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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: T L Comiskey who wrote (43349)	4/21/2004 10:24:00 AM
From: TigerPaw	Respond to of 89467

A key tactic against northern boats and rail was the black bomb. This would probably be characterised as a terrorist action now. Irregular black iron was used to fashion a hollowed facimile of coal. This was filled with powder and then just tossed into the big piles of coal near railyards and steamship ports. At more or less random intervals these chunks would get shoveled into the firebox of a steam engine along with the coal where they would heat up and explode, often causing a boiler rupture. Some of these remained in the large coal piles for many years after the war, blowing up civilan traffic as well as military craft. TP