Royal Artillery Research Articles

Chemistry and Cannon: J.-L. Proust and Gunpowder Analysis

Chemistry and Cannon: J.-L. Proust and Gunpowder Analysis SEYMOUR H. MAUSKOPF D’un instrument de guerre à un instrument de labo­ ratoire, les affinités ne changent certainement pas. [J.-L. Proust, “Cinquième mémoire sur la poudre à canon,” Journal de physique, de chimie et d’histoire na­ turelle 73 (novembre 1811): 390] This is the story of an attempt by a major chemist of the late 18th century to develop “useful knowledge” for industry under govern­ ment patronage. The chemist was Joseph-Louis Proust (1754—1826; known as Luis José Proust in Spain); the industry was munitions; the government was Spanish. It is not a success story in any simple sense; Proust’s research did not bring about any change in the manufacture of gunpowder (although Proust rather passionately argued for some reforms based on his experiments) and his work on gunpowder has been all but forgotten. Yet, on closer scrutiny of Proust’s career, I came to realize the significance of the gunpowder research for it. Although Proust is best known for his work in analytical chemistry (the enunciation of the law of definite proportions, a basic principle of chemical stoichiometry), he carried out research and taught on a wide range of chemical topics, many of them practical. Indeed, it was primarily through his practical chemistry that Proust was enabled to spend his mature and most creative years in Spain in the employ of the Spanish government. Of central importance were his activities as researcher, consultant, and teacher concerning munitions, carried on when he was professor of chemistry at the Royal Artillery School in Segovia (1785—98). Proust Dr. Mauskopf is professor of history at Duke University and, in 1988—89, was Edelstein International Fellow in the History of Chemical Sciences and Technologies at the Beckman Center for the History of Chemistry and the Edelstein Center, Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is currently researching scientific involvement in explo­ sives and munitions from the late 18th century through World War I. He thanks the secretarial staffs of the Duke Department of History and of the Beckman Center for their expert services; and Alex Roland, Joe Burchfield, and the Beckman Center “brown bag seminar” for their helpful, frank readings of various drafts of the article.© 1990 by the Society for the History of Technology. All rights reserved. 0040-165X/90/3103-0003$01.00 398 Chemistry and Cannon: J -L. Proust and Gunpowder Analysis 399 certainly did not regard his practical chemistry as any less important than his “pure” chemical analysis; as we shall see, he placed high value on his gunpowder research. In fact, this research was probably the most comprehensive and systematic study of gunpowder chemistry of its day. Moreover, it was part of a scientific research tradition devoted to the elucidation of the physics and chemistry of gunpowder that spanned the 18th century.1 Therefore, one of the objectives of this study is to present and analyze Proust’s scientific research on gunpowder for its intrinsic scientific interest and significance. That this work has been neglected is only partly due to its limited application to the munitions industry in its own day; it is also a part of the general neglect that the history of modern scientific investigations of munitions has suffered. The classical study by J. R. Partington has for its focus the medieval and early modern eras and is very sketchy about the history of gunpowder after 1700.2 To discover information about the later period, one is forced to turn to state-of-the-art treatises of the 19th century, with their inevitable “textbook” orientation to the history of science.3 This study and its companion in Osiris are intended to provide partial redress for the shortcomings in the history of the scientific study of munitions. There is also a second objective related to the state patronage of Proust as practical chemist: the examination of Proust’s gunpowder research as a species of the “useful knowledge” so prized by 18thcentury reformers, bureaucrats, and entrepreneurs. There has devel­ oped a vast literature on the issue of the relationship between science and industry encapsulated by this phrase. Much of it has focused on 'Seymour H...

Chemistry and Cannon: J.-L. Proust and Gunpowder Analysis

This is the story of an attempt by a major chemist of the late 18th century to develop useful knowledge for industry under government patronage. The chemist was Joseph-Louis Proust (1754-1826; known as Luis Jose Proust in Spain); the industry was munitions; the government was Spanish. It is not a success story in any simple sense; Proust's research did not bring about any change in the manufacture of gunpowder (although Proust rather passionately argued for some reforms based on his experiments) and his work on gunpowder has been all but forgotten. Yet, on closer scrutiny of Proust's career, I came to realize the significance of the gunpowder research for it. Although Proust is best known for his work in analytical chemistry (the enunciation of the law of definite proportions, a basic principle of chemical stoichiometry), he carried out research and taught on a wide range of chemical topics, many of them practical. Indeed, it was primarily through his practical chemistry that Proust was enabled to spend his mature and most creative years in Spain in the employ of the Spanish government. Of central importance were his activities as researcher, consultant, and teacher concerning munitions, carried on when he was professor of chemistry at the Royal Artillery School in Segovia (1785-98). Proust

CING 19 Plumstead Museum

Plumstead Museum's geological collections have suffered from years of neglect - they have only recently been removed from the tea chests in which they were heaped. Fortunately things are now improving. Collections present should include Simeon Priest, F.J. Epps, Royal Artillery Institution Museum, Busbridge, and Lessness (Abbey Woods) mammal material. Over the years a great deal seems to have been disposed of, and records are poor....

Presentation of an Institute Gold Medal to Mr Gordon Vernon Bayley

The President (Professor P. G. Moore): Gordon Bayley joined the Equitable as an actuarial student from Abingdon School in 1938; 41 years later he was to become Chairman of its Board of Governors. He served in the Royal Artillery in the later part of the last war, but with the temporary suspension of examinations from 1942 to 1945 it was not until 1946 that he qualified in what many have had me believe was a vintage year for qualification. He moved into consultancy in 1954 on becoming a partner in Duncan C. Fraser and then moved back to the world of the insurance companies a few years later by joining National Provident Institution in 1957; he became its chief executive in 1964 until his retirement earlier this year.

Electrocardiograph voltage in fit young men.

Several criteria exist for the diagnosis for left ventricular hypertrophy as shown by high voltage on the electrocardiograph. This study of 200 healthy young recruits to the Royal Artillery with normal blood pressure and normal left ventricular wall thickness as measured by echocardiography [corrected] shows that no matter which criteria are used the false positive rate is approximately 25%. High voltage is a normal phenomenon in young men and its use as a predictor of left ventricular hypertrophy is likely to be misleading in this age group.

Profile: Edward Sabine, polar scientist 1788–1883

Few paintings are better known to polar historians than Stephen Pearce's 1851 group portrait of the Arctic Council (Polar Record, 6 (43): 385). The Council consisted of experts consulted by the Admiralty for advice upon the search for Sir John Franklin and the crews of H.M.S. Erebus and Terror, which had been lost among the Canadian arctic islands since 1845. Of the ten persons represented all except one were either naval officers or civilians officially connected with the Navy. The exception was Edward Sabine, Colonel in the Royal Artillery. How did this landsman find his way into such a salty gathering?

An audiometric survey of Royal Artillery gun crews following "Operation Corporate".

An Audiometric Survey was carried out on two batteries of 4 Fd Regt RA (n-84) who were exposed to massive levels of impulse noise during "OP CORPORATE". A control group (n-30) was obtained from the remaining battery which did not serve in the Falklands, and it was matched well in age, service and job. They completed a questionnaire, were physically examined and had an audiogram using the MAICO M26 computer audiometer. Results were related to PULHEEMS standards and compared. No subject in the control group was classed below H2 but in those exposed, 17 were H3 or worse. This is significant (p 0.01 for 1 df) but the significance is attenuated medically and statistically. No significant correlation was found between type of ear defender and degree of protection. The survey showed that sufficient numbers had been affected to necessitate a full examination of all troops who fought in East Falkland.

Religion and medicine—a new partnership

Journal Article Religion and medicine—a new partnership Get access C. K. Hamel Cooke, MA, DPS C. K. Hamel Cooke, MA, DPS Rector of St Marylebone St Marylebone Parish Church, Marylebone Road, London, NW1 5LT, UK The Reverend Christopher Hamel Cooke studied theology at Oxford and Cuddesdon after war service in the Royal Corps of Signals and the Royal Artillery. He later read for the Diploma in Pastoral Studies at Birmingham University - an inter disciplinary course in Psychology, Sociology and Pastoral Counselling. Consequently he became Director of Coventry Samaritans and, later, adviser to the Bishop of St Alban's for Hospital Chaplaincies. He was appointed Rector of St Marylebone in January 1979 to further the work of Christian Healing and Counselling in the Parish Church of Harley Street and ‘Hospital Land’. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Science and Public Policy, Volume 10, Issue 3, June 1983, Pages 142–145, https://doi.org/10.1093/spp/10.3.142 Published: 01 June 1983

II. The Use of Inertial Techniques

Conventional survey methods for position and azimuth as practised in the Royal Artillery, although sufficiently accurate, were slow and expensive in manpower, while vehicle-navigation systems based on distance measurement by odometer and directional gyros were not sufficiently accurate. In the early 1970s therefore a General Staff Requirement was issued for an equipment designated PADS (Position and Azimuth Determining System) which would provide the necessary combination of speed and accuracy for gun batteries and observation posts, which may have to move frequently, by day or by night, in poor visibility. Precise knowledge of battery and target location, together with an azimuth reference, can help to achieve the first-salvo hit capability that is essential, not only from the point of view of surprise, but also to reduce risk of detection by shell-locating radar.

Reviews of Books

Abstract Special forces: Military Elites By Roger A. Beaumont (Robert Hale, London, 1976), £5.50, 251 pages. Conflict in Ireland: The Anglo-Irish Tradition By J. C. Beckett (Faber and Faber, London, 1977), £5.50, 159 pages. Conflict in Ireland: Revolutionary Underground: The Story of the Irish Republican Brotherhood 1858–1924 By Leon 'Broin (Gill and Macmillan, Dublin), £6.95, 245 pages. Development and control of arms: Developing the ICBM: A Study in Bureaucratic Politics By Edmund Beard (Columbia University Press, 1976), $18.75, 273 pages. Development and control of arms: International Arms Control—Issues and Agreements By the Stanford Arms Control Group, ed. John H. Barton and Lawrence D. Weiler (Stanford University Press, California, 1976), $18.50, paperback $12.95, 444 pages. Two air forces: The Royal Air Force: The Last Thirty Years By A. G. Trevenen James (Macdonald and Jane's, London, 1976), £5.95, 230 pages. Two air forces: The Soviet Air Force since 1918 By Alexander Boyd (Macdonald and Jane's, London, 1977), £6.50, 259 pages. Be prepared: Civil Defence—A Soviet View By P. T. Yegorov, I. A. Shlyakhov and N. I. Alabin (Moscow, 1970). (Translated and edited by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory under the auspices of the United States Air Force. Printed and distributed by the US Government Printing Office.) $3.45, 374 pages. The dark continent: Strategic Highways of Africa By Guy Arnold and Ruth Weiss (John Friedmann, London, 1977), casebound £5.95, paperback £3.50, 178 pages. The dark continent: The Secret War in the Sudan, 1955–72 By Edgar 'Ballance (Faber and Faber, London, 1977), £5.50, 160 pages. Two views of peace-keeping: War and Peace in the Middle East By General Odd Bull (Leo Cooper), £6.95, 205 pages. Two views of peace-keeping: Peace Soldiers—The Sociology of a United Nations Military Force By Charles C. Moskos, Jr (University of Chicago Press, 1976), £7.50, 171 pages. A wealth of experience: Bunch of Five By Frank Kitson (Faber & Faber, London, 1977), £5.95, 303 pages. A by-gone age: Britannia Rules: The Classic Age of Naval History 1793–1815 By C. Northcote Parkinson (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1977), £5.95, 200 pages. A. T. Mahan: The Letters and Papers of Alfred Thayer Mahan Edited by Robert Seager II and Doris D. Maguire (Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland, 1975; Patrick Stephens, Cambridge, 1976), £60, three volumes of 718, 745 and 873 pages respectively. Arthur Marder: Naval Warfare in the Twentieth Century—Essays in Honour of Arthur Marder Edited By Gerald Jordan (Croom Helm, London; Crane Russak, New York, 1977), £6.95, 243 pages. Ships World-wide in World War II: Allied Escort Ships of World War II By Peter Elliott, (Macdonald and Jane's, London, 1977), £15.00, 558 pages. Ships World-wide in World War II: Soviet Warships of the Second World War By Jurg Meister (Macdonald and Jane's, London, 1977), £7.95, 348 pages. Ships World-wide in World War II: Warships of the Imperial Japanese Navy 1869–1945 By Hansgeorg Jentschura, Dieter Jung and Peter Mickel. Translated by Antony Preston and J. D. Brown (Arms and Armour Press, London, 1977), £12.95, 280 pages. US Naval Strategy: The First South Pacific Campaign: Pacific Fleet Strategy December 1941–June 1942 By John B. Lundstrom (Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland, $14.50; Patrick Stephen Ltd, Cambridge, 1977), £10.95, 205 pages. 19th-century warfare: Austerlitz 1805 By Christopher Dutty (Seeley Service and Cooper, London, 1977), £5.95, 200 pages. 19th-century warfare: Wellington's Army in the Peninsula 1808–1814 By Michael Glover (David and Charles, Newton Abbot, 1977), £5.50, 180 pages. 19th-century warfare: The Red Soldier: Letters from the Zulu War, 1879 By Frank Emery (Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1977), £6.25, 288 pages. The Victorian era: The Army in Victorian Society By Gwyn Harries-Jenkins (Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, 1977), £5.50, 281 pages. Battle honours: Honour Titles of the Royal Artillery By Major-General B. P. Hughes (Royal Artillery Institution, Woolwich, London SE18, 1977), £5.95, 222 pages. Death to the Führer: The History of the German Resistance 1933–1945 By Peter Hoffmann (Macdonald and Jane's, London, 1977), £15, 800 pages. Collectors' items: The Two World Wars. A Guide to Manuscript Collections in the United Kingdom By S. L. Mayer and W. J. Koenig (Bowker Publishing Co), £2.50, 317 pages. Collectors' items: A Bibliographical Guide to the Two World Wars By Gwyn M. Bayliss (Bowker), £15.00, 578 pages. Collectors' items: World War II: An Account of its Documents Ed. James E. 'Neill and Robert W. Kraushopf (Howard University Press, Washington, DC), £15.00. Collectors' items: A Subject Bibliography of the Second World War: Books in English 1939–1974 By A. G. S. Enser (Andre Deutsch), £11.95, 592 pages.

Comparative wind measurements in the lower thermosphere using rocket trail and meteor radar techniques

In September 1973 a comparison of neutral wind measuring techniques for the lower thermosphere was made from the Western Isles off the West coast of Scotland using a mobile meteor radar system situated at Stornoway, Lewis, and two Petrel rockets, carrying Tri-methyl-aluminium (TMA) trail experiments, launched from the Royal Artillery Range at South Uist. The two sets of wind measurements are, in general, strongly correlated (0.5 < r < 0.8), especially between about 85 and 105 km. However, possibly due to differences between the statistical approach of volume sampling of the meteor method and the tracer technique of the TMA chemical release method, there were much poorer correlations between the TMA data and meteor data acquired some distance (> 100 km) and some time (> 15 min) from the TMA trail. Some of the apparent temporal and spatial structure may be inferred to be due to internal atmospheric gravity waves; however, the scale sizes necessary to explain the discrepancies are much smaller (100 km, 15 min) than those inferred independently from meteor radar or chemical release measurements (1000 km, 1–2 hr).

People

Mr W. S. Kerr, who until his retirement in 1969 was managing director of Pinchin Johnson, died on Saturday, December 28 aged 70. Mr Kerr joined Pinchin Johnson and Associates in 1934 as a senior industrial paint representative in Scotland. He enlisted in the Royal Artillery at the beginning of the last war and attained the rank of staff captain. Almost immediately after the war he was appointed Pinchin Johnson's Scottish manager.

Reviews of Books

Abstract Pacific strategy?: Australia in the Nuclear Age: National Defence and National Development By Ian Bellany (Sydney University Press) £4.20 Pacific politics: National Security and International Trusteeship in the Pacific Symposium from the United States Naval War College, edited by W. R. Louis, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis (Patrick Shepherd) £5.80 Nuclear theft: Preventing Nuclear Theft: Guidelines for Industry and Government Ed. by Robert B. Leachman and Phillip Althoff (Praeger) £8.25 Nuclear and general: Weapons Technology and Arms Control By W. F. Biddle (Pall Mall Press) £8.50 The Soviet Legal System and Arms Inspection: A Case Study in Policy Implementation By Z. L. Zile, Robert Sharlet and Jean C. Love (Pall Mall) £8.50 Soviet Decision-Making for Defence. A Critique of U.S. Perspectives on the Arms Race By Matthew P. Gallagher and Karl F. Spielmann Jr. (Praeger Special Study, Pall Mall Press) £5.25 The Search for Security: A Report of a working party appointed by the Dept. of International Affairs of the British Council of Churches and the Conference of British Missionary Societies (SCM Press) 90p Prospects of Violence: Protest and the Urban Guerrilla By Richard Clutterbuck (Cassell) £3.75 … and peace: The Causes of War By Geoffrey Blainey (Macmillan) £4.95 A Field Survey: British Military Intelligence By Jock Haswell (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) £4.85 Commanders—favoured: Alex By Nigel Nicolson (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) £3.95 … and favourite: Sir John Monash By A. J. Smithers (Leo Cooper) £4.25 Approach: The Management of Britain's External Relations Ed. by Robert Boardman and A. J. R. Groom (Macmillan) £5.95 … or departure?: British Defence Policy East of Suez 1947–1968 By Phillip Darby (Oxford University Press for the Royal Institute of International Affairs) £6.50 World War II: Blood, Toil, Tears and Sweat: The War History from Dunkirk to Alamein, based on War Cabinet papers of 1940 to 1942 By Roger Parkinson (Hart-Davis MacGibbon) £4.25 Relations relative: The Lion and the Eagle By Basil Collier (Macdonald) £5.00 Blockade, Berlin and the Cold War By Eric Morris (Hamish Hamilton) £3.95 Burma: Distinctly I Remember: A Personal Story of Burma By Harold Braund. Foreword by Brigadier Sir Bernard Fergusson (Wren) £3.95 … and Sittang: Sittang: The Last Battle By Louis Allen (Macdonald) £3.50 The Zulu War By David Clammer (David & Charles) £3.95 The War of 1812 By John K. Mahon (University of Florida Press) $12.50 The Voortrekkers By Johannes Meintjes (Cassell) £3.00 The East India Company and Army Reform, 1783–1798 By Raymond Callahan (Harvard University Press: Oxford Press, London) £5.50 Battles in focus: Borodino and the War of 1812 By Christopher Duffy (Seeley Service) £2.75 At War with the Bolsheviks By Robert Jackson (Tom Stacey) £3.40 Russian and Soviet Imperialism By E. J. Foote (Foreign Affairs Publishing Co) £3.00 People in compartments: The Fellow-Travellers: A Postscript to the Enlightenment By David Caute (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) £5.75 Wargames at sea: British Admirals of the Eighteenth Century—Tactics in Battle By Captain John Creswell RN (retd) (Allen & Unwin) £4.80 Rights and wrongs: Britain's Aircraft Industry. What went Right? What went Wrong? By Arthur Reed (Dent) £2.95 Armstrong-Whitworth Aircraft Since 1913 By Oliver Tapper (Putnam) £6.00 History of the Indian Regiment of Artillery By Major-General D. K. Palit (Leo Cooper Ltd) £4.00 British Artillery Weapons and Ammunition, 1914–1918 By I. V. Hogg and L. F. Thurston (Ian Allan) £6.50 Battery Records of the Royal Artillery, 1859–77, Volume II By Lt.-Col. M. E. S. Laws, OBE, MC, RA (Retd), FRHistS (Royal Artillery Institution—Limited edition 100 copies only) £12 Ceremony plus: The Coldstream Guards 1946–70 By Richard Crichton £2.25 Horse and tank: Famous Tank Battles By Robert J. Icks (Profile) £4.25 The Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry 1907–1967 By Brigadier J. R. I. Platt (Garnstone Press) £4.90

Gunners at War: A Tactical Study of the Royal Artillery in the Twentieth Century.

Gunners at War: A Tactical Study of the Royal Artillery in the Twentieth Century.

The State of Affairs in the Army

The Purpose of Army light aircraft, fixed-wing and helicopter, is to help ground units to carry out their normal tactical task more effectively. Therefore the main roles are: Reconnaissance.Fire support.Exercise of command.Tactical movement.Logistic support.For special-to-arm tasks, light helicopters are integrated into certain major units of the Royal Armoured Corps, Royal Artillery, Royal Engineers, Royal Signals and Infantry. The aircraft must be capable of living in the field and be easy to maintain. Aircraft strengths in these units vary from six in an air squadron of the Royal Armoured Corps, to three in an air platoon in an infantry battalion.

Rocket Soundings of the Upper Atmosphere

DURING the first World Geophysical Interval of the IQSY, measurements of temperature and winds were made at heights up to 60 km, using the new meteorological rocket Skua, launched from the Royal Artillery Guided Weapons Range at South Uist in the Outer Hebrides (57.3° N., 7.4° W.). The results of these measurements are shown in Figs. 1 and 2. By sheer good fortune these first four ascents spanned a ‘stratospheric warming’. Stratospheric warmings and coolings of this type are recorded by balloon ascents from time to time during the early months of most years, but this may be the first series of measurements showing the rapid growth and decay of a warming at levels above 35 km.

For Members Only

VIGNETTE LXXIV. William Thomas Hobdell Jackson, Executive Council member, 1960-63, is a native of Sheffield, England. His B.A. degree (1935) is from Sheffield University with First Class honors in the classics. His M.A. (1938) is from the same university. He was a Captain, Royal Artillery, General Staff, in the British Army 1940-46, and emigrated to the United States in 1948. He taught German at the Univ. of Washington, 1948-50, where he took his Ph.D. in Germanics in 1951. He taught for two years at Coe College, then came to Columbia in 1952, where he has been Chairman of the Department of Germanic Languages since 1961. There he has also been chairman of the University Seminar in Medieval Studies, 1955-62, editor of the Germanic Review since 1954, and editor of the Columbia Records of Civilization since 1962. We first met him dining a Conference of Editors of Learned Journals in 1956 and were impressed with his ability to share his editorial experience with his compeers, yet maintain his individual point of view. He has been a Guggenheim Fellow (1958–59), a recipient of of an ACLS grant (1958), and has been tapped as visiting professor at Chicago, Princeton, and Rutgers. His teaching fields are Comparative Literature of the Middle Ages (for the Columbia English Department), Medieval Latin, Paleography, and the History of the German Language. He drives an English car (surprise, surprise) and is fond of horseback-riding, sailing, and boxing. He relaxes over fine wines (of which he is a connoisseur) and fine cheeses. His summer habitat is his place at Quonochontaug, Rhode Island, perched upon a sandbar between a salt pond and the ocean.

History of the Royal Artillery Band, 1762-1953

History of the Royal Artillery Band, 1762-1953

George Martin Lees, 1898 - 1955

George Martin Lees, son of George Murray Lees of Edinburgh, was born at Dundalk, County Louth, Ireland, on 16 April 1898. He was educated at St Andrews College, Dublin (1906-1915) and immediately thereafter attended the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, in preparation for taking part in the first world war, then in progress. From Woolwich he was commissioned in the Royal Artillery, in which he served in France. He soon transferred to the Royal Flying Corps and won the M.C. There followed a tour of duty as a flying instructor in Egypt, where he gained his first experience of the Middle East, a region on which he was later to become the leading geological authority. From Egypt he moved to Mesopotamia (now Iraq) and saw further active service in air operations, for which he was awarded the D.F.C. He took part in the capture of Kirkuk from the Turks and made a forced landing behind the Turkish lines in what is now the great Kirkuk oilfield, regaining the British lines with difficulty on foot.

REVIEWS OF BOOKS

REVIEWS OF BOOKS Get access History of the Royal Artillery Band: 1762–1953. By Henry George Farmer. pp. 485. ( Royal Artillery Institution, London, 1954.) H. C. H. H. C. H. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Music and Letters, Volume XXXVI, Issue 3, July 1955, Pages 275–276, https://doi.org/10.1093/ml/XXXVI.3.275 Published: 01 July 1955