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The mill used to grind the powder was driven by water from a mill pond formed by a dam across the original stream. The mill was the scene of three explosions, before its eventual closure, in which several workers died (one of whom, according to a rather ghoulish contemporary newspaper report, was blown into five, named, pieces).
More than 2.75 million pounds of first-quality gunpowder (a majority of the powder used by the Confederacy) were produced before its closure in 1865. [5] By comparison, Union gunpowder manufacture was distributed among many mills, with the larger Hazard Powder Company of Connecticut producing 40% of the annual production of 8.4 million pounds. [6]
Powder mills were originally powered by windmills, water mills or horse mills. Despite later availability of steam engines, the older power sources did not require a fire to generate steam, and avoided the possibility of sparks which might ignite the gunpowder. Some 20th-century powder mills used electric power.
King's Mead Mill is a four-storey smock mill on a single-storey brick base. It has a Kentish-style cap winded by a fantail.When working it had four shuttered sails carried on a cast-iron windshaft, driving three pairs of millstones.
Oriental Powder Company was a gunpowder manufacturer with mills located on the Presumpscot River in Gorham and Windham, Maine. The company was one of the four largest suppliers to Union forces through the American Civil War .
Schaghticoke Powder Company was a powder mill located in Rensselaer County, New York in the village of Schaghticoke. The powder mill was founded by Josiah Masters and Nicholas Masters in 1813 for the supply of gunpowder during the War of 1812 .
Manufacturing facilities were dispersed along the 2-mile (3.2 km) power canal to minimize damage during infrequent explosions. King's son-in-law Gershom Moore Peters began working at the powder mill in 1881 and became president of the powder company when King died in 1885. Peters formed the Peters Cartridge Company at Kings Mills in 1887.
American Powder Mills (1883–1929) was a Massachusetts gunpowder manufacturing complex on the Assabet River. It expanded to include forty buildings along both sides of the river in the towns of Acton , Concord , Maynard , and Sudbury .