The Fulton County news. [volume] (McConnellsburg, Pa.) 1899-current, 1900-03-29
THE MARvELs OF snRApNEL.
The Most Terrible Agency OF War.

death III use to-day was as fa-
miliar to our grandfathers and
great-grandfathers in the earli-
est years of the century as to us.
Machine guns, such as the
Maxim and Gatling, each pour
ing forth a very deluge of bullets
at the rate of several hundreds a
minute, and moving down the
enemy's ranks as scythe mows
down grass, are very terrible
weapons; but for sheer destruct-
iveness and the power to demor
alize the enemy they must yield
precedence to the shrapnel shells,
within whose Operative area"
nothing can live.
These deadly proiectiles were
invented two years before Ira
falgar by Colonel Shrapnel, a
British officer; but, as is the case
with so many inventions, the orig
inal shrapnel shell was of very
primitive construction. 1t con-
sisted of spherical shell, filed
with bullets and bursting
charge of gunpowder; but, as it
had a trick of exploding at the
wrong time, and was only reliable
in it's uncertainty, it was often a
source of as much danger to
friends as to enemies.
1t is, however, from this crude
projectile that the wonderful
shell of to-day has been evolved.
The modern shrapnel shell con-
sists of three parts: the base, the
head, and the tube which runs
through it's body. The explosive
charge is placed in the base of
the shell; and on a kind of dia-
phragm placed over this charge
two or three hundred bullets
rest, being kept in position by
resin, which is melted and poured
over them.
Running from the base to the
point of the shell is q tube filed
with powder to connect the eX-
plosive charge in the base with
the fuse which is placed in the
head of the shell.
Before firing the shell, the dis
tance of the enemy is calculated
and the fuse is cut down to such
length that the shell will eX-
plode at the precise fraction of a
second when it can inhict most
damage. In other words, the
fuse must be of such a length
that the charge will be exploded
when the shell is about 20 feet
above and $50 feet in front of the
enemy.
The fuse is ignited by the act
of firing; and as shell screams
through the air at the rate OF 800
to /, 600 miles an hour, it burns
rapidly until, just as it is on the
point of striking the enemy bod
lily, the charge at the base of the
shell is ignited, and with terrif-
ic explosion the shell is shattered,
pouring down it's deadly hail of a
quarter of a thousand bullets ov-
er an area of about 500 square
feet The bullets are so evenly
distributed from this terrible
"spray diffuser" that, if $50 men
were massed within this area,
every man would either be killed
or dangerously wounded.
In some recent experiments
with shrapnel, shells were fired
at a range of a mile and a half at
wooden target | inch thick.
Fifty yards behind this target
screens were placed to represent
a battalion of infantry in column
of companies. The shells were
exploded on contact with the tar
get, and the number of hits on
the screen were counted. From
one shell 100 hits were scored,
each hit in all probability repre-
senting mans life; second
shell no fewer than 220 out of it's
$50 bullets found on the screen.
Thus a single shrapnel well
aimed is capable of doing terrible
execution on an enemy; but their
destructiveness only becomes APP
parent when we consider the ra-
pidity with which they can be