Please decipher enigmatic monogram (?) on cannon

Thx, will check that.

 

Thanks for the tip. Most Google books sub-sites give only snippets but classic view gives whole books and articles. So I used that and found what I needed.

I’m not sure I’ll be able to identify the two sets of initials, but now that I’m pretty sure of the history back to 1899, I really don’t need to. This piece was in the US Navy’s Bureau of Ordnance Museum. That until an unknown date in the 20th C., was in the Washington Navy Yard, DC. No records or catalogs have yet been found but I have our National Archives looking for such. This gun and its captor I’m fairly certain are described in various published government reports about battles between the US and Filipino insurgents in 1899. In one, Navy Ensign Cleland Davis and three Marines used a Colt M1895 machine gun to subdue insurgent fortifications. Davis captured an insurgent cannon and canister ammunition. Davis later served in the Navy Bureau of Ordnance. I’m fairly certain he gave the captured cannon to the museum. If anyone wants to see some of the battle reports, I can post links. Davis was an interesting person. In 1910 he invented the Davis Gun for aircraft, the first recoilless gun. Davis captured the Filipino gun and canister ammunition on June 13, 1899, under a bridge, these events described in detail in Faust. Karl I., MacQueen, Peter, CAMPAIGNING IN THE PHILIPPINES, Hicks-Judd, 1899.

 

Thanks, I’ve read some of the reports (military) but I know there are more. Meanwhile I got an email from a gent suggesting I look at the old Philippine writing, Baybayin. Haven’t had time to focus on it yet but I’ll probably start here: https://omniglot.com/writing/baybayin.htm