Good evening,
I found this digging the web.
First picture : William Parlour percussion grenade from 1834. Rejected by the Ordnance Board.
Second picture : Called 'Hale safety hand grenade'
Third picture : Called 'Rope handle hand grenade thrown by swinging'. (Seems to be a HALES J PATTERN ?). Something similar on Paul Spence's website (No 2 'Converted to Arial Bomb')
(pic no. 2 & 3 found via google images on http://www.illustratedfirstworldwar.com, but website is unavailable).
Does anyone have more information about those grenades ?
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It is possible that the first grenade is a 'Norton' rather than Parlour's grenade. They are clearly very similar from the content of the letter rejecting Parlour's invention, which reads:
"Sir,
I have the honour to report that, in obedience to your commands signified in Lt Col Couper's letter of the 22nd ult, I submitted to the Select Committee the enclosed papers from Mr Parlour, with a detonating hand grenade of his invention.
The Committee, having read the letter from Mr Parlour and its enclosure, and examined the hand grenade of his invention, beg to state that a proposal very nearly on the same principle, was made in August 1828. by Captain Norton, 34th Regiment, when the Committee reported that they considered the contrivance ingenious, but not applicable to His Majesty's Service to which they adhere upon the present occasion.
I have the honour to be Sir,
Your most obedient
humble Servant
William Millars"
Couper was Secretary to the Board of Ordnance.
Spencer (1852) and Bucknill (1854) submitted designs for percussion grenades which were similarly rejected.
The second grenade in the photos is subject to a Hales patent which can be found on-line. It did not get into British Service.
The third grenade is Hales Military Shrapnel Grenade dating from 1913/14. The example shown has a clip to fit the nose of an SMLE rifle suggesting that it was one of the 'Brazilian Pattern' grenades requisitioned by the War Office from the Cotton Powder Company at the beginning of WW1. Brazil had ordered them for riot-control purposes. The rope tail which could be used for hand throwing the grenade was purchased by the War Office to convert 'Mexican Pattern' (No 2 Grenades) from rifle use to aerial bombs.
