bottles. Together, they widen the story beyond the famous final assault.

“While not every artifact will find its way to public display, they all contribute to expanding the story of the Alamo,” Lindley told Fox News Digital.

The cannonball may eventually be displayed on site, possibly in the new visitor center and museum. It has reminded historians that even at one of the most mythologized places in North America, the ground still has evidence to give.