Category: Weapons and Technology
The Brown Bess – A New Twist on How Britain’s Famous Musket Got Its Name
“The moniker first appeared in print in 1785, yet it clearly had been in soldierly use for a good many years before. The two explanations usually offered for its origin have proven as anachronistic as…
Stalin’s Organ – 10 Surprising Facts About the Katyusha Rocket
“The Katyusha was omnipresent on the Eastern Front and likely contributed as much to the Allied victory as the M4 Sherman tank, the Higgins Boat or the Spitfire.” FOR ANYONE who fought on the Eastern Front in World…
Getting There Was Half the Battle – Inside the Incredible Maiden Voyage of the USS Monitor
“By evening of the second day, a full-force gale engulfed the little convoy. Monitor, with just two feet of freeboard, was singularly ill-designed to weather an ocean storm.” By Walter Topp ON MARCH 9, 1862,…
Cameras Go to War – 100 Years of Combat Photography Gear
“We remember the images, but who remembers the cameras that shot them?” By John Wade THINK OF WAR photography and thoughts turn to the images produced by the likes of Matthew Brady, who battled the…
Civil War Submarines – How North and South Rushed to Win History’s First Undersea Arms Race
“The ill-fated Hunley was just one of a number of submarines and semi-submersibles to see service in the war between North and South. Here are some others.” ON THE NIGHT of Feb. 17, 1864, the 40-foot-long,…
Home Made Arsenal – Nine Ingenious Weapons of the Polish Underground
“Many of the underground’s own submachine guns, grenades and pistols had been secretly mass-produced for years.” IN AUGUST 1944, nearly 20,000 fighters from Poland’s underground Armia Krajowa (AK) or “Home Army,” launched a series of…
