Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2013 December 31

= December 31 =

Military quotation
A military commentator, discussing (I think) the Congreve rocket in Napoleonic times (or thereabouts), said something along the lines of "If rockets had been invented before guns, the inventor of the gun would be hailed as the greatest engineer of all time." What's the exact quote, and who said it? Tevildo (talk) 00:55, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I've read that quote before, but I've just spent a very frustrating half-hour or more sifting through the dark recesses of Google to no avail. Maybe I'll have another go tomorrow. I have an idea that it was later, maybe in the Crimean War. Alansplodge (talk) 02:05, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I have posted a link to this question at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history - hopefully one of their regulars will know. Alansplodge (talk) 11:59, 2 January 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks again for your help. Not knowing any of the exact words makes it a bit of a pain to search for, as I'm sure we've both discovered. Tevildo (talk) 23:28, 2 January 2014 (UTC)
 * The annoying thing is that I've seen it fairly recently, in connection to an edit that I made on Rocket launcher in October, although it's not in the references that I actually included. Alansplodge (talk) 12:33, 3 January 2014 (UTC)