Technikatörténeti szemle 20. (1993)

TANULMÁNYOK - Móra László: Görgey Artúr mint kémikus és haditechnikus

LÁSZLÓ MÓRA: ARTÚR GÖRGEY IN HIS CAPACITY AS A CHEMIST AND MILITARY ENGINEER This year 1993 has seen Hungary to celebrate the 175th anniversary of birth of Artúr Görgey (1818-1916), the commander of Hungarian Revolution and War of Independence in 1848-1849. Commemorations just as books written of him up till now deal almost exclusively with his role as a military commander and politician. But he, after leaving the army of monarchy, graduated from chemistry at the University of Prague in years 1845 through 1848. His dissertation on examination of fatty acids of cocoanut oil had been published both in the Report of Vienna Academy of Sciences (Sitzungsberichte), and in Volume 1848 of Justus Llebig's famous periodical „Annalen der Chemie und Pharmacie". It is less known that Captain Görgey who had volunteered for the defence of his fatherland was first sent — considering that he was a chemist — to Vienna and Prague to purchase ammunition primers and firing-caps (Zündhütchen). Based on his experiences having collected there, he elaborated an expert opinion in August of 1848 with the view to establishing a similar firing-cap factory in Budapest. Relying upon documents preserved in the archives of Görgey family, author is the first to publish the whole text of Görgey's proposal in this paper, In addition to drawing a picture of Görgey's other engineering-related activities.