A model military cannon. 'The smallest gun in the world'. Originally made in eight separate pieces, mounted on stand in box and viewed through a microscope. The model was reportedly displayed at the Great Exhibition of 1851 and later kept at Windsor Castle according to the donor. A label dated 19 October 1893 states: 'Made in 1828 by the late Mr J. T. Towson, and the smallest piece of workmanship, composed of eight pieces that has ever been manufactured. During the last 50 years many attempts have been made to construct a cannon equally small, but in no instance has the attempt to put the pieces together succeeded. The total weight being only the 29th part of a grain, it consists of the cannon with trunnions, moulding box and touch hole, made of steel, 2 wheels with 6 spokes made of silver, 2 sides of timber of gold and the two coupling-bars and axle of steel'.
Towson's name does not appear in the index of the catalogue for the 1851 Great Exhibition and there is no obvious reference to the model in Queen Victoria's diary.