Bombard

an ancient piece of ordnance, so called, very short, and very thick, with an uncommon large bore. There have been bombards which have thrown a ball or shell of 300 weight: they made use of cranes to load them. The Turks use some of them at present. | To BOMBARD, | | - | | BOMBARDING, | | BOMBARDMENT, | the act of a aulting a city or fortre , by throwing shells into it in order to set fire to and ruin the houses, churches, magazines, . and to do other mischief. As one of the effects of the shell results from its weight, it is never discharged as a ball from a cannon, that is, by pointing it at a certain object: but the mortars are fixed at an elevation of or about 45 degrees; that is, inclined so many degrees from the horizon, that the shell describes a curve, called the military projectile: hence a mortar, whose trunnions are placed at the breech, can have no point-blank range. Mortars should be so contrived, that they may be elevated to any degree required, as much preferable to those fixed at an angle of 45°; because shells should never be thrown at that angle but in one single case only, which seldom happens; that is, when the battery is so far off, that they cannot otherwise reach the works: for when shells are thrown from the trenches into the works of a fortification, or from the town into the trenches, they should have as little elevation as po ible, in order to roll along, and not bury themselves; whereby the damage they do, and the terror they cause to the troops, is much greater than if they sink into the ground. On the contrary, when shells are thrown upon magazines, or any other buildings, with an intention to destroy them, the mortar should be elevated as high as po ible, that the shells may acquire a greater force in their fall. Shells should be loaded with no more powder than is requisite to burst them into the greatest number of pieces, and the length of the fuzes should be exactly calculated according to the required ranges; for, should the fuze set fire to the powder in the shell, before it falls on the place intended, the shell will burst in the air, and probably do more mischief to those who fired the mortar, than to those against whom it was discharged. To prevent this, the fuzes are divided into as many seconds as the greatest range requires, consequently may be cut to any distance, at an elevation of 45 degrees. Mortars are not to be fired with two fires; for when the fuze is properly fixed, and both fuze and shell dredged with mealed powder, the blast of the powder in the chamber of the mortar, when inflamed by the tube, will likewise set fire to the fuze fixed in the shell.