During the Civil War gunpowder was very scarce in the Confederacy. And after resorting every means to makeup the shortage. The authorities hit upon the idea of urine as a source of supply.
According, the following advertisement ran in the Alabama Sentinel Selma, Alabama:
"The ladies of Selma are respectfully requested to preserve all their chamber lye collected about their premises for the purpose of making Nitre. Wagons with barrels will be sent around to gather up the lotion"
Signed,
Jonathan Haralson,
Agent Nitre and Mining Bureau.
Confederate States Army
Whereupon a Southern wag made up the following verses:
John Haralson! John Haralson!
You are a funny creature;
You've given to this cruel war
A new and curious feature.
You'd have us think, while every man
Is born to be a fighter,
The women, bless the pretty dears
Should save their pee for nitre.
John Haralson! John Haralson!
Where did you get the notion
To send barrels around our street
To fill them with that lotion?
We thought the girls work enough
With making shirts and kissing:
But you put the lovely dears
To patriotic pissing.
John Haralson! John Haralson!
Pray do invent neater
And a somewhat less immodest way
Of making your saltpetre.
Indeed, the thing is so very odd,
Gunpowder like and cranky,
That when a woman lifts her skirt
She shoots another Yankee!"
They say there is a subtle smell
That lingers in the powder;
That when the smoke grows thicker,
And the din of the battle louder
There was found to this compound
One serious objection;
A soldier can not sniff it
Without having an erection.
Jimbert
Free Forum Hosting
Important Announcement
First 
Return to The Civil War
