Tipu Sultan, the great technologist and warrior who invented and first time used the iron- cased rockets

http://history.msfc.nasa.gov/rocketry/11.html
The English confrontation with Indian rockets came in 1780 at the Battle of Guntur. The closely massed, normally unflinching British troops broke and ran when the Indian Army laid down a rocket barrage in their midst.
Mysorean rockets were the first iron-cased rockets that were successfully deployed for military use. Hyder Ali, the 18th century ruler of Mysore, and his son and successor, Tipu Sultan used them effectively against the British East India Company. Their conflicts with the company exposed the British to this technology, which was then used to advance European rocketry with the development of the Congreve rocket.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mysorean_rockets
A military tactic developed by Tipu Sultan and his father, Hyder Ali, was the use of mass attacks with rocket artillery brigades on infantry formations. Tipu Sultan wrote a military manual called Fathul Mujahidin in which 200 rocket men were prescribed to each Mysorean rocket artillery brigade known as Qushoon. Mysore had 16 to 24 Qushoons of infantry. The areas of town where rockets and fireworks were manufactured were known as Taramandal Pet (\"Galaxy Market\").
Hyder Ali and his son Tipu Sultan organized Rocket artillery brigades, or Qushoons, against the British East India Company during the Anglo-Mysore Wars. The rocket men were trained to launch their rockets at an angle calculated from the diameter of the cylinder and the distance of the target. In addition, wheeled rocket launchers capable of launching five to ten rockets almost simultaneously were used in war. Rockets could be of various sizes, but usually consisted of a tube of soft hammered iron about 8 inches (200 mm) long and 1.5 to 3 inches (38 to 76 mm) diameter, closed at one end and strapped to a shaft of bamboo about 4 ft long. The iron tube acted as a combustion chamber and contained well packed black powder propellant. A rocket carrying about one pound of powder could travel almost 1,000 yards (910 m).
In contrast, rockets in Europe, not being iron cased, could not take large chamber pressures and as a consequence were not capable of reaching distances anywhere near as great.[1] Hyder Ali\'s father, the Naik or chief constable at Budikote, commanded 50 rocketmen for the Nawab of Arcot. There was a regular Rocket Corps in the Mysore Army, beginning with about 1200 men in Hyder Ali\'s time. Hyder Ali introduced the first iron cased rockets in warfare.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congreve_rocket
A revival commenced late in the 18th century in India. There Hyder Ali, prince of Mysore, developed war rockets with an important change: the use of metal cylinders to contain the combustion powder. Although the hammered soft iron he used was crude, the bursting strength of the container of black powder was much higher than the earlier paper construction. Thus a greater internal pressure was possible, with a resultant greater thrust of the propulsive jet.
The rocket body was lashed with leather thongs to a long bamboo stick. Range was perhaps up to three-quarters of a mile (more than a kilometre). Although individually these rockets were not accurate, dispersion error became less important when large numbers were fired rapidly in mass attacks. They were particularly effective against cavalry and were hurled into the air, after lighting, or skimmed along the hard dry ground. Hyder Ali’s son, Tippu Sultan, continued to develop and expand the use of rocket weapons, reportedly increasing the number of rocket troops from 1,200 to a corps of 5,000. In battles at Seringapatam in 1792 and 1799 these rockets were used with considerable effect against the British.
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/1357360/rocket-and-missile-system/57311/The-19th-century