'A Practical Course of Artillery [...]

Bookseller Notes

A richly detailed illustrated manuscript treatise on artillery by Irish army officer and author of books on Canada, George Warburton (1816-57). Born in Galway, Warburton was educated at the Royal Military College in Woolwich, from which he graduated in 1833. This manuscript presents the distillation of his training and provides a comprehensive account of up-to-the-minute artillery theory, as it was taught to cadets at this time. It begins with a laboratory course and continues with lectures on grape shot, signal rockets, fuses, smoke balls, construction of iron guns, sea service mortars, elevation, gunnery practices, notes on gunpowder, and a section on military law. It includes accomplished sketch and illustrations within the text - callipers, signal rockets, gauges, diagrams showing parts of guns and various other pieces of hardware - as well as a fine full-page pen-and-watercolour 'Plan of the Boring Machine'. Many tables for the calculation of distance and tonnage for various types of ordnance, including howitzers, shells and other types of hand-held and heavy ordnance.These years saw a change in the function of the RMA; whereas previously the cadets had been junior military personnel, they were removed from the muster roll and began paying fees for attendance. In this way, the college began to resemble a public school rather than an apprenticing body. In 1844 the RMA is described as accommodating 'about one hundred and thirty young gentlemen, the sons of military men, and the more respectable classes, who are here instructed in mathematics, land-surveying, with mapping, fortification, engineering, the use of the musket and sword exercise, and field-pieces; and for whose use twelve brass cannon, three-pounders, are placed in front of the building, practising with which they acquire a knowledge of their application in the field of battle. This department is under the direction of a lieutenant-general, an instructor, a professor of mathematics, and a professor of fortification; in addition to which there are French, German, and drawing masters'. Warburton's manuscript neatly reflects this curriculum. After a spell at Woolwich Warburton fought in Spain, and was thereafter sent to Montreal, where he began work on what would become two immensely popular and much-reprinted books on the history, customs and topography of Canada. The first was edited by his brother Bartholomew and published anonymously under the title Hochelaga, or, England in the New World (1846). Upon returning home he published The Conquest of Canada. It is alleged that Warburton shot himself following a particularly virulent bout of indigestion. He is buried in Iffley, Oxfordshire (ODNB).See: Edward Mogg, Mogg's New Picture of London and Visitor's Guide to its Sights (1844).