This is an excellent example of the bomb lance, patented in 1852 by C. C. Brand of Ledyard, Conn. Bomb lances were developed to administer the coup de grace on whales that had been harpooned and then fought to exhaustion. The devices were fired from heavy duty “ bomb lance” shoulder guns carried in the whale boats that did the harpooning. Inherently dangerous to use from a pitching boat, bomb lances found their greatest in the Arctic whale fishery after the 1850s. In the calmer, ice infested waters of he Beaufort and Chuckchi Seas they found favor with whalers. The bomb lance is essentially a tube filled with black powder that was muzzle loaded into the shoulder gun, and then fired toward a whale using a 10 guage shotgun shell to power the bomb lance. When fired, the explosion lighted an internal fuse in the lance that caused the device to explode a few seconds after firing.
Brand’s version of the bomb lance utized an iron tube to hold the charge. This was the smallest size of Brand’s four types, with a diameter of 7/8”. The point of the lance has three edges. When he device left the muzzle of the gun a set of three India rubber“vanes” (like the fletching of an arrow) unfolded to stabillize the trajeetory of lance. This example is unmarked (the original paper label has been lost), but the rubber vanes are present, and in much better condition than they are usually found.
I have disassembled the bomb lance to make sure that it is not loaded, and is safe to handle. In internal fuse is present, but not a trace of he black powder remains. This is an exceptionally nice example of a bomb lance. Fine
Price - $290.00