So much for the explosive ball "sent by the Confederates."
In the same volume of the Patent Office Reports will be found also the following:
No. 36,197—Ira W. Shaler, of Brooklyn, New York, and Reuben Shaler, of Madison, Connecticut, assigned to Ira W. Shaler aforesaid—Improvement in Compound Bullet for Small Arms—Patent dated August 12, 1862.
This projectile is composed of two or more parts which fit the bore of the barrel and so constructed that the forward end of each of the parts in the rear of the front one enters a cavity in the rear of the one before it, and is formed in relation to the same in such a manner as to separate from it after leaving the barrel of the gun and make a slight deviation in its line of flight from that of its predecessor.
Claim—The projectile hereinbefore described, made up of two or more parts, each of equal diameter, constructed as set forth so as to separate from each other.
No illustration of this projectile appears in the illustrated volume of patents; but an official drawing of it from the Patent Office lies before me. The ball is slightly different from figure B (supra), in that it is here perfect, and figure B gives but two parts of the missile.
So much for the poisoned ball "sent by the Confederates."
Any person ought to know perfectly well that it was not necessary to invent or construct a rifle ball especially adapted to carry poison, when the common minnie ball itself, dipped into liquid poison and coated, as ball cartridges are usually finished, with wax or tallow, would have effected the same purpose.
To what extent the bullets of Williams and Shaler were used during the late war by the United States troops, the following official communication from the War Department at Washington, under date of September 16, 1879, will show:
Sir—In reply to your letter of the 9th instant to the Secretary of War, I have to inform you that during the late war a great many of the bullets patented by Elijah D. Williams and about 200,000 of those patented by Ira W. Shaler were used by the United States.
Respectfully, your obedient servant,
In the fourth place, in repelling and refuting the charge against the Confederates of having used explosive musket or rifle projectiles, I charge the United States Government with not only patent--
