646 Notes. 



had spent very large sums on his experiments, which much impoverished 

 his family. Born 1761, son of Zechariah Shrapnel, the owner of a large 

 cloth mill at 'Bradford, he entered the Koyal Artillery in 1779, and 

 served with the Duke of York in Flanders. His " Spherical Case Shot," 

 as it was at first called, was adopted by the British Army in 1802 and the 

 action of the shell was unknown outside England until 1834. He died 

 March 13th, 1842, and was buried at Bradford-on-Avon. On the inner 

 side of the gate the pillars bear a stone shield on which is the following 

 inscription: — "Invented by General Shrapnel 1785. Battles won by 

 using Shrapnel Shell, Battle at Waterloo, Vimiera, Talavera, Maida, 

 Scilla Castle, Busaco, Pamplona, Table Bay, Copenhagen, Monte Video, 

 Ghuzneemedansee, Khyber Pass, Burmese War, Tsage, Bella Formosa, 

 San Sebastian, Bidasoa, Kioze, With the Sikhs, Crimean War, Indian 

 Mutiny, and Abyssinian War." The General's son, Henry Scrope 

 Shrapnel, pressed the claims of the family upon the War Office for 

 years, but only succeeded in obtaining an authoritative declaration 

 that the shell should bear the name of its inventor, which it still does 

 in all countries. He was eventually obliged to sell Midway Manor and 

 emigrate. On a wall of the Manor House is carved the crest which 

 Gen. Shrapnel devised for himself, "a bomb fired," i.e., a spherical 

 shrapnel shell bursting. The Field, October 24th, 1914, had a further 

 letter on the subject with photo illustrations of a portrait of Lt.-Gen. 

 H. Shrapnel from an oil painting by F. Arrowsmith, 1817, in the R.A. 

 Institution, and of the mural memorial tablet to the Shrapnel 

 family in Bradford-on-Avon Church. 



The Gold Ornaments in Devizes Museum. The whole 



of the gold ornaments of the Bronze Age from Wiltshire barrows 

 which have hitherto been exhibited in the cases at the Museum have 

 now been accurately reproduced in electrotype by Mr. W. H. Young, 

 of the Ashmolean Museum. These electrotype copies are now exhibited 

 in the place of the originals, which have been withdrawn from the 

 cases, as in view of recent thefts from museums, it was thought that 

 they ought not to be exposed to the risk of being lost. The intrinsic 

 value of the gold is of course very small owing to its thinness, but 

 their appearance might tempt a thief, and from an archaeological point 

 of view they are of the very highest importance. 



