rds, to some extent, were the rationalizations of an old
man, Bessemer's career showed that his philosophy had a practical
foundation; and, if this was indeed his belief, the episode explains in
large measure Bessemer's later insistence on the legal niceties of the
patent procedure. The effect of this will be seen.

Bessemer's intervention in the field of iron and steel was preceded by
a period of experiments in the manufacture of glass. Here Bessemer
claims to have made glass for the first time in the open hearth of a
reverberatory furnace.[11] His work in glass manufacture at least gave
him considerable experience in the problems of fusion under high
temperatures and provided some support for his later claim that in
applying the reverberatory furnace to the manufacture of malleable iron
as described in his first patent of January 1855, he had in some manner
anticipated the work of C. W. Siemens and Emil Martin.[12]

[11] _Ibid._, p. 108 ff.

[12] _Ibid._, p. 141. Bessemer's assertion that he had approached
"within measurable distance" of anticipating the Siemens-Martin
process, made in a paper presented at a meeting of the American
Society of Mechanical Engineers (_Transactions of the American
Society of Mechanical Engineers_, 1897, vol. 28, p. 459), evoked
strong criticism of Bessemer's lack of generosity (_ibid._, p.
482). One commentator, friendly to Bessemer, put it that
"Bessemer's relation to the open-hearth process was very much
like Kelly's to the Bessemer process.... Although he was
measurably near to the open-hearth process, he did not follow it
up and make it a commercial success...." (_ibid._, p. 491).

The general interest in problems of ordnance and armor, stimulated by
the Crimean War (1854-1856), was shared by Bessemer, whose ingenuity
soon produced a design for a projectile which could provide its own
rotation when fired from a smooth-bore gun.[13] Bessemer's failure to
interest the British War Office in the idea led him to submit his
design to the Emperor Napoleon III. Trials made with the encouragement
of the Emperor showed the inadequacy of the cast-iron guns of the
period to deal with the heavier shot; and Bessemer was presented with a
new problem which, with "the open mind which derived from a limited
knowledge of the metallurgy of war," he attacked with impetuosity.
Within three weeks of his experiments in France, he had