Episode 3 of 3

Theft of Big Cannon

When: April 25, 1875
Where: Princeton University campus
Part of: Rutgers sophomores steal a cannon from Princeton, starting the Rutgers–Princeton Cannon War

Ten Rutgers sophomores stole Big Cannon from Princeton on April 25, 1875, starting the Cannon War.

On the night of April 25, 1875, ten members of the Rutgers Class of 1877 set out to take Big Cannon back from Princeton. This event marked the beginning of the series of incidents involving the two Revolutionary War cannons.

Sources

Rutgers–Princeton Cannon War Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-30

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.