Naval contact mine (Jacobi)
Mina naval de contacto (Jacobi)
- Date
- 1853-1855 · confidence medium
- Place
- Kronstadt, Saint Petersburg, Russia
- Credited to
- Moritz von Jacobi and Immanuel Nobel
- Field
- Conflict
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
Gunpowder charges moored underwater with contact or electric fuses to defend harbours. The Russians laid thousands off Kronstadt and Sevastopol in the Crimean War and damaged some British ships.
There are precedents: Ming-era Chinese treatises on sea mines (Huolongjing), Bushnell's 'torpedo' (1777) and Fulton's (1805); Jacobi was the first to deploy contact mines en masse in 1853-1855.
What it led to
- mine warfare in the world wars
- minesweepers
- the torpedo and submarine as complementary weapons