Battles & Wars › Industrial wars
Alfred Nobel: dynamite, smokeless powder and Bofors
1833–1896; dynamite 1867; bought Bofors 1894· Person· Arms makers & war industry
Well documentedSolid records, physical evidence or scientific consensus.
Swedish chemist and industrialist who invented dynamite and a smokeless powder, owned the gunmaker Bofors, and endowed the Nobel Prizes.
See it on the Battles & Wars map →What happened
Born in Stockholm in 1833, Nobel grew up in St Petersburg, where his father made naval mines for Russia. He tamed unstable nitroglycerin with a blasting cap (1863) and dynamite (1867), a safer paste used mainly for mines, tunnels and railways. An 1864 explosion killed his younger brother Emil. His smokeless powder, ballistite (1887), helped make modern rifles and machine guns practical. In 1894 he bought Bofors and turned it toward cannon. He held 355 patents.
Why it matters
His explosives built railways and tunnels and armed modern armies. His will left most of his fortune, about 31 million kronor, to fund prizes, including one for peace.
Legacy and how we know
His patents, letters and company records, many held by the Nobel Foundation and Swedish archives, and his 1895 will, which founded the prizes first awarded in 1901.
Still debated
The story that a premature 1888 obituary calling him a 'merchant of death' moved him to create the prizes is widely told, but historians have struggled to trace the original article.
Connections (2)
▸Alfred Nobel: dynamite, smokeless powder and Bofors worked in his father's naval-mine business during the Crimean WarWell documented
The connection
Alfred's father, Immanuel Nobel, made naval mines in St Petersburg that Russia laid to guard Kronstadt and the Baltic against British and French fleets. Young Alfred worked in the family business. When the war ended, orders collapsed and the firm went bankrupt in 1859. Alfred turned to nitroglycerin, leading to his detonator and dynamite.
When and how
St Petersburg and the Gulf of Finland, 1854–56; Immanuel Nobel and his sons Alfred, Ludvig and Robert.
How we know
Nobel family letters, Russian naval records, and British reports of warships damaged by mines in 1855.
Debates and open questions
How much Alfred's later work grew from the mine business, rather than from his chemistry training under Nikolai Zinin, is hard to separate.
▸Alfred Nobel: dynamite, smokeless powder and Bofors built up Bofors, whose guns fought throughout World War IIWell documented
The connection
In 1894 Nobel bought Bofors, an old Swedish ironworks at Karlskoga, and steered it toward making cannon; he died two years later. In the 1930s Bofors designed a 40 mm anti-aircraft gun so good that both sides used it. The US, Britain and others built it under license, and it defended ships and airfields worldwide.
When and how
Karlskoga, Sweden, 1894–96; the 40 mm gun, developed around 1930–34; license production in the US, Britain and elsewhere, 1939–45.
How we know
Bofors company records and Allied ordnance and production records.
Debates and open questions
Nobel's direct role was small: the famous gun came decades after his death, so the link runs through the company he reshaped.