Illustration: PREPARING LEAD FOR BULLETS.
The sizes of howitzers and mortars are expressed by the diameter
of the shell they are intended to throw; the largest of which at
present in general use is the “thirteen-inch.” This immense shell
when charged weighs nearly 200 pounds. These shells or “bombs” as
they were formerly called, are cast hollow (fig. 7), with a small
opening into which a “fuze” or wooden tube filled with combustible
matter is inserted; they are charged with gunpowder, which on being
ignited by the fuze burning down to it, explodes and bursts the
shell into fragments, which fly about with terrible force. What are
called “shrapnel-shells,” are those shells which are filled with both
gunpowder and leaden bullets, to be scattered about by the explosion.
Case-shot is a name given to a packet of bullets inclosed in a tin
canister and used as a projectile, the case bursts and the bullets
are scattered. Grape-shot is the name given to a collection of nine
iron balls packed up so as to be used as one. Hand-grenades are small
shells of about three pounds’ weight, to be cast by hand. Bullets for
the ordinary musket are simple balls of lead, in some cases cast six
at a time in moulds (fig. 8), and coming out in one piece as seen at
fig. 9, which are afterwards separated and finished off by a sort of
nippers as seen in fig. 10; but for the most part musket and rifle
bullets are formed by compression. The bullets for the Minié rifle
are made by machinery; they are of a conical form, with a hollow at
the base into which a small plug of box wood is fitted, this end
being towards the powder receives the whole force of the explosion,
the effect of which is to drive in the plug and open out the bullet,
thus fitting it tightly into the grooves of the rifle and preventing
any loss of power by the escape of the gases resulting from the
combustion of the powder. The machine for making these bullets is
shown at fig. 11. The following is an account of it, taken from the
“Times”:--
“Like all the machines here, these are perfectly automatic. Coils of
solid leaden piping are hung in it, which it unwinds, cuts to the
required length, stamps with steel dies into the form of a Minié
bullet, and then conveys away into boxes. Each machine has four dies,
which cut, stamp, and pass into boxes thirty-six bullets per minute,
giving for each machine an average of 7,000 per hour. There are four
of such machines, which thus each day turn out 300,000 Minié bullets;
but, of course, as they never tire, the number produced can at any
time be doubled by leaving them to work all night. They are so simple
in their construction that one man could easily attend to them all.
It was a curious contrast to the silent rapidity with which these
deadly messengers were formed, to watch a number of men and boys
working near them casting round musket-balls for Shrapnel shells,
in the old style of hand work. By this method two persons can only
rough-cast seven cwt. of bullets per day, or about 12,500, which it
takes two persons another day to trim. Thus, four hands, with a great
consumption of fuel to keep the lead always melted can only produce
6,000 bullets per day or 1,000 less than each machine produces in one
hour.”