Also known as: the laboratory.
| Role | Making up ammunition and its components |
|---|---|
| Work | Filling cartridges, loading and fuzing shells, making fuzes and primers |
| Hazard | Handling powder and loaded projectiles |
Making up the ammunition
In ordnance usage the laboratory was the establishment where ammunition was assembled: powder charges measured and bagged, shells loaded with their bursting charges and fuzed, fixed rounds put together, and fuzes, primers, and pyrotechnics prepared.
This was careful and dangerous work with powder and loaded projectiles, and the arsenals maintained laboratories, often staffed in part by civilian workers, where the ammunition for the armies was made up.
On this site
Sources & further reading
- United States Army, Ordnance Department. The Ordnance Manual for the Use of the Officers of the United States Army. 2nd ed. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1862.
- CivilWarArtillery.com research archive: manuals, reports, and manufacturing references.