Daily Davenport Gazette

Davenport, Monday, April 16, 1855.

A Word about "Shell."

As our readers frequently meet with the word "shell," in the perusal of the operations of the Quixotic individuals at the Crimea, perhaps a few words explanatory of the term may not be amiss. The ordinary shell, or bomb-shell, is a hollow cast iron globe filled with gunpowder and ignited by means of a fuse. Sometimes these globes are filled with balls or bullets and in the interstices is poured gunpowder, they are then termed shrapnels or spherical case-shot. A canister similar to those used for preserving fruit constructed of sheet iron and filled with bullets. This, although strong, is not of sufficient strength to withstand the explosive force of gunpowder, consequently when it issues from the mouth of the cannon it explodes and scatters the bullets. This is the famed canister-shot. Formerly bombs were projected from short cannon termed mortars, and the fuse was lighted before the shell was inserted in the instrument—sometimes a perilous undertaking—latterly they are fired from cannon and ignited by the blast of the gun. Upon the length of the fuse depends the effect produced by the bomb. If too short, the shell explodes before it reaches its destination; if too long, it stands an equal chance of failing in its mission. Consequently the regulation of the fuse is a matter of skill and calculation and requires experience. Many efforts have been made within a few years to effect the ignition of shells on the principle of the percussion cap, but as yet without avail. The implements of war, through man's inventive genius, are becoming so destructive that going to battle is more hazardous than in the days of our ancestors.