As the U.S. Civil War raged on, Scientific American devoted much space to covering the military news. We also devoted space to our bread-and-butter business back then, inventions, including those designed for use in the war.

War is a lot about attack and defense; it is also about supplying all of the needs of the armies and navies and countries that are attempting to wage war more effectively than the adversary. Weapons, fortifications, care of the wounded, arms production--these aspects of the “grim enginery of war” [Scientific American, April 4, 1863] feature in these images of inventions from our archives in 1863. Some concepts were useful, some were ridiculous, and some bore within them the germ of an idea that was developed much later.

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5 Comments

1. 1. RobLL 01:06 PM 3/2/13

   Any reason I cannot see the slide show and am asked to subscribe. I am a subscriber and have been for most of my life - long retired - Rob

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2. 2. thevillagegeek 01:18 PM 3/2/13

   Somebody invented a slide show so fast it cannot be seen by the human eye.

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3. 3. Robin Lloyd 02:00 PM 3/2/13

   Sorry for the missing slides here. We'll try to fix this asap.

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4. 4. jbairddo 07:18 AM 3/3/13

   NO, I think astonishing is some one with no ability to spell thinks SA readers are dumb enough to fall for your scam. Or maybe the prison computer doesn't have spell check.

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5. 5. PDLARK 01:27 PM 3/3/13

   With the difficulties that SA has with filtering junk advertising and with making content accessible to subscribers, SA needs to find some new talent. These are easy problems technically. There are a large number of very talented but unemployed folks out there.

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