THE PRODUCTION OF EXPLOSIVES 139 



phenylsulphide, and both sides employed in drop bombs the 

 liquid nitrogen peroxide explosives indicated by Berthelot in 

 1 88 r and well developed by Turpin about that time and styled 

 by him ponclastites. Also chlorinated nitrosubstitution com- 

 pounds, which had been rejected before the war because of the 

 poisonous nature of their explosion products, were tested out 

 but not adopted for use. 



A multitude of explosive mixtures were proposed and some 

 of them were used. The only new one which attained marked 

 prominence and large use was amatol, which was a mixture 

 of TNT with ammonium nitrate. . By its aid the enormous de- 

 mand for bursting charges was met. Its production, however, 

 involved no new idea, for joveite was a similar mixture of 

 nitrosubstitution compounds and ammonium nitrate. Joveite 

 was the explosive which was tested at the Indian Head Prov- 

 ing Ground under Captain Sampson in 1897 and which Admiral 

 Sampson sought in vain for loading the shells of his fleet prior 

 to its encounter with Cervera's fleet. It may be recalled that 

 in the Indian Head tests Commander Couden fired armor 

 piercing shell charged with 8.25 pounds of joveite through 

 14.5 inches of the harveyized armor of the U. S. S. Kentucky 

 and that the shell exploded after complete perforation of the 

 armor. This was the first time in history that such a result 

 was attained and it demonstrated the practicability and effi- 

 ciency of these nitrosubstitution compound-metallic nitrate 

 mixtures for shell charges. 



The real problems that had to be solved after the explosives 

 to be used had been selected were those pertaining to large 

 scale production at high speed and the obtaining of sufficient 

 supplies of raw material. These materials were mainly cotton 

 and glycerine for smokeless powder, phenol for picric acid, tolu- 

 ene for TNT, nitric and sulphuric acids with which to nitrate 

 each of the foregoing, ammonium nitrate, alcohol and mercury ; 

 but many other substances playing subordinate parts, as puri- 

 fying or stabilizing agents and the like, though used in much 

 less quantities than the foregoing, were nevertheless called for 



