Two gunmen drawing on each other in the middle of town was actually a rare occurrence in the American west. Still, it did happen, and most historians agree that the first example came July 21, 1865, and involved one of the west’s most famous gunfighters.
During the civil war, the manufacture of powder and explosives was often handled by the most vulnerable, young women and children, whose labor was needed when so many men had been sent off to war. On March 13, 1863, the confederacy experienced a munitions disaster, in the confederate capitol of Richmond.