Fair Chance and not a Blunt Refusal

Abstract

Newly found documents demonstrate that Alfred Nobel’s 1887 patented smokeless Ballistite gunpowder was tested by the French Army in 1889, yielding unimpressive results. This and other technical reasons were the basis for final 1889 French rejection rather than political motives, as claimed by Nobel, repeated by an influential 1962 biography, and echoed on a current Nobel website. Nobel offered Ballistite to the French military in late 1887, but was refused by 1888 since the French smokeless poudre B of 1884 was already employed and Ballistite was considered erosive and unsafe to produce. However, letters from French officials (and the intervention of the French Minister of War) confirm that Ballistite was indeed tested by the French military in 1889. Ballistic results in the 8 mm Lebel rifle were unfavorable and this seems the final technical reason for the rejection, rather than French interests in promoting their supposedly inferior propellant. This case study highlights the question of balance between technical and social history of military technology. The latter, examining social factors often ignored in various past military technological histories, have shown to shape inventions. In this case, though, the author of the influential Nobel biography has missed the complex technical history of the issue, relying on the personal and political for explaining the decisions.