The Chemistry of Powder and Explosives - Sciencemadness Dot Org

248 NITRIC ESTERS
dried at a low temperature. The product was brittle at low temperatures,
could be molded like jalap resin at slightly elevated
ones, was semi-fluid at 100°, and at high temperatures gave off
red fumes. When heated more strongly, it deflagrated suddenly
and with violence. Schonbein also experimented with other organic
substances, and states that in experiments carried out
during December, 1845, and the first few months of 1846 he discovered,
one after another, all those substances about which so
much had lately been said in the French Academy. In March he
sent specimens of the new compounds, among them guncotton, to
several of his friends, notably, Faraday, Herschel, and Grove.
About the middle of April, 1846, Schonbein went to Wiirttemberg
where he carried out experiments with guncotton at the
arsenal at Ludwigsburg in the presence of artillery officers and
at Stuttgart in the presence of the king. During May, June, and
July he experimented at Basel with small amis, mortars, and
cannon. On July 28 he fired for the first time a cannon which
was loaded with guncotton and with a projectile. Shortly afterward
he used guncotton to blast rocks at Istein in the Grand
Duchy of Baden and to blow up some old walls in Basel.
In the middle of August Schonbein received news from Professor
Bottger of Frankfort-on-the-Main that he too had succeeded
in preparing guncotton, and the names of the two men soon
became associated in connection with the discovery and utilization
of the material. There were, moreover, several other chemists
who at about the same time, or within a few months, also worked
out methods of preparing it. In a letter 80 to Schonbein dated
November 18, 1846, Berzelius congratulated him on the discovery
as interesting as it was important, and wrote, "Since Professor
Otto of Brunswick made known a method of preparing the guncotton,
this discovery has perhaps occupied a greater number of
inquisitive persons than any other chemical discovery ever did.
I have likewise engaged in experiments upon it."
In August Schonbein went to England where, with the help
of the engineer Richard Taylor of Falmouth, he carried out
experiments with guncotton in the mines of Cornwall. He also
demonstrated his material successfully with small arms and with
artillery at Woolwich, at Portsmouth, and before the British
80 MacDonald, op. cit., pp. 47, 48.