The rockets’ red glare in the Star-Spangled Banner came from Congreve rockets, some of the most erratic weapons ever fielded. This episode tells the story of the iron-cased rocket and the well-connected inventor, Sir William Congreve, who pushed it onto battlefields around the world.

We start with the iron rockets of Tipu Sultan’s Mysorean army, which inspired Congreve’s designs, and follow how his royal friendship with the Prince Regent helped secure funding and production at Woolwich. We look at the weapon’s long wooden guide stick, its warhead variants, its poor accuracy, and why armies still embraced it for portability, lack of recoil, rate of fire and sheer psychological terror.

• Why iron casings let Mysorean rockets fly far beyond European paper-cased fireworks
• Captain Cavalié Mercer’s account of rockets turning back on their own crews
• How four horses could carry 72 rockets and their launch frames, and why ships could fire them from small boats
• Uses from Leipzig and Bladensburg to Burma, Poland, Paraguay, New Zealand and Greenland whaling trials
• How William Hale’s spin-stabilized rocket replaced it, and its final use firing rescue lines to sinking ships