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Post by Avatar on Oct 19, 2023 23:56:43 GMT
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Post by Avatar on Oct 19, 2023 23:59:50 GMT
The Ostend Manifesto, America’s Attempt To Seize Cuba From Spain In 1854Now guess where this fits? The Virginius AffairNow the SES Minneapolis was an Ameriship steam-electric vessel, a state-of-the-art passenger-cargo vessel that would not be expected to be the target of the Spanish government in Cuba. So why did an agent of the Cuban colonial administration, smuggle an explosive device into the fire room that blew her boilers apart and set her on fire, so that she sank? Why would the Spanish of Cuba risk such a catastrophic insane event? Well they had several reasons in this timeline: those reasons were named the Atkins.Now, assume that the Atkins’ sugar concern was dubiously involved in several Cuban Filibusters, as they historically were via their associations with the Torriente brothers, and assume that the firm of E. Atkins & Co, whose address was 26 India Wharf; Boston, Massachusetts, was practically neighbors up the Charles River from Tesla Laboratories? It was not much of a stretch in this timeline to understand that Edwin Atkins would reach out to Nikola Tesla to make inquiries about "electrification" of the railroad from the port of Cienfuegos to the Soledad Plantations that he owned in Cuba, or to improve the agricultural methods employed in sugar cane harvests as was being developed by Iron Eagle Manufactory in their pursuit of agricultural automation. Atkins' mistake was not to understand that he should have communicated his intents to Irene Tesla. She knew the risks better. Nikolai was an inventor first and a "business" oriented person second. What he saw before him, was an opportunity to tinker and to experiment in a new locale, and the chance to solve a new problem. She would see the politics and the hazards of that entangled imbroglio that was Cuba. So the two happy men at play boarded the new Ameriship Steam Electric Ship, SES Minneapolis, on her plasnned maiden voyage, for a joy jaunt down to Cienfuegos, Cuba; to travel there, make landfall, and to tourist about so Nikolai could get a look of the lay of the land, so as to see what he needed to develop or implement for the "electrification" Atkins desired. What the Spanish regime in Havanna saw, instead, was another American Filibuster at work. They were not desirous of another blowup like the Virginius Affair became. An "accident" would be better for them. So they arranged one. Unfortunately, there were survivors, trained survivors who knew what sabotage looked like and who could and would testify as to what happened, how it probably happened, and who was most likely certainly responsible. That is the curse of attacking a ship captained and crewed by veterans of the American Civil War navy. See MAP. Where the SES Minneapolis was blown up. Idiots. ====================================================== Why was Nicaragua involved?You do get the drift, reader? 1. Nicaragua had a hot border dispute with Costa Rica. 2. The "gringos" backed Costa Rica's claim because they wanted to put in an "electrified railroad" to ship out bananas. 3. Nicaragua had its collective feelings hurt that it did not get the "French" canal project. With the "gringos" siding with Costa Rica, when the Spanish regime in Cuba, needed a "cutout" to plant their bomb, the Nicaraguan regime of Evaristo Carazo, who well remembered the William Walker War, was more than happy to supply a "terrorista" to blow up some Filibustering gringos and sink their shiny new ship.
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 0:32:04 GMT
U.S. Navy Ship Force Levels, 1886-1891 DATE.....................12/86......12/87.......12/88,,,,,,12/89......12/90......12/91 BATTLESHIP CRUISER.................1.............2..............2............4............7.............8 MONITOR.........................................................................................1 TORPEDO BOATS....................................2............4.............6............7 STEEL GUNBOATS....1.............1..............1............4.............5............7 AUXILIARIES....................................................................................1 SCREW STEAMER...13...........13............13...........13...........11...........10 SCREW SLOOPS.....14...........14............14...........14...........10...........10 GUNBOATS..............5............5..............5.............5.............5............5 SAILING VESSELS....4............4..............4.............3.............3............3 NEW STEEL NAVY.....2............3..............5............12...........18..........24 OLD NAVY.............36...........36............36............35...........29..........28 TOTAL ACTIVE.......38...........39............41............47...........47..........52 We peek in on a meeting held at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The date is 1 July 1888. The persons present are rather unusual. Charles Francis Brush; agent of record for American Consortium of Manufactured Electrics Arent S. CrowninshieldJohn A. HowellMarie Bissell HotchkissHudson Maxim Montgomery SicardLewis Wallace; attorney of record. George Boyer Vashon, Jr; attorney of record. William C. WhitneyScheduled to be present, but unavailable due to other reasons: was Alfred Thayer Mahan and Stephen Luce. The interesting summary of this meeting concerns a discussion of the SES Minneapolis Incident, the fortuitous rescue of one Mister Nicholas Tesla by the steamship, Paconic of British registry out of Liverpool, on 21 March. He was retrieved from a lifeboat, alone adrift at sea, for a period of a week. He was picked up about 120 km or 80 miles adrift due WSW of the Cienfuegos Harbor Light. The further discussion concerned how to get him back to the United States, after the Paconic made landfall for she was assumed to be on her return leg to Yarmouth port, England. Tesla's return was to be accomplished secretively and expeditiously. There was definite need to confirm from him what other survivors from the SES Minneapolis conjectured, as to the cause of that ship's loss. A scientist's testimony added to that of the captain, Thomas Gates, the other command crew-member, third mate, Balsam Honeycutt; and the few passengers who made it to the lifeboats, and especially the words of the stoker, Alfred Pennyworthless, would form the legal case. Once all testimony had been accumulated and collated, what exactly to do about it, for this was an outrage that had to be answered in some measure; filled the rest with the discussion. ================================================================================== LETTER: Brooklyn Navy Yard 63 Flushing Ave, Brooklyn, NY 2 July 1888 For Irene Goss Davenport Tesla C/O Fraye, Higgenbottom and Stutz, Attorneys at Law. 47 1st Ave, Boston, Mass Madam: Your husband is alive. The details of his rescue, remain most sketchy, but we ascertained that a British steamer, the SS Paconic, picked him up adrift at sea some three months and two weeks ago. We believe that Mister Tesla currently is hospitalized at Northgate Private Sanitarium in Yarmouth, England. We have made arrangements by private means to return him to the United States forthwith. The Pinkertons handle it. On the other matter, which may be of interest to you; yesterday, I attended a meeting at the offices of the Supervisor of the Brooklyn Navy Yard. I was astounded to be importuned and invited to this assemblage of peers of our Republic, for I was in Manhattan on other business, but as it was assumed that a representative of the ACME executive board would be useful in attendance, and I was the nearest body of that board within known reach, I was accosted and "formally" subpoenaed to attend the conclave. Vashon, the junior, not the senior, was most persuasive in this comportment. He told me bluntly that he and I would be agents for action in the matter of your husband and as you could not for medical reasons be in attendance, he presumed we would stand in for you. I submit that we did the best that we could; given the tenure of the meeting and the facts of the matter as we now know them. To summarize, we have no direct means of action available to us, to compel justice upon the scoundrels responsible for this situation crime. The best we could do is bleat as sheep and hope that some other better equipped, more warlike nation might inflict justice upon the culprits at our behalf. We discussed this option and concluded that such a recourse was not only unseemly, but impractical for foreign and domestic reasons. To be honest, madam, much as I admire your pacific nature and your aversion to the violent implements of the law required in this case, if you want justice, you must help us. We, at that meeting, have concluded that we must protect ourselves, and by that conclusion I mean we must embrace Alexander Hamilton and abandon Thomas Jefferson's notion of how a navy ought to behave. I know that you will argue the morality of the case that we were first in the wrong, going all the way back to the Ostend Manifesto, but that was diplomacy then and this is war now. We really have no choice in the matter if our trade life external is to go forth overseas unmolested. Your Servant; Charles Francis Brush, Esq. LETTER: 47 1st Ave, Boston, Mass 4 July 1888 Mister Charles Francis Brush, Esq. 1350 Euclid Avenue, Suite 1000, Cleveland, Ohio My Friend and Covalent; What would you have me do? Without some further background on this subject, I would only see our time and money and efforts wasted. With circumspection: Irene Davenport Tesla DME BNY LETTER: 1350 Euclid Avenue, Suite 1000, Cleveland, Ohio 7 July 1888 Misses Irene Davenport Tesla 47 1st Ave, Boston, Mass Irene; First, some fair news. Your husband will arrive in New York this 15 July aboard the SES Roanoke. It took us some doings to pry him loose from the denizens of Northgate Sanitarium without arousing suspicions. It appears that Nikolai has some memory lapses from his lifeboat sojourn, but he does clearly recall the events that preceded his "escalade over the side" as he cabled Knox. He is quite confident that the accident was no such thing. It is the nail for the case, as lawyer Vashon is wont to say. Second, after post hoc consultation with Misters Howell and Maxim, I have some short term and then long term answers for you. The short term answers are that we must address what the two gentlemen in question refer to as "effectors". As Mister Hudson Maxim put it, "We cannot do a sensible thing until we improve our chemistry and our projectiles." I infer that he means we must improve our cannons and torpedoes so that when, not if, we resort to the argument of kings, we will be able to compete kinetically as well as legally upon the matter at hand. This is not in my wheelhouse, and I seriously doubt it lies within yours, unless you can aid Mister Howell with his experiments more directly. The other matter seems to be best left in the hands of Misters Driggs, Schroeder and Seabury; who have been encouraged to solve the issue by any means available to them. The long term solution is more akin to making the necessary numerical and qualitative adjustments to our accouterments and empennage: which is to say that we need more launch platforms for our ordnance and surer guidance in their use. That is more a matter for our government to handle, and one in which our lobbyists can operate within the congress. I am glad to say that our current president and his secretary are well-disposed to make this happen. They have parallel reasons to ours to make it so. Cordially: Charles Francis Brush, Esq. LETTER: 47 1st Ave, Boston, Mass 16 July 1888 Mister Charles Francis Brush, Esq. 1350 Euclid Avenue, Suite 1000, Cleveland, Ohio Charles: You so think like a man. Find John Holland of the Fenian Society and put him to the short task. I will devote some more attendance upon Mister Howell and his "effectors". As for the long term solutions, it is better to use the tools of charity and peace to attain long-term justice than to seek petty immediate retribution. Thank the Pinkertons, for me, in the latest matter to which they are accustomed, and arrange to send my husband to me. We have "much" to discuss, he and I, and "more" to correct. When I am at fuller health, those who have wronged us, will have my fullest attention and charity. Your covalent; Irene Davenport Tesla DME BNY
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 0:45:07 GMT
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 0:55:39 GMT
And now our story resumes: Refer to: Newpower, Anthony (2006). Iron Men And Tin Fish: The Race to Build a Better Torpedo During World War II. Greenwood Publishing Group. pp. 23-25. Summary: Louis Victor Robert Schwartzkopff was alleged to have stolen, with Robert Whitehead's compliance, plans to the hydrostatic depth control valve and pendulum yaw and pitch controllers to the Whitehead Torpedo, around November 1871. This secret was incorporated into a torpedo design created by the Berliner Maschinenbau AG vorm. L. Schwartzkopf the following year. To make a very long story short, this competing line of torpedo was built out of bronze instead of steel like the Whitehead, and was just different enough in mechanicals, to escape outright patent infringement on the motive parts. Oddly enough Whitehead never patented the controllers, The Germans sold the torpedo, as a product, but NOT the right of manufacture to Japan, China, Spain, Russia et al. They even sold 12 copies to the United States. In testing, and this should have surprised no-one, against the Whitehead, the German fish was better manufactured and more reliable than the Whitehead. It was also twice as expensive per unit to make. There were only two nations who could make a copy of such a torpedo, either the Whitehead or the Schwartzkopff: these were the United States and France. The French paid a license fee and then went on to develop their own piston-engined air powered fish. After the Americans looked at the Brotherhood engine setup and determined that the setup induced a drift right or drift left nose wander error based on the turn of the crank shaft and the rod throw of those radial engines, that could not be flywheel or contra-rotator shaft damped, they went to a two horizontal turbine drive setup. THAT became the state secret, which caused the famous legal case which prohibited E. W. Bliss from competing with either Whitehead or Schwartzkopff in the torpedo market. Whether that bit of Leavitt engineering was worth the loss of an independent check and developer of torpedoes within the American torpedo monopoly manufacture acquired by the USN at that time, still has historians in argument. From the USN's point of view, now, as will be presumed in this fictional history, it was a huge error to not have competitive contract bidding and outside the government designers work on such weaponry. The object lesson was the collective grand disaster to American ordnance, known as WWII. 100,000 lives is a stiff price to pay for dud shells and torpedoes. ==================================================== LETTER: 47 1st Ave, Boston, Mass 25 August 1888 The Bashon Law Firm PLLC 1634 K Street NW Ste 300, Washington, DC My dear Elias: Accept my condolences on the passing of your father, George. I am sure that now you have assumed his practice that you will continue the good work he has carried on these past three decades. Between us, I had hoped that our blighted country would have managed a further transit to fairness and equity, but some of us still refuse to be reconstructed in this progressive year of 1888, no matter how hard the gentile effort is made to educate and elucidate, either by moderate persuasion, economic self-interest, or normative legal means those recalcitrant citizens. Then it comes down to force majeure, domestically. This brings me regrettably to force majeure internationally. Of course I refer to the SES Minneapolis. Objectively; I have a personal stake in the resolution of the matter in that I desire justice. You also know of my bias against the usual anthropoid recourse in the attempt to solve the ex-judicia-internationale problem. We have the grisly results in our cemeteries and in the living maimed to remind us of what a few foolish stupid incompetent men whose evil ideology drives them to unreason, can do the to the common woman and man? That old Irish reprobate was and is correct that we must do something in the matter of dissuasion. And that is where you come in. We have a slight problem in Congress. His name is William Lawrence Scott. Get rid of him. I object to him on two fundamental grounds: 1. He interferes with Phase Four as we try to integrate and improve our nation. We need those future citizens for labor now. 2. He obstructs the Navy. We may have need to politically remove some further obstructions to human progress in the future, Elias. Your father understood the necessity, then, when it was required in the past, and I call upon you now to continue the necessary work. Your friend always; Irene Davenport Tesla DME BNY
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 1:06:06 GMT
An Austrian military Officer and inventor...? Here is some background that machine gun Antonetti refused to procure for the Americans; What is not mentioned in the article is that Adolf Odkolek's design did not work. So how did this come to be, that it, the machine gun, finally worked?Odkolek could not get the cyclic dialed in, that is he could not figure out how to tap the gas off the barrel as it pushed the bullet through at the right "timing" or bleed drop-off to move the oscillator back and forth smoothly to repeat without stalling the action. Laurence Benét firing a Hotchkiss Mitrailleuse Modéle 1897. Laurence Vincent Benet was recommended by the experts of the United States Navy to the firm of Hotchkiss in France, when they appealed for help to sell this gun to the Americans. That is part 1. Here comes part 2. [/quote] Laurence V. Benét Firing the First Model Hotchkiss Machine Gun. Being something of a nut, Laurence Vincent Benet was aware of a mechanism whereby manufacturers of ladies' perfume bottles and makers of fire hoses had hit upon the same screw valve design to meter the flow of a gas or liquid fluid through a pipe. Whether, perfume, water or hot propellant bled off a gun barrel, a screw valve meters the same upon the fluid and adjusts the pressure. As the machine gun fouled with burnt residue over time, the operator just opened the valve and the gun kept working... dirty. As the Japanese would discover in 1894, and as the Russians discovered in 1904, a Hotchkiss kept running in mud, when a Maxim seized up. ====================================================== In "Thunder and Lightning", now incited with an increased incentive to pace the Europeans, the Americans will be very interested in the above developments. ====================================================== Schwartzkopff torpedo's general profile, as illustrated in The Schwartzkopff Torpedo manual, published by the US Navy in 1903: 1. War nose 2. War head 3. Immersion chamber 4. Air flask 5. Engine room 6. After body 7. Bevel gear box 8. Tail And this was of some interest. Whatever the faults of the Ansaldo firm as to chicane business practices with the Spanish, most of which were Spain's fault becasuse they kept trying to cheat the Italians, the ships that Ansaldo owned shipyards built for the Argentines, Italians, and the Japanese could only be described as "excellent". ======================================================== Re: the Minnesota affair - the canals and railroad land routes assume even greater importance for the Americans as they begin to fathom their geographic handicaps. If you want trade and profits, thereby, over any distance; you have to secure the right of way and provide protection from bandits on land and pirates at sea. So... Wycliffe will be meeting these fellows in Arizona. They are "Buffalo Soldiers". And... As might have been noticed from this timeline, which does not stray, infrastructure development wise, from the real history in progression by more than a decade or so in advancement to the true political and technological capabilities in our real history, the United States was internally built upon its railroads and knitted together by the ability of those railroads to move people and goods overland economically and with general safety. The phases: phase 1 northeast and midwest; phase 2 the central corridor to California; phase 3 southeast, and finally this phase 4 the northern plains and northwest and southwest is the actual historic investment and development, based on the economics. The chief difference in this alternate path is the electrification of that process instead of the coal-powered genuine history, with the fictional invention of a single mastermind to ensure that it is an electrification and not coal-power that drives the trains. At least that was my original intent. But it has grown on me as the alternate history evolved. I became aware of how slavocrat Filibustering affected American ambitions. We are about to enter into that 1890s era of fallout from those sins; which should prove interesting as "my mastermind" confronts her own new moral choices in this age of temptations. Will she succumb to the temptations, or will she at least try to hold true to her avowed principles?
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 1:54:47 GMT
LETTER: From: Navy Department 17th Street NW, Pennsylvania Avenue Washington, District of Columbia 10 August 1888. To: Mister John Howell C/O Bu-Ord Munitions Factory Number Four 1520 Capella S, Newport, Rhode Island Subject: current deficiencies in your program. Para 1: You will find appended to this letter, the results from the forces afloat of the usage of Torpedo Mark 1 (Flywheel) and Torpedo Mark 2 (electrified cable) in warshot simulations, as conducted at the Dahlgren Center. Para 2: Tests summary one; Torpedo Mark 1 (Flywheel), was found to lose momentum after a run time of 60 seconds. Velocity calculations yielded a run out of 730 meters with a fall out of depth control at 450 meters. Beyond 450 meters the torpedo loses cylinder lift and deepens in the last 280 meters or twenty one seconds of run such that it will usually run under the keel of the intended victim. Para 3: Tests summary two; Torpedo Mark 2 (Electrified cable), was more satisfactory as to run out, when the extension cord unspooled properly, but was useless in the transverse movement (broadside launch), experiments due to the lateral forces of ship movement which snapped the extension cord. This could occur at any moment during the torpedo run out at any time leading to the loss of the simulated warshot and the loss of the rather expensive torpedo. Para 4: Torpedo Mark 1 (Flywheel), has been found, despite its disappointing characteristics as proved in run out tests, to be an interim solution for forces afloat as a ship based weapon. We are now aware that the “flywheel principle” has serious limits; a. No significant improvement in the potential energy storage can be expected due to materials construction and mechanical limits. b. The spin up of the flywheel, described as a banshee wail, announces to any potential victim, our immediate intent to let loose upon it, the weapon and allows that victim more than two minutes, that being the time required to spin the flywheel safely up to speed, for the victim to recourse to evasive action and take positive steps to destroy our very obvious launch ship. Para 5: Torpedo Mark 2 (Electrified cable), has been proved to be of some practical use in those rather extremely limited circumstances: a. where it can be emplaced as a shore battery in harbor defense. b. where it can be launched from a slow vessel which aims its bow at the probable calculated projected intersection where the torpedo’s run out and the target’s future course of motion may be predicted to intersect at some future time. c. based on b. ; there is now a need for a submerged vessel which can employ Torpedo Mark 2 (electrified cable), as an ambush weapon. Para 6: It is rather obvious that both Torpedo Mark 1 (Flywheel), and Torpedo Mark 2 (Electrified cable), have serious limitations as to successful application, neither being entirely satisfactory for use by our forces afloat. Para 6: It is now expected that you will continue work upon Torpedo Experimental (electric battery) until it can be tested and evaluated. Such resources and materials and personnel as you require will be forwarded to this office for approval. This office will do whatever is within our granted authority to ensure that your requests are expedited. Para 7: We need you to succeed, John. We are under a lot of political pressure from the International Trade League, The Farmers Coalition, The Gompers Coalition, the Citizens Equal Rights Association and the Chamber of Commerce. This SES Minneapolis thing has them out for blood. Who knew that the free traders, the farmers cooperatives, big labor, the abolitionists, and the big bankers and manufacturers would all get together? We have never seen anything like it. Do you know that they, together, forced Senator William Lawrence Scott to resign “for reasons of health”? Robert B. Dashiell for: Montgomery Sicard, CPT USN Bureau of Ordnance ==================================================== LETTERS: From: Navy Department 17th Street NW, Pennsylvania Avenue Washington, District of Columbia 10 August 1888. To: Mister Bradley Fiske, MEE C/O USS Charleston 63 Flushing Ave, Brooklyn, New York Subject: telemeters Para 1: We are not sure if such remote aiming mechanisms fall within the purview of this bureau. To be honest, we have no idea who has the jurisdiction. We are clear on gun sights on guns, and optical aids adjacent to guns and gun mounted transits, but as to a “director”, as you call it, we are puzzled whether that might not be a general ship system, which legally belongs to Construction and Repair. It might even fall under the authority of the Bureau of Engineering, as if it is a machine part of the ship. Para 2: Until we obtain a legal ruling on who has jurisdiction, we cannot assume authority or authorize the tests you requested. Robert B. Dashiell for: Montgomery Sicard, CPT USN Bureau of Ordnance ********************************************************************* LETTER: To: Robert B. Dashiell for Montgomery Sicard C/O Navy Department 17th Street NW, Pennsylvania Avenue Washington, District of Columbia 10 August 1888. From: William C. WhitneyC/O Navy Department 17th Street NW, Pennsylvania Avenue Washington, District of Columbia 10 August 1888. Internal Correspondence: Subject: Jurisdiction of telemeters: Para 1: Are you kidding me? If it aims the guns, then it belongs with the guns and that is your jurisdiction. Handle the matter forthwith; or you, collectively, will conduct a penguin census in the Aleutian Islands. Para 2: The next time you people have such a silly question, I instruct you to apply some common sense among yourselves. Grover was not amused when I put the question to him. William C. Whitney Secretary of the Navy ===================================================== LETTER: To: Mister Elias Mathew Vanson One Lincoln Center Suite 43 110 West Fayette St Syracuse, NY From: Navy Department 17th Street NW, Pennsylvania Avenue Washington, District of Columbia 10 August 1888. Subject: our situation. Elias; First, you must destroy this correspondence hand delivered to you by Ensign Sims after you have read it. The information I give you is “sensitive”. You may verbally convey it to Misses Davenport Tesla, as she has the need to know why we need her continued valuable assistance. Second, I apologize for the necessity of using you as the second stage courier, inasmuch as any direct communication between this office and Misses Tesla would immediately become known to the press. There are those out there in the public, who would discomfort our plans and discombobulate us if they could either out of stupidity, or malice; arouse public opinion against us. Third, as to means of operations, if the Spaniards will not negotiate this incident satisfactorily, the truth is that we have a very weak present hand to play. We have, as of this date, 4 steel cruisers which might be able to stand up to their own formidable fleet of 18 armored vessels. Eighteen might not seem like much, compared to Britain with her 270 or France with her 90, but for us, 18 might as well be the moon. Fourth, our plans to remedy this sad state of affairs, will take years and must embrace the inevitable change of administrations, the vague currents of present politics, and the realities of future uncertainty. I can tell you that we have made efforts to improve our artillery through the Endicott Survey. Inasmuch as our stated goal was modest, to overmatch a second or third tier adversary such as Brazil or Spain, we were not publicly very ambitious, so we were able to accomplish the true survey objectives without too much close scrutiny. The products of that survey, we should see made by 1891, when we will have the following results: 1. We will have working models of breech-loaded artillery in the bore diameters of 1 inch, 2 inch,3 inch, 4 inch, 5 inch, 6 inch, 7 inch, 8 inch, 9 inch, 10 inch, 11 inch, and 12 inch. Of these items, we expect to have rapid fire guns in bore diameters up to 5 inches. Fifth: in the other matters which we have investigated: 2. We should have a working Hertz principle mine for harbor defense and for blockade purposes. 3. We should have either developed for ourselves a self-contained electric battery powered torpedo or have acquired a pressurized air flask powered one. We prefer the electric as it would have less risk of explosion upon charging. 4. And we will have smokeless powdered propellant, something which only the French and the Germans pursue with great vigor. For these latter efforts; we owe the success expected; either due to Misses Davenport’s direct voluntary assistance or to her indirect application to others to aid our cause. For these efforts we are grateful. Sixth, the current program of torpedo rams, which Misses Davenport backed as being prudent, gives us some limited defense which is more mobile than our coastal forts, but as must be obvious by now; once one of our merchant ships passes outside the range of the railroad coastal guns, which at present is effectively 3 miles, that ship is as vulnerable to piracy as a ship from a minor power such as Siam. The lack of cruisers hampers our arguments, when we must make them with the brigands upon the world ocean. It cannot have escaped your notice or hers how Spain has ignored our private approaches and rebuffs and ridicules our public ones? Seventh, if the lack of cruisers entails a risk to our merchant shipping, then what of the Nicaragua canal? The Panama canal has the assurance of access for us, guaranteed by the French Navy, which is concern enough, because today’s friends may not be so friendly tomorrow. The French will not and cannot of choice guarantee the Nicaragua canal’s access during the construction or its use. Such a tempting prize would require that we garrison it against some other’s theft of it or denial of access to us at some future time. And that fact means that we would have to succor the garrison by sea. Only a navy with the ability to at least challenge the use of the sea in those waters to a future opponent could and should make the Nicaraguan canal worth the enormous economic risks. Eighth, if we would be masters of our own waters, protect our shipping and secure both the Panama and Nicaragua canals, we must become resolute participants and a genuine effective presence upon the world ocean as more than a collection of worm-eaten sail and steam frigates and corvettes armed with antique Civil War era muzzle-loaders. What would do for Korea ten years ago will not pass for China today. That is how far we have fallen and how impotent we actually are. Therefore we have programmed the following remedy for the forces afloat. a. We will embark on a modest cruiser program that will see the construction of 4 such vessels per year by budget for the next 8 years. One will be a first rate, one will be a second rate, and two will be third rates per annum. The third rates we will declare as gunboats to hide their true offensive purposes, the second rates we will label “peace cruisers” while the first rates will be “coast defense ships". b. Inside that cruiser program will be folded genuine line of battle ships, which we hope to publicly procure in such numbers as to overawe a possible South American naval combination, such as Brazil could form with Chile. The actual private goal will be to create a genuine line of battle to give the Spanish something to consider the next time they try to pirate us. c. For the next tier challengers; such as Russia, Japan or Germany, our ambitions are much more circumspect. We are so far down the totem pole in that respect; that it would be a miracle for Congress to fund the 100 or so ships and provide the monies to operate such a fleet in men and material, unless a deliberate event occurred that would make them see that need. Convey this information to Misses Davenport Tesla, and on our behalf, lobby her to continue her needed assistance, but now with a political and technical view towards the above programs. Cordially: William C. Whitney Secretary of the Navy ======================================================== What did Misses Tesla say to Ethias Vanson when he told her the contents of this letter on 20 August 1888 in Rochester, New York? "Ethias: go to Washi9ngton and ask that fool about John Holland. Be polite; but you make him aware of it. There is more than one way to cook a hog."
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 2:06:36 GMT
At least it shows the government have the knowledge not to go headless into a fight; even if the Vox Populi demand such! So now they have to listen. ================================================================================= That last post was modelled upon the Grant Administration and the Virginius Incident. The short version of that situation, was that some Unreconstructed Confederates and some British pirates from Jamaica went about the program of supporting some Cuban "sugar planter revolutionaries": to drive the Spaniards out of Cuba so they could set up a "republic" whereby they instead could then oppress and loot the Cuban people locally in place of the far off government in Madrid. Whether you consider the Spaniards as villains and oppressors, for they were, or consider the gunrunners and smugglers and freebooters aboard the SS Virginius to be brigands and outlaws, for they were, the current international law solution for such smuggling, gunrunning and filibustering, was to seize the ship and cargo, arrest the crew and apply the national remedy as specified in that offended nation's laws. Spain properly could try and imprison or execute the crew. The prudent thing to do, would have been to imprison the crew. But the Spaniards wanted to "make an example". The "show trials" were a bit of a farce; and the death sentences, even by the shaky legalisms applied, somewhat unmerited per forma if not per judicia. It should have resulted in war, but the Grant Administration decided on the practical grounds of not fighting a war the United States would lose, over an issue in which Americans were so clearly in the wrong, was the proper decision. Of course, the Vox Populi would not see those reasons at all. And it did show, in development a state of unacceptable affairs which George Robeson, Grant's secretary of the navy found intolerable, in that if he had been tasked to fight that unwinnable war, he would send thousands of men to their deaths in antiques that Horatio Nelson would have blown apart with a laugh. It was Robeson who started the Amphitrite rebuilds that were the practical examples of the Theseus ships. As it came to pass, the British government cabled its Caribbean station commander to send a ship to the local Spanish Cuban town where the show trials and executions took place. The ship was sent. The ship's captain sent the Spanish authorities ashore a note that effectively told them to cease and desist their acts immediately, or he, that captain, would shell the town. The incident was closed satisfactorily. The popular rush to war ended and the furor died down. And it was business as usual within the American republic for the next ten years with a frustrated USN gnashing its teeth as the lessons of impotence were forgotten. So, to prod the incentives along, I changed the situation up in this fictional history to use international terrorism as the motivator. It is true that the Atkinses were in the midst of a sort of filibuster, but it was of a much less overt nature. Nikolai Tesla was a relatively naive victim, sucked into it, and the Spaniards, trying to be fictionally clever, overreached themselves again. As there was no convenient British bully-boy to attain a resolution, since no Britons were involved, the American government once again found herself in the position of impotence. And here we are in that story, with Irene Tesla about to embark upon Phase 5.
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 2:13:11 GMT
and and Buffalo Soldiers. and where they resided...
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 13:56:04 GMT
LETTER: C/O United States Post Office / General Delivery 24 Beacon Street, Boston, MA 22 September 1888 Doctor Norman Oswald Bates DP C/O The Athenaeum 107 Pall Mall London, United Kingdom My dear Norman: I have been a year in this benighted territory called Arizona. The inhabitants continually insist that I sit me upon a horse and conduct my travels and affairs from thereupon, when in a civilized milieu one would summon a carriage. But this is not London and it is certainly not India, where in my youth I was of more of the custom to ride mounted. That was when I officered Punjabis in the 15th Lancers (Cureton's Multanis). So I have some experience in the matters of a conversation I will relate to you, that I had with an American soldier, named William Fritch, as we rode a stage coach from Tombstone to Fort Thomas on the Gila River. It was quite a trip and quite a revelation. He was a black man and a sergeant, of about his mid-forties. He claimed that he enlisted in the American War of the Rebellion for the Union side in the year 1864 and served with the US 5th Cavalry (colored troops). He spoke some of his service in that war. His chief remarks of that piece of history in remembrance was that he learned the difference between a plow horse and a war horse, and between a stuffed shirt and a man. He seemed bitter about that part of his history, saying; “When you fight to prove that you are a man, with a man’s right to be free; it is one thing to fight an enemy who presumes that you are cattle and deserve to be so treated. It is another to fight alongside men who think exactly the same of you; who wear the same uniform you wear, and who purport to fight for the same cause as you.” His recounts of the two Battles of Saltville, Virginia ( Battles of Saltville, Virginia) seemed very like the raids the 15th Lancers conducted against the Afghans in my own war, although with much lesser glory or significant results. I made comment upon that fact, and further remarked that this territory of Arizona reminded me a little of the Northwest Frontier. He then took me to school, by pointing out that Arizona was a richer country with watered rivers and minerals, with a paucity of people that was not true of the Northwest Frontier. He further argued with me that with the mountains that bisected Arizona from the northeast plateau to the lowlands of the southwest, that the military geographic similarities were nothing alike. He said; “We have fewer troops than you had with our two regiments to patrol and police this territory; whereas you of the British Indian Army had 50,000 or more men invading a region; which though with twice the size of Arizona had fewer than 15,000 fighters armed and ready to oppose your aggressions.” I rejoined that if I was an invader into Afghanistan, then what was he in Arizona in what used to be a part of Mexico? He said; “What makes you think, that I am the invader, here? That I wear the American army uniform? That I try to keep the Mexicans on their side of the line and my people on our side of the line? That I try to make sure that the US mail contracted stage coaches get through? That I try to prevent the native peoples from being massacred by the bandits and so-called territorial militias? Or that I bring the law to bear; where there is none?” I pointed to the fact that he was a mere sergeant. He came back at me: “Don’t let the stripes fool you. I learned to read and write when I was twenty; so that I could read the regulations to make corporal. I learned to think for me when I was thirty to make sergeant. You don’t make sergeant in this American army without knowing that difference between what is reality and what is not, Wycliffe. Have you ever led a troop out on your own book, because there were no officers present who could do it better or even as well? I mean, have you ever done anything in your so-called military life without someone holding your hand and wiping your nose? I bet you never made it past Lieutenant.” This last accusation was true. The military life and I were ill-suited, which was why I took up my present life of academia. I was still quite insulted. I was about to stand up for myself, when he put his hand up; “Save your breath. You probably had a Sepoy sergeant who did your thinking and manhandling for you. Army to army, that is the way it works until you make captain as an officer. You have to grow up and mature into it. Believe what you want about yourself, Wycliffe. Just don’t lie about it to me, or pretend that you are me. You were never born a slave. You are not a career soldier. And you don’t have the right to judge me or what I do or why I actually do it, imperialist. ” Needless to say, it was a most unpleasant coach trip after that conversation. I think the only time we spoke again, was when I asked him about Turkey Top.^1 He said: "Custer lost the big one at the Little Big Horn. Cibecue Creek was our Little One." He then fell silent for the next two days. I tell you, Norman. That is the usual kind of reception I obtain from these Americans. I want to finish this business, and come home. Your Servant and colleague; Brandon Croyden Wycliffe, ESQ. OM FRS. ================================================================================== ^1 That was fouled up beyond any repair.
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 14:11:28 GMT
Newspaper: Rochester Democrat and Chronicle 245 East Main Street Rochester, New York DATE OF October 16, 1888. (Item on page 4) THE EXPOSITION OF THE OHIO VALLEY AND THE CENTRAL STATES OF 1888 By Richard Danforth Huxton, reporter (Cincinnati) The wonders of the Midwest delight the eyes, when one enters the Great Exhibition Hall. The predominance of gizmos electrical would seem to suggest that the theme of progress among us still remains the struggle between the Edison Combine and his competitors of the Westinghouse led Conglomerate. For the suitable price of a $2.00 ticket, the visitor can wander among the 250,000 square feet of exhibits on display inside the pavilions and see what this Great Republic’s progressives offer to its citizens; such marvels of electrification as have made the travelers’ sojourn’s across the land a clean, and safe experience unknown to the previous generation, the businessman’s drudge clerical tasks an ease in time and money, and the housewife’s once onerous daily chores a new bliss on Earth. But the visitor would miss the most important development, which this reporter espied. Outside the pavilion, and free to the whole world to view, is a small monster. It appears crude to this reporter, but is of some note to excite the interest for what it promises the farmer and to the constructor. It appears as nothing as marvelous as the moving pictures or the audio recordagraph of Mister Edison, or the steam turbine electric dynamo of Misses Davenport Tesla and Mister Charles Curtis, but believe me, reader, this monster will change our world in a far greater detail than those marvels recorded inside the exhibition hall upon the eye. The monster, appears as a self-motivated machine that lays track in a continuous wheel like motion. It can change direction, which has been the chief limiter of previous attempts of a self-crawler. It can do so in the soft, fertile grounds with which we of this Great Republic have been blessed. Furthermore, it can do the work of many oxen or horses to break the rough prairie ground with which we have been cursed. And around that small monster, the Iron Eagle Manufacturers of Cincinnati have posed other machines familiar to us that are of the previous minds of Cyrus McCormick, of Eli Whitney and others diverse types familiar quite familiar to the American farmer, the machines of planting and harvesting, whose size and effectiveness was previously limited by the capacity of animal draught and the ability of a man to steer and coax such animals over soft ground or hard grounds. It is as if Mister Charles Brush has expanded the physical capacity of one man to farm the land with the strength and endurance of an electro-locomotive. You, dear reader, might begin to understand with profundity just what this means for us? At the very least, our food shortages, due to the lack of cheap harvest labor, will now be abated somewhat. Perhaps we might even see the price of food, now ridiculously outrageous since the Civil War, begin to decline to the point such that even the meanest of our poor can now afford the gifts of good food, that along with good hygiene, and clean water is their civil right as other members of our democratic social contract enjoy? That is the future, this reporter, sees. =================================================== The above illustration is a much very manipulated public domain image of a 1909 failed Russian made tractor. (author)
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 14:15:33 GMT
Fort ThomasNotice that the barracks are built on stilts? Also note that the barracks are built to a standard plan? This is where Brandon Croyden Wycliffe will find out about the American army of 1888 in this timeline. And The Horse You Came in On! by Mark Boardman | Apr 12, 2018 | True West BlogDid Wyatt Earp blast Curly Joe out of existence? Yes, he did. We have four eyewitnesses to the Iron Springs massacre and independent Wells Fargo agent verification from those witnesses. This real incident at O'Neil's Saloon forms the basis for a Brandon Croyden Wycliffe diary entry, in this fictional timeline, which follows: ================================================================================= Diary of Brandon Croyden Wycliffe of 26 September 1888. Fort Thomas, Arizona – Entry made in parlor Quarters Number Four. I have settled this eventful day into what passes for a domicile on this outpost of civilization. There is electricity, courtesy of a windmill generator that the Americans brought to this place but recently. I can tell because the paint had not flaked off the paddle blades of the wind screw; nor has the rust attacked the steel casing of the electric dynamo which the windmill turns, nor have the local vermin eaten the insulation off the power lines to these quarters. When we have wind, we have electricity. We always have wind. The quarters are fairly plain. They resemble in almost perfect duplication all the other "officers quarters" on this post, of which there are three, which are of course poetically named Quarters One (Major Marsh), Quarters Two, (Captain Alvarez) and Quarters Three (Surgeon Leonard). If you are of lesser rank and unmarried, you share the Lieutenant's Bachelor's Quarters, or the Sergeant's Bachelor's Quarters. Married folks live in homestead housing off the post, which the government built and rents to them under a housing allotment based on the soldier's pay or officer's salary. It is a tidy little village of same alike houses about a mile distant from the post and nearer to the Gila River, a rather brackish stream which has its origins in the Black Range Mountains in the New Mexico territory. The reason the American army ostensibly placed itself here in the middle of nowhere, it claims, is to keep the peace among the Pima and Apache tribes. More likely, it is to protect the silver fields and the railroad. There are but two companies here of the US 6th Cavalry in garrison at present, with the rest of them scattered among and amidst the plateau mountain range barrier that splits Arizona in two northwest to southeast. To the south in the lowlands and along "the line" as Sergeant Fritch calls it which is the American Mexican border, that is the province of the US 10th Cavalry. What a strange country. But to this day's significant event. After our stagecoach deposited us unceremoniously at the local post office, bag and baggage, I made my way to the Sutler's House, one of those Same Alike buildings built upon stilts in this semidesert. I wondered why, except for the stone quarters, the buildings contained this unusual feature that I associated with Monsoon lashed environments? I should have trusted my instincts. When it rains here and that is rare, the ground floods and the runoff ruins dwellings that are not foundationally prepared for it. There is the problem of desert vermin, some of which is poisonous. Even the horse stalls are mounted on stilts to protect the animals within from scorpions and snakes. I digress. I entered the Sutler's House to avail myself of the promised shade and protection from this Arizona sun. It is not as hot as Tombstone was, but at 90 degrees it was and is hot enough this day. There was the proprietor, a Judson McCaffrey, and three soldiers. No one was at or attended the bar, no-one was at the electrified kitchen that was at one end of the saloon / restaurant. All four of them, present, were seated at a square table playing a game of cards which i recognized was "poker". I went toward them and made inquiry whether I might purchase food and drink, for I was hungry and thirsty after a day of silent monotony lurching toward this hell-hole with a sphinx for company aboard a conveyance laughably called a Concord torsion sprung stagecoach. McCaffrey told me to serve myself as he was busy with his game. It was a dollar for a bottle of whiskey and a half dollar for a sandwich, which I could assemble from the makings provided at the counter that fronted the electrified kitchen. I asked for water or milk, and the proprietor laughed at me. The water he declared undrinkable, and the milk was not to be had until the week after of this Wednesday, when the next cattle herd was due to arrive. Now I know why that madwoman wants to railroad the country together. I obtained the hard liquor and the sandwich, which was a piece of dried jerked beef between two slabs of half cooked flour laughably called bread. The sandwich required the liquor to wash it down. I sat alone at a square table, four tables removed I thought, safely from the card game in progress and potential troubles. I should have known. This is Arizona. My sandwich was half consumed when I heard the commotion of a horse approach. Into the saloon, through the open double doors, entered a drunken cowboy upon a drunken horse. Yes; a drunken horse. The man was obviously celebrating something, as he held a pistol in his hand, which he aimed in the general direction of the bar and discharged. He then put a hole in the ceiling and shot the proprietor. This annoyed the three irate soldiers considerably, who rose from their interrupted card-game and as a body wrestled the cowboy off his horse, disarmed him and proceeded to punch him senseless. The corporal of the three ordered the two privates to haul the now unconscious cowboy off to the guardhouse to await the pleasure of the justice of the peace; who, if the custom in these parts is honored, will have that wretch on the rock-pile swinging a hammer at it for the next thirty days for disturbing the peace. So off went the privates with their charge. The corporal then turned his attention to McCaffrey. He wrapped the man's arm and told him to see the surgeon about it, being not too concerned that the man had been shot. Then the corporal invited me, a complete stranger to him, to sit down with him and play cards. I uninvited myself, promptly, with the true excuse that I must report my arrival here to the post commandant. He directed me to the Same Alike building on the post, which was helpfully labeled "Headquarters" and took from me my bottle of whiskey and the uneaten half of my sandwich. That was my introduction to Fort Thomas! ================================================================================ Not like the Northwest Frontier or Afghanistan at all for Wycliffe at all, is it?
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 14:25:34 GMT
You know that vision of Nebuchadnezzar in the Book of Daniel?Well, that was an interesting vision, but the hidden point was that the statue had feet of clay, which could be smashed with ease to bring the whole statue crashing to the ground; such that it was the lesson that a single fragility of corruption could crash the so called "magnificent" edifice. People miss that allegorical point to the story. And so we turn to a map of the United States and look at COAL which makes up the shortfall between wind turbines and hydroelectricity in this America. Figure in 1888, it powers 29% of the existent grid: And we now turn to what has reared its ugly political and economic justice head to worry the ACME executive council and President Grover Cleveland. ARTICLE • WEST VIRGINIA MINE WARS Introduction to the West Virginia Mine Wars: This began in 1880. For a decade in this timeline, it has festered in West Virginia as the wonders of electrification seemed to promise a clean American Utopia. ================================================================================ To say that the simmering West Virginia situation was known is an understatement, but here is what surprised Irene Tesla, this date: Roslyn coalminers strike, precipitating the importation of Black miners, on August 17, 1888. By Jim Kershner Posted 12/16/2009 HistoryLink.org Essay 9240LETTER: 47 1st Ave, Boston, Mass 1 October 1888 The Bashon Law Firm PLLC 1634 K Street NW Ste 300, Washington, DC My dear Elias: If you have perused my telegram, you have become aware that we have a situation in the Washington Territory that threatens to interfere with Phase Four's completion in that part of our country. Those idiots are astride the main North Pacific Railroad that we intend to electrify. That line heads to the port of Seattle and the shipyards at Bremerton. I understand that there is a civil rights component that is quite touchy for both of us to consider, here, Elias, but those are our Chinese workers , who we hired and promised work and a better life, at the mine operator's specific request, and now those same mineowners are importing "strikebreakers" and "armed police" to use against them? We must attend to this issue or our word means nothing. You have some contacts with the Secretary of the Interior, William F. Vilas? Maybe he can help us? Your friend: Irene Davenport Tesla DME BNY. ====================================================== The Bashon Law Firm PLLC 1634 K Street NW Ste 300, Washington, DC 7 October 1888 Irene Davenport Tesla 47 1st Ave, Boston, Mass Dear Irene: I bypassed Bill. He was too small a fish for this pond to swim quickly enough to rectify it, or so I thought. I went straight to Grover Cleveland. He called in William Crowninshield Endicott and Augustus Garland and told them to handle "the coal miner problem". In retrospect I regret going to Grover. He is too direct action oriented about such things without the circumspection of thought we might have needed for this relatively minor labor dispute outbreak; for the proposed solution that Endicott and Garland have invented will be most annoying to you. To wit as I understand the proposal; the solution is to nationalize the coal mines as public property and lease them back to their current owner/operators under direct governmental supervision. Some of the mines, to ensure that there is no interruption of the needed coal supplies to our national economy; shall be seized and operated as federal work centers where malefactors and convicts can reform themselves and become rehabilitated useful legal citizens by the extraction of coal as part of their education in righteousness. Most of these federalized mines are slated to be seized in West Virginia, but the problem area in Washington Territory, you brought to my attention, and which I passed forward, has been declared an act of sedition by Garland and it will get the same exact federal prison camp treatment, too. I am sorry for this disaster. For the Bashon Law Group, Elias Mathew Vashon LLD ====================================================== 47 1st Ave, Boston, Mass 10 October 1888 Elias Mathew Vashon C/O The Bashon Law Firm PLLC 1634 K Street NW Ste 300, Washington, DC Elias: Garland is an Unreconstructed Confederate, who was involved in the Bell Telephone Scandal, from which we recently narrowly escaped at ACME. Endicott is a raving lunatic, who has this childish fascination with forts and things that go boom. How did you let them arrive into this problem, and so let it whirl out of your hands? I am annoyed, but I am more disappointed. You have much amiss to rectify here to restore my trust in you. Still your friend: Irene Davenport Tesla DME BNY.
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 14:57:51 GMT
A Thesis that might be interesting for what is coming next: Read it at the cited link. For those too long did not read people: here is the summary: =============================================================================== It was poor decision-making, but there were at the time supposed " good reasons". For the trapdoor, actually the Allins conversions and new builds, the reasons for the choice of this system were multiple: a. Congress mandated a single bullet bore diameter and use of existent armory tools and machines for the federally made replacement to the half dozen different rifles and bullet bores in the American army inventory. The rifle and the carbine could use different load charges to match the different recoil characteristics between rifle and carbine, but in that same legislation, the Congress demanded the cheapest and the simplest and most robust weapons and bullets the federal arsenals could make, with a deliberate bias for arms conversions, if it was possible to be built into the testing and proofing. Congress wanted to get some more use out of all those civil war muskets. b. About 40 different systems were tested, I mean TESTED by issuing test examples to soldiers of all qualities and trainings under simulated field conditions anywhere in the United States to be expected with deliberate weapon fail stressing built into the tests. I wish our interwar torpedoes had been tested this thoroughly. c. Statistical analysis later, the simplest to make, cheapest and most robust weapon was the "Trapdoor Springfield" in .45 caliber either rifle or carbine load. It had recognized problems with copper cartridge case extraction that the Army was prepared to accept since brass shell cases were on the way, but the other contender, the Remington Rolling Block, was also a single shot and cost twice as much to make. Both guns were close enough to be near matches. The army went with the cheaper option. Sometimes you need a Winchester and brass cartridges sooner than you scheduled. In 1882 the American army looked at the Winchester Hotchkiss, Remington Lee and the Chaffee Reese bolt action magazine rifles.l The Chaffee Reese became a club due to weather effects and some parts fragility issues. The Winchester Hotchkiss was "complicated and expensive" and privates could hurt themselves with it. The Remington Lee which the NAVY adopted, was also army rejected as lacking a bullet cutoff, and potentially susceptible to accidental discharge in the process of loading. This could have been solved with training, but the army in its wisdom decided that privates were not as smart as officers and would not be easy to mass train in safety procedures. That last assumption was kind of novel since the standard army dictum was that a Marine was dumber than an army mule, much less an army private. The NAVY was happy to issue 10,000 Remington Lees to the Marines. Marines might occasionally shoot each other by accident , but that was the cost of doing business in a Dreyse Needle Gun world. The navy needed a magazine feed rifle and this was the best America could make, or for that matter the world at the time. The army fouled up that one; but they tried over 53 different systems before they rejected ALL of them. Enter smokeless powder in 1886 in France. The French rush out the Lebel rifle in 1888 *( Paul-Marie-Eugène Vieille) and suddenly the smallish American Army has the nightmare of the Mexican Army armed with French rifles. Maybe that Model 1882 Remington Lee was not such a bad rifle? No. Remington was happy with its Navy contracts, thank you. There were other reasons, such as American chemists (Specifically Hudson Maxim, the brother of Henry Maxim, who deserted his country to sell machine guns to the Europeans. Hudson was not a traitor. like his brother He was a patriotic chemist.), had not worked out how nitrocellulose propellants were made yet, and the British kept blowing themselves up and the French were not sharing and neither were the Germans. In the real history, it will be 1904 before the new American double base powders (6 of them!) replace the Belgian Wetteran nitro-powder which the American army had to purchase to test out another 53 designs of smokeless powder rifles, the initial trials which began in 1890. So how did the Krag of all rifles make it in that rather similar to the 1872 testing protocol program^1? Both Lees **(The 6 mm one the Navy will adopt in 1894 and the reworked Remington Lee in the new 0.30 inch bullet bore diameter that Adelbert Buffington, who was the Army officer in charge for these tests, just pulled out of thin air, which is to say he picked a number and told his people to design the bullet.to it. M.) were arguably much better as was the MAUSER. ^1 Daniel Werbster Flagler, Chief of US Army Ordnance Branch, rigged the results. He had an economic interest in seeing that the Krag won.
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Post by Avatar on Oct 20, 2023 15:17:27 GMT
Did you know how much of a Lege Ferende president Grover Cleveland was? One of the reasons he did not nominate a replacement vice president after Thomas A. Hendricks died on him, was that he wanted to avoid Senate oversight of his "decrees".
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