Observations on the
Theory and Practice of
SHRAPNEL SHELLS
Major R. S. Seton
Printed by J. A. Ballantyne, Edinburgh, 1854
The very rare 1854 edition of Major R. S. Seton's Observations on the Theory and Practice of Shrapnel Shells, or Spherical Case-Shot. Privately printed by J. A. Ballantyne and published in 1854, the book is a detailed examination of the theoretical and practical aspects of the design, testing, and use of shrapnel shells, which at the time of publication was a significant, and controversial, military innovation. Although introduced during the Napoleonic Wars, by the mid 19th century the effectiveness of shrapnel as an artillery weapon was still regarded as unproven. By the time of the First World War millions of shrapnel shells would be used in trench warfare on the Western Front.
Major Richard Sommer Seton: served in India as an officer with the Madras Artillery of the East India Company's army from 1813. He was promoted to Captain in 1825, Major in 1838, and was given the honorary rank of Lt-Colonel in 1854. The Madras Artillery was part of the Madras Army, which was one of the three presidential armies of the British East India Company. It was formed in 1748 and its officers were European. In 1861, the East India Company's army was amalgamated with the British Army, and its artillery units were incorporated into the Royal Artillery.
Richard Seton was a very experienced artillery officer who fought in numerous campaigns and actions, including the Mahratta war from 1817 to 1819, the battle of Mahidpore, 21st December 1817, the capture of Rangoon in May 1824, the repulse of the attack on the lines at Rangoon, 11th July 1824, the defence of the Shui-da-gon Pagoda from 1st to 5th December 1824, the capture of Donabew and Prome in 1825, and the storming of Mallown in January 1826. He also commanded the artillery with the Coorg field force in April 1834, and was known for his work on artillery shells. He published Observations on the Theory and Practice of Shrapnel Shells, or Spherical Case-Shot in 1854. R. S. Seton retired from the army in October 1838 and died in August 1872.
Shrapnel Shell: In 1784 Lieutenant Henry Shrapnel of the Royal Artillery began developing the artillery shell that would eventually be named after him. It took until 1803 for the British artillery to adopt the shrapnel shell or 'spherical case', and Henry Shrapnel was promoted to Major in the same year. The first recorded use of shrapnel by the British was in 1804 against the Dutch at Fort Nieuw-Amsterdam in Surinam. The Duke of Wellington's armies used it from 1808 in the Peninsular War and at the Battle of Waterloo, and Wellington wrote admiringly of its effectiveness.
Before the introduction of shrapnel, artillery used 'canister shot' - a tin or canvas container filled with small iron or lead balls instead of the usual cannonball - to defend themselves from infantry or cavalry attack. When fired, the container burst open at the muzzle of the gun, producing the effect of an oversized shotgun shell. Canister shot was only effective up to around 300 metres, and for longer ranges, solid shot or 'common shell' —a hollow cast-iron sphere filled with black powder — was used. Shrapnel's innovation was to combine the shotgun effect of canister shot with a time fuze to burst the canister and disperse the shot after it had left the gun. His shell was a hollow cast-iron sphere filled with a mixture of musket balls and gunpowder, fitted with a crude time fuze. If the fuze was set correctly then the shell would explode either in front of or above the intended objective, and the shrapnel balls would carry on with the residual velocity of the shell. The explosive charge in the shell was just enough to break the casing rather than scatter the shot in all directions. Shrapnel's invention increased the effective range of canister shot from 300 metres to about 1,100 metres. Shrapnel called his device 'spherical case shot', but in time it came to be named after him, with the term 'Shrapnel Shell' eventually being adopted by the British Government in 1852.
The initial design suffered from the potentially catastrophic problem that friction between the shot and gunpowder during firing could sometimes cause premature ignition of the shell. Various solutions were tried with limited success, until in 1852 Colonel Boxer proposed used a diaphragm to separate the bullets from the bursting charge, which proved successful and was adopted the following year. Lieutenant-Colonel Boxer adapted his design again in 1864 to produce shrapnel shells for the new rifled muzzle-loader (RML) guns. The gunpowder charge was now in the shell base with a tube running through the centre of the shell from the time fuse in the nose to the charge in the base. In the 1870s William Armstrong introduced a revised design with the bursting charge in the head and the shell wall made of steel, which was much thinner than the previous cast-iron shells. The final shrapnel shell design adopted in the 1880s, known at the time as 'Boxer Shrapnel', bore little similarity to Henry Shrapnel's original design other than its spherical bullets and time fuse. It used a much thinner forged steel shell case with a timer fuse in the nose and a tube running through the centre to convey the ignition flash to the bursting charge in the shell base. This design came to be adopted by all countries and was in standard use by the outbreak of WW1.
Henry Shrapnel (1761-1842) joined the Royal Artillery in 1779 and the next year, after gaining his commission, was posted to Newfoundland. Four years later, as a Lieutenant he finalised an invention called 'spherical case ammunition'. This new artillery shell was a hollowed-out cannonball that would explode in mid-air and rain lead shot down on the enemy. At Gibraltar in 1787 Shrapnel held the first successful demonstration of this new shell. The British military adopted Shrapnel’s shell in 1803 and it was first used at the Battle of Surinam in May 1804 against the Dutch, who promptly surrendered when the new projectiles wreaked havoc on their infantry. The shell also played a significant role in the Battle of Waterloo on June 18, 1815. Although Shrapnel invested a great deal of his own money in the invention, he was never properly reimbursed by the British government and was only granted a modest pension for the invention in 1814. Shrapnel retired as a Lt-Colonel in July 1825 and died on March 13 1842.
Condition:
In good condition. The boards are in good condition, with some wear to the spine and some marks. The binding and hinges are good and secure. The text is in very good condition with some marks. The folding chart at the rear is in very good condition.
Published: 1854
Red boards with gilt titling
Dimensions: 145mm x 230mm
Pages: 104 (plus 1 folding chart at rear)
