Good day again to you, young Inventor.
Since our last meeting, your mind must be a-whirl with ideas and plans to make your undersea weapon of war a reality.
Let’s temper that reality by understanding that, though you may indeed be the One With The Idea, it will take more than you to give that idea form and substance.
Good day to you, young Inventor.
You are to be congratulated.
You hold in your hand the Inventor’s Vade Mecum, a handbook for you to use whatever, wherever, whenever and, most important of all, why-ever you have questions or need assistance in your chosen field of endeavor.
Your enthusiasm for the field of maritime engineering at this moment in our country’s history places you at the forefront in the development and construction of nautical devices and mechanisms that will astound and discomfit our country’s foes.
Using your knowledge and that of your team plus the latest tools and methods that 19th century science and industry can provide and the steps found in this Vade Mecum, you should encounter fewer interruptions and delays in making your latest technological marvel the Wonder of the Age.
It was a United States $20 gold piece that started it all.
A badly dented $20 gold coin, minted by the U.S. Treasury in 1860.
A gift from a young lady named Queenie to her beau, Lieutenant George E. Dixon, formerly attached to the 21st Alabama Regular Infantry, Confederate Army of Mississippi.
The coin got its dent on April 6th, 1862 during the battle of Shiloh in Tennessee.
That day, the 21st Alabama lost six color bearers and over two hundred casualties fighting over a thicket on that bloody battlefield; a thicket that became known as “The Hornet’s Nest” by those who fought there.
During the battle, a Yankee minie ball struck Dixon in the left thigh. The force of the bullet’s impact was dissipated by its striking the $20 gold piece in his trouser pocket.
The dented gold piece not only saved Dixon’s leg, it probably saved his life as well.
Dixon certainly seemed to think so.
