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Battle Of Isandlwana
The Battle of Isandlwana (alternative spelling: Isandhlwana) on 22 January 1879 was the first major encounter in the Anglo-Zulu War between the British Empire and the Zulu Kingdom. Eleven days after the British invaded the Zulu Kingdom, Zululand Empire in Southern Africa, a Zulu force of some 20,000 warriors attacked a portion of the British main column consisting of approximately 1,800 British, colonial and native troops with approximately 350 civilians. The Zulus were equipped mainly with the traditional assegai iron spears and cow-hide shields, but also had a number of muskets and antiquated rifles.Smith-Dorrien, Chapter 1B "It was a marvellous sight, line upon line of men in slightly extended order, one behind the other, firing as they came along, for ''a few of them had firearms'', bearing all before them." eyewitness account, emphasis added The British and colonial troops were armed with the modern Martini–Henry breechloader, breechloading rifle and two RML 7-pounder moun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anglo-Zulu War
The Anglo-Zulu War was fought in present-day South Africa from January to early July 1879 between forces of the British Empire and the Zulu Kingdom. Two famous battles of the war were the Zulu victory at Battle of Isandlwana, Isandlwana and the British defence at Battle of Rorke's Drift, Rorke's Drift. Following the passing of the British North America Act 1867 forming a federation in Canada, Henry Herbert, 4th Earl of Carnarvon, Lord Carnarvon thought that a similar political effort, coupled with military campaigns, might lead to a ruling white minority over a black majority in South Africa. This would yield a large pool of cheap labour for the British sugar plantations and mines, and was intended to bring the African Kingdoms, tribal areas, and Boer republics into South Africa. In 1874, Sir Henry Bartle Frere, Bartle Frere was appointed as British High Commissioner for Southern Africa to effect such plans. Among the obstacles were the armed independent states of the South ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Impi
is a Nguni word meaning war or combat and by association any body of men gathered for war, for example is a term denoting an army. were formed from regiments () from large militarised homesteads (). In English is often used to refer to a Zulu regiment, which is called an in Zulu, or the army of the Zulu Kingdom. Its beginnings lie far back in historic local warfare customs, when groups of armed men called battled. They were systematised radically by the Zulu king Shaka, who was then only the exiled illegitimate son of king Senzangakhona kaJama, but already showing much prowess as a general in the army () of Mthethwa king Dingiswayo in the Ndwandwe–Zulu War of 1817–1819. Genesis The Zulu impi is popularly identified with the ascent of Shaka, ruler of the relatively small Zulu tribe before its explosion across the landscape of southern Africa, but its earliest shape as an instrument of statecraft lies in the innovations of the Mthethwa chieftain Dingiswayo, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cetshwayo
Cetshwayo kaMpande (; ; 1826 – 8 February 1884) was the king of the Zulu Kingdom from 1873 to 1884 and its Commander in Chief during the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879. His name has been transliterated as Cetywayo or Cetshwayo. Cetshwayo consistently opposed the war and sought fruitlessly to make peace with the British and was defeated and exiled following the Zulu defeat in the war. He was later allowed to return to Zululand, where he died in 1884. Early life Cetshwayo was a son of Zulu king Mpande and Queen Ngqumbazi, half-nephew of Zulu king Shaka and grandson of Senzangakhona. In 1856 he defeated and killed in battle his younger brother Mbuyazi, Mpande's favourite, at the Battle of Ndondakusuka. Almost all of Mbuyazi's followers were massacred in the aftermath of the battle, including five of Cetshwayo's brothers. Following this he became the ruler of the Zulu people in everything but name. However, he did not ascend to the throne as his father was still alive. Stories from that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Hale (British Inventor)
William Hale (21 October 1797 – 30 March 1870), was a Great Britain, British inventor and rocket pioneer. Biography Hale was born in Colchester, England in 1797. He was self-taught although his grandfather, the educator William Cole, is believed to have tutored him. By 1827 he had obtained his first patent; he also won a first class Gold Medal of the Royal Society of Arts in Paris for his paper on ship propulsion using an early form of jet propulsion. Hale was inducted into the International Space Hall of Fame in 2004. Rocketry In 1844, Hale patented a new form of rotary rocket that improved on the earlier Congreve rocket design. Hale removed the guidestick from the design, instead vectoring part of the thrust through canted exhaust holes to provide rotation of the rocket, which improved its stability in flight. These rockets could weigh up to and were noted for their glare and noise on ignition. Hale rockets were first used by the United States Army in the Mexica ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
RML 7-pounder Mountain Gun
The Ordnance List of British ordnance terms#RML, RML 7-pounder Mk IV "Steel Gun" was a British Rifled muzzle-loader, rifled muzzle-loading mountain gun. 7-pounder referred to the approximate weight of the shell it fired. History Development began in 1864 to replace the List of British ordnance terms#RBL, RBL 6-pounder gun of , which had proved too heavy for a mountain gun. Several Mks of 7-pounder RML of were tried in 1865 by boring out and rifling old List of British ordnance terms#SBML, SBML bronze guns, but were still too heavy.Ruffell Several Mks of new steel barrels (the first British all-steel gun, hence the name "Steel Gun") were then produced of and but were not considered powerful enough. Mk IV of with a longer bore was settled on for production in 1873. It was superseded by the RML 2.5-inch Mountain Gun from 1879. Combat use It could be assembled and a round loaded in 20 seconds. Its List of British ordnance terms#Common Shell, common shell was considered ine ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Breechloader
A breechloader is a firearm in which the user loads the ammunition from the breech end of the barrel (i.e., from the rearward, open end of the gun's barrel), as opposed to a muzzleloader, in which the user loads the ammunition from the ( muzzle) end of the barrel. The vast majority of modern firearms are generally breech-loaders, while firearms made before the mid-19th century were mostly smoothbore muzzle-loaders. Only a few muzzleloading weapons, such as mortars, rifle grenades, some rocket launchers, such as the Panzerfaust 3 and RPG-7, and the GP series grenade launchers, have remained in common usage in modern military conflicts. However, referring to a weapon explicitly as breech-loading is mostly limited to weapons where the operator loads ammunition by hand (and not by operating a mechanism such as a bolt-action), such as artillery pieces or break-action small arms. Breech-loading provides the advantage of reduced reloading time because it is far quicker to loa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Martini–Henry
The Martini–Henry is a breech-loading single-shot rifle with a lever action that was used by the British Army. It first entered service in 1871, eventually replacing the Snider–Enfield, a muzzle-loader converted to the cartridge system. Martini–Henry variants were used throughout the British Empire for 47 years. It combined the dropping-block action first developed by Henry O. Peabody (in his Peabody rifle) and improved by the Swiss designer Friedrich von Martini, combined with the polygonal rifling designed by Scotsman Alexander Henry. Though the Snider was the first breechloader firing a metallic cartridge in regular British service, the Martini was designed from the outset as a breechloader and was both faster firing and had a longer range. The Martini–Henry was copied on a large scale by North-West Frontier Province gunsmiths. Their weapons were of a poorer quality than those made by Royal Small Arms Factory, Enfield, but accurately copied down to the proof ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rifle
A rifle is a long gun, long-barreled firearm designed for accurate shooting and higher stopping power, with a gun barrel, barrel that has a helical or spiralling pattern of grooves (rifling) cut into the bore wall. In keeping with their focus on accuracy, rifles are typically designed to be held with both hands and braced firmly against the shooter's shoulder via a buttstock for stability during shooting. Rifles are used in warfare, law enforcement, hunting and shooting sports, target shooting sports. The invention of rifling separated such firearms from the earlier smoothbore weapons (e.g., arquebuses, muskets, and other long guns), greatly elevating their accuracy and general effectiveness. The raised areas of a barrel's rifling are called ''lands''; they make contact with and exert torque on the projectile as it moves down the bore, imparting a spin. When the projectile leaves the barrel, this spin persists and lends gyroscopic stability to the projectile due to conservatio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Musket
A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket gradually disappeared as the use of heavy armour declined, but ''musket'' continued as the generic term for smoothbore long guns until the mid-19th century. In turn, this style of musket was retired in the 19th century when rifled muskets (simply called rifles in modern terminology) using the Minié ball (invented by Claude-Étienne Minié in 1849) became common. The development of breech-loading firearms using self-contained Cartridge (firearms), cartridges, introduced by Casimir Lefaucheux in 1835, began to make muskets obsolete. The first reliable repeating rifles, the 1860 Henry rifle and its 1866 descendent the Winchester rifle, superseded muskets entirely. Repeating rifles quickly established themselves as the standard for rifle design, ending the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Assegai
An assegai or assagai is a polearm used for throwing, usually a light spear or javelin made up of a wooden handle with an iron tip. Area of use The use of various types of the assegai was widespread all over Africa and it was the most common weapon used before the introduction of firearms. The Zulu, Xhosa, and other Nguni tribes of South Africa were renowned for their use of the assegai. ''Iklwa'' Shaka of the Zulu popularized the use of the shorter stabbing spear with a shaft and a larger, broader blade long in warfare, which was traditionally used primarily as a hunting spear. This weapon is otherwise known as the ''iklwa'' or ''ixwa'', after the sound that was heard as it was withdrawn from the victim's wound. The traditional spear was not abandoned, but was thrown from range at enemy formations before closing in for close quarters battle with the iklwa. This tactical combination originated during Shaka's military reforms. This weapon was typically used with one hand ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Southern Africa
Southern Africa is the southernmost region of Africa. No definition is agreed upon, but some groupings include the United Nations geoscheme for Africa, United Nations geoscheme, the intergovernmental Southern African Development Community, and the #Definitions and Usage, physical geography definition based on the physical characteristics of the land. The most restrictive definition considers the region of Southern Africa to consist of Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Namibia, and South Africa, while other definitions also include several other countries from the area. Defined by physical geography, Southern Africa is home to several river systems; the Zambezi, Zambezi River is the most prominent. The Zambezi flows from the northwest corner of Zambia and western Angola to the Indian Ocean on the coast of Mozambique. Along the way, it flows over Victoria Falls on the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe. Victoria Falls is one of the largest waterfalls in the world and a major tourist a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the English overseas possessions, overseas possessions and trading posts established by Kingdom of England, England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, and colonisation attempts by Kingdom of Scotland, Scotland during the 17th century. At its height in the 19th and early 20th centuries, it became the List of largest empires, largest empire in history and, for a century, was the foremost global power. By 1913, the British Empire held sway over 412 million people, of the world population at the time, and by 1920, it covered , of the Earth's total land area. As a result, Westminster system, its constitutional, Common law, legal, English language, linguistic, and Culture of the United Kingdom, cultural legacy is widespread. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
