7 The 100 Most Influential Inventors of All Time 7

This new projectile could be loaded into dirty rifles with

ease, and, because it was not deformed while loading, it

had greater accuracy.

Officials in several countries, notably Britain and the

United States, saw the significance of Minié’s invention.

In the Crimean War (1854–56), Russian troops armed with

smoothbore muskets were no match for Britons shooting

Minié balls from rifled muskets. Massed formations

were easy prey, as were cavalry and artillery units. A cor-

respondent for the Times of London wrote: “The Minié is

king of weapons... the volleys of the Minié cleft [Russian

soldiers] like the hand of the Destroying Angel.” The

American Civil War, in which both sides fielded Minié-

type infantry weapons, clearly demonstrated the deadly

effect of rifled muskets, although many battlefield com-

manders only slowly appreciated the changing nature of

warfare. Individual soldiers could hit their opposing

numbers with accurate fire out to 250 yards (223 metres),

so that frontal assaults, in which soldiers advanced in neat

ranks across open fields, had to be abandoned. By 1862 both

sides were building field entrenchments and barricades to

provide protection from rifle and artillery fire.

Minié was rewarded by the French government with

20,000 francs and an appointment to the staff of the

military school at Vincennes. After retiring in 1858 with

the rank of colonel, he served as a military instructor for the

khedive of Egypt and as a manager at the Remington Arms

Company in the United States.

Louis Braille

(b. Jan. 4, 1809, Coupvray, near Paris, France—d. Jan. 6, 1852, Paris)

L

ouis Braille was a French educator who developed a

system of printing and writing that is extensively used

by the blind and that was named for him.