Ingenious Applications of Steam Power

(Page 3 of 3)

November/December 2003
Dr. Robert T. Rhode 
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THE VILLAR AND TALBOT STEAM LAND TORPEDO

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Patented in 1917, the land torpedo was the invention of Victor A. Villar of New York and Stafford C. Talbot of London. The purpose of the land torpedo was to open a channel through obstacles, such as barbed wire, protecting an entrenched enemy force. In World War I, the only ways to attack a defensive position were to wage a manual assault at great loss of life or to bombard entanglements from a distance a slow and costly endeavor, as artillery projectiles tended to pass through barbed wire without exploding. In their patent application of 1915, Villar and Talbot proposed transporting a torpedo (7 in the drawing) across no-man's-land by means of a two-cylinder steam engine (5) and boiler (6). The engine was to be manufactured inexpensively, as it would, in all likelihood, be destroyed by the blast. If one wanted to retrieve the engine, which had no reversing mechanism, the control cable (9) could bring it back. Villar and Talbot believed that their torpedo could detonate powerfully enough to clear an area for a large attacking force to charge through enemy lines. Does anyone know if the Villar and Talbot land torpedo was ever produced?

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I want to thank my colleague Dr. Jonathan Cullick, director of writing programs at Northern Kentucky University, for sharing information on steam-powered airplanes; Scott Lengle, a student in my course entitled 'The Machine and the Garden,' for introducing me to the Confederate cigar boats; and Charles C. Rhode for scanning the image of the Winans gun from his 1893 edition of The Soldier in Our Civil War.

Steam historian and author Dr. Robert T. Rhode is on the faculty of Northern Kentucky University. Contact him at 990 West Lower Springboro Road, Springboro, OH 45066, or email: case65@earthlink.net

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