What this this Scottish vicar, Reverend Alexander Forsyth, patent in 1807?
a) The chocolate wheel
b) Bingo
c) The percussion lock gun

Answer below.













c) The percussion lock gun. Why a reverend would have need for a gun is a mystery but this Aberdeenshire minister invented and patented the percussion lock gun which fires after the gun's hammer hits a shock-sensitive chemical button held in a nipple screwed into the barrel. Percussion locks replaced flintlock guns which were modified by preplacing the flint and frizzen of the flintlock with a hammer and nipple. Percussion lock guns, easier to load, weather-resistant and more reliable than flintlocks, were used exclusively by both armies during the American Civil War.