A SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF 

 PROPELLANTS 1 



BY SIR ANDREW NOBLE, D. Sc., F. R. S. 



I PURPOSE, in this paper, to give a sketch of the history 

 of propellants, pointing out how gunpowder for many 

 centuries was the sole propellant employed, and which 

 remained during these centuries with the mode of manu- 

 facture unimproved, while, even by very great men, the 

 wildest and most divergent ideas were entertained as to the 

 pressures developed by its explosion, and the energy which 

 it was possible to realize. 



"The origin of gunpowder is, I am afraid, lost in remote 

 antiquity. It was supposed to have been known, though 

 not as a propellant, in China before the Christian era, but 

 it was certainly known to Roger Bacon about 12.G5, who 

 also was the first to suggest its use for military purposes. 

 Its first employment in war was in the fourteenth century, 

 and its composition and mode of manufacture during 

 many centuries seem to have undergone but little change 

 or improvement. 



In England gunpowder consisted of 75 per cent, of 

 saltpeter, 15 per cent, of carbon, and 10 per cent, of 

 sulphur, while in France and some other countries the 

 carbon and sulphur were in equal proportions, viz., about 

 12.5 per cent. 



These differences in proportions affected but slightly the 

 energies and pressures developed by fired gunpowder, but 

 I do not know any physical fact with regard to which such 



1 Abstract of a paper read before the Institution of Engineers and 

 Shipbuilders in Scotland, and published in the Scientific American 

 Supplement, September 11, 1909. 



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