The Sun.
London, England, 1855-12-07 00:00:00

EAST INDIA AND CHINA MAILS.

SOUTHAMPTON, DEC. 6.
The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation
Company's steam-ship Euxiney Captain Joy,
reached Southampton this day, at 8 p.m., with
mails and dates from the following places :
Alexandria, Nov. 21 ; Malta, 26 ; and Gibraltar,
Dec. 1. She brings 38 passengers, amongst whom
there is no• ono of particular importance.
On her passage home the Euxine experienced fine
weather in the Mediterranean, N.E. winds along
the coasts of Spain and Portugal, a heavy N. W.
gale across the Bay of Biscay and up the Channel.
The freight of the Euxine consists of 10 packages
of tea (samples), 73 ditto elephants' teeth, 20 cases
of parcels, 3 cases of opium, 614 bales and 42 cases
of silk, 6 bales of flax, 20 bales of wool, 41 barrels
of dates, 1 package of sculpture, 1 case of shawls,
166 barrels and 37 packages of gum, 2 cases of
moss stones, and 3 cases of sundries.
H.M. Ships at Malta, Nov. 26.—Hibernia,
London, Rodney, Wasp, Diamond, and Niger
and U.S. corvette Constitution. Steam Transports
—Nos. 17, 87, 88, 175, 104, and 213. Sailing
ditto—Edeudale, No. 10 ; Northfieet, No. 33.
H.M. Ships at Gibraltar, Dec. I.—Hill and
Prometheus ; steam' transports, 215 ; and the
French steamer E uph rate.

THE FATAL EXPLOSIO.V IN THE
ARSENAL AT WOOLWICH.

Yesterday Mr. Carttar, the coroner for Kent, and a
jury held an inquest at the Gun Tavern, in Woolwich,
on the bodies of Henry Stephen Laugham, John Kirwan,
and James William Wallace, who died from injuries of
the most painful and shocking description, sustained by
them in a terrific explosion iu a rocket factory on the
morning of Monday last in the Royal Arsenal at Wool-
wich. Wallace had died during the preceding night,
thus adding another victim to the results of the cala-
mity.

Previous to the necessary witnesses being called, the
coroner and jury proceeded to the Arsenal to inspect
the scene of the explosion, which exhibited striking evi-
dence of the havoc and destruction which had been pro-
duced. The explosion originated in a temporary wooden
building, of a single floor on the ground, and detached,
in which rockets, manufactured upon the plan of Mr.
Hale, were undergoing a finishing process. That part
of the Arsenal, forming a portion of the Laboratory, is
under the control of Capt. Boxer, 41 near relative of the
late distinguished admiral of that name, but it is superin-
tended immediately by Mr. Tozer and Mr. Pickering,
subordinate officers. C intiguous to that building was
another exactly simi"ar, in which a diffurent part of the
process was performed. Both of them contained consi-
derable quantities of most inflammable and explosive
rnater;als which imparted to the vocation of the arti-
sans employed there a high degree of hazard, in spite
of the manifold precautions under which it was pursued.
The explosion, after blowing to atoms the house in
which it originated, communicated itself to the adjacent
building, and razed it to the ground in almost a
single moment. A series of explosions followed the ori-
ginal one in quick succession until the combustible ma-
terials had been exhausted, spreading terror and alarm
throughout the neighbourhood, and leaving only a heap
of ruins to indicate the scene of the effects of the casu-
alty.

Mr. C. F. Stanton, surgeon to the Royal Artillery at
Woolwich, deposed that he was on duty at the Arsenal on
Monday morning, between 11 and 12, and saw a num-
ber of men brought into the hospital on stretchers, all
more or less burnt, and some of them with shattered and
broken limbs. The right leg of Kirwan, one of the de-
ceased, was much shattered and crushed up to the knee,
and charred up the thigh. He was quite sensible, but
very much depressed in spirits. After a consultation
with two other of the hospital surgeons, it was deemed
advisable to amputate the shattered limb, with the
view of stopping the hn'norrhage, of which of itzelf
he would have certainly died in a short time. Witness
performed the operation, but the patient died imme-
diately afterwards. He had a number of serious burns
about his person, and there could be no doubt that he
died from the injuries he received. Langharn, another
of the deceased, was also seriously injured. He had a
fracture of the left elbow joint, and was severely burnt
over the body and arms. Ha lingered until the even-
ing, and died at half-past 10, after undergoing the most
horrible sufferings. The severity of his injuries, espe-
cially the shock given to his nervous system, was no
doubt the cause of his death.
Mr. G. L. Dods, a staff surgeon, under whose care the
deceased Wallace had been placed, proved that he was
suffering from extensive and severe burns about the
head, arms, and body, more particularly the abdomen
and legs. Every care and attention was paid to him,
but he died that (yesterday) morning) at three o'clock.
William Miller, foreman of the "mealing " shed, the
continuous building to that in which the explosion origi-
nated, stated that the process of mealing was the rub-
bing of gun-powder down to a fine consistency, and
then sifting it. Seven men besides himself were em-
ployed in the mealing shed, Kirwan, the deceased, being
one. There were at the time of the explosion about
1001 b. of gunpowder in the shed, some of which was in
sieve., some on an open table, and some in cases
lined with copper, but open at the top. 171 b. of gun-
powder were allowed to each man for a day's work,
but that was not all brought into the shed at one
time. About 20 minutes past 11 on Monday morn- ,
ing the men under him were at their usual work.
To avoid accidents it was an imperative regulation
that no one should enter the mealing shed with
his shoes or boots on, and he was in the act of putting
his boots on, after coming out of the shed, when the ex-
plosion took place in the adjoining rocket shed. He
was completely buried for some time among the broken
wood and materials, but eventually taken out with com-
paratively little injury. Just before the explosion be
noticed the door rocket shed open. Besides the de-
ceased Kirwan, four of the men under witness were
injured more or less, and were now in the hospital. He
was quite certain the explosion took place in the rocke
shed.

At this stage of the proceedings a rocket manufac-
tured in the building which exploded was produced.
It was made of iron, about 18 inches in length,
three inches in diameter, and hollow. After being
filled with an inflammable composition, compressed
into it by a hydraulic machine until it becomes
a solid mass, a round iron cap is rivetted on one
end of it, which cap serves the purpose of a shell in the
process of explosion. The other end, called the nose, is
perforated with five small boles, through which the fire
issues when the rocket explodes, and gives it a rotary
motion in its flight. These small boles are filled with
putty during the by Iraulic process, to prevent the com-
position oozing through them ; and at a subsequent
stage of the manufacture the putty is picked out of the
holes again by means of a steel gimlet, or rymer, re-
sembling a cbeesetaster. Behind the putty there is
always a coating of the composition left about a quarter
of an inch thick, which requires to be drilled through,
and it ia precisely that part of the operation which is
pregnant with danger, and which in all probability caused
the explosion on Monday. In addition to that, a small
portion of the composition is bored, or scooped out,
throughout the whole length of the rocket, after being
submitted to the hydraulic pressure, in order that the
projectile, when used in warfare, shall explode all at once,
and with complete effect, by the fire which is applied to
it running along the interstice, and this boring process
is also accompanied with considerable hazard. The
nose of the rocket is finally tied over with canvass and
painted, and then stored in the magazine ready for use.
James Wallace expressed a wish to repeat a statement
made by his son, one of the deceased, just before his
death, in reference to the accident, but the coroner hav-
ing elicited from the father that the statement was not
made by his son under any belief or conviction that he
was approaching his death refused to receive it, on the
ground that it could not be regarded in the light of a
dying ,declaration, and was therefore not adreiesible in
evidence.

Thomas Harris, a labourer in the Laboratory at the
Arsenal, deposed that the deceased Langton), who was
the foreman of the rocket shed that exploded, occasion-
ally asked bins in his (Langham's) absence to step into
the shed to see that all was going on well, and that he
was there for that purpose on Friday last, when he found
Wallace, the deceased, and a man named Wheelwright,
now in the hospital, engaged in the finishing process,
Wallace, he thought, being occupied in painting rockets,
and Wheelwright in picking the putty out of the holes
in the nose of each, and afterwards capping it with
canvass. Witness proceeded to describe in detail the
process of finishing the rockets in the way related
above. In reply to a juryman, he said he could not sly
how many rockets were in the shed at the time of the
explosion, but 17 had been taken away that morning
br fore :he
He never z..e.,s eopp-r 1.,14
and composition out of the holes. Tile iyiners were al-
ways made of steel. Both copper and brass bad been
tried fir the purpose, but they were not found to answer

so well as steel. Wallace and Wheelwright between
them would finish about 17 rockets daily. He had known
the steel rytners used for about three or four months.
The coroner and jury then proceeded to the hoF..pital
to examine Wheelwright, but it was found that it was
not cafe t 9 subject him to a formal examination in his
present critic 1 state. The coroner and the foreman,
however, were admitted into his room, and to them he
made a statement to the effect that a steel rytner was
used constantly for removing the putty, and after that a
steel bradawl for perforating the composition, which was
of a nature excessively hard. On the morning of the
accident he was asint, a bradawl in that way on a rocket
which he held, when the rocket caught firs and flew out
of his band. Wallace, the deceased, was at that moment
engaged by his side in sifting a quantity of the composi-
tion which had been scooped out of rockets during the
finishing process, to be used afresh for that purpose on
a subsequent occasion. He could not say whether
the explosion originated among the gunpowder which
Wallace was sifting, or is the rocket on which he
(Wheelwright) was operating. The steel instruments
used in the manufacture were supplied to the men by
their foreman, Langhaw, who procured them from the
Laboratory of the Arsenal.

Mr. Toler, of Shooter's-hill, superintendent of compo-
sitions in the Royal Laboratory at Woolwich, in reply
to the coroner, stated that be had not been previou ly
aware that a bradawl was used in drilling the holes
through the composition at the nose of the rockets. His
impression always was that the rymer, - or gimlet, was
invariably employed for that purpose.
The inquest was then adjourned to a future day for
the production of evidence which was not now forth-
coining.