From nothing earlier than 1872 is the Memory of an aerial propulsion method.

-Mr. Federico Gómez Arias, director of the Nautical School in Barcelona, ​​proposed a rocket engine to propel a manned vehicle through space.

“First page of the memory”

-Document had by title "Elevation and direction of devices heavier than the atmosphere".

-It is also mentioned "that the device, raised by the air, will offer a surprising aspect; the continuous boom of its detonations will reveal the bellowing of the Lord of the clouds".

“Gómez-Arias's machine”

-It was expected to run on gunpowder, nitrocellulose, nitroglycerin including hydrogen and oxygen (!).

-It had a horizontal chamber with ignitions of various electrical or pyrotechnic types, even by injection of acids through a capillary tube, which is already mentioned as a hypergolic ignition in the year 1872. He advanced on other researchers such as Kibaltchich and Ganswindt.

“Gómez-Arias's engine, two views”