LIFE OF ROBERT STEVENSON.
Edinburgh University Press:
THOMAS AND ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE, PRINTERS TO HER MAJESTY.
[Illustration:
J. SYME DELINEAVIT. J. HORSBURGH SCULPSIT.
ROBERT STEVENSON F.R.S.E.
CIVIL ENGINEER.
_From a bust by Joseph, placed in the Library of the Bell Rock
Lighthouse by the Commissioners of the Northern Lighthouses_]
LIFE
OF
ROBERT STEVENSON
CIVIL ENGINEER
FELLOW OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH; FELLOW OF THE GEOLOGICAL
SOCIETY OF LONDON; FELLOW OF THE ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF
LONDON; MEMBER OF THE SOCIETY OF SCOTTISH ANTIQUARIES,
OF THE WERNERIAN NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, AND OF
THE INSTITUTION OF CIVIL ENGINEERS.
ENGINEER TO THE COMMISSIONERS OF NORTHERN LIGHTHOUSES AND TO
THE CONVENTION OF ROYAL BURGHS OF SCOTLAND, ETC.
BY
DAVID STEVENSON
CIVIL ENGINEER
VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH;
MEMBER OF COUNCIL OF THE INSTITUTION OF CIVIL ENGINEERS, ETC.
ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK, EDINBURGH
E. AND F. N. SPON, LONDON AND NEW YORK
1878.
PREFACE
The addresses made to the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and the
Institution of Civil Engineers, at the opening meetings of the
session--1851, contained obituary notices of Robert Stevenson. The
late Alan Stevenson, his eldest son, also wrote a short Memoir of his
father, which was printed for private circulation.
But Robert Stevenson’s long practice as a Civil Engineer--the
important works he executed--and the valuable contributions he made to
Engineering and Scientific literature, seem to me to require a fuller
notice of his life than has hitherto been given.
This has been attempted in the following Memoir, which will be found
to consist of extracts from Mr. Stevenson’s Professional Reports--of
notes from his Diary--and of communications to Scientific Journals and
Societies, between the years 1798 and 1843, when he retired from active
practice.
These papers embrace a wide field of Engineering, including
Lighthouses, Harbours, Rivers, Roads, Railways, Ferries, Bridges, and
other cognate subjects.
Some of them describe Engineering practice which is now obsolete, but
not on that account, I think, uninteresting to such modern Engineers as
have regard for the antiquities of their Profession.
Some of them, I am aware, can only be appreciated by those who are
specially interested in the city of Edinburgh.
All of them will, I venture to think, be found worthy of preservation
as interesting Engineering records of an era that has passed away. It
formed no part of my duty to criticise them, in the light of modern
Engineering, and, unaltered in form of expression or statement of
opinion, they are now reproduced as they came from my father’s pen.
I offer no apology for presenting these Extracts as the outlines of the
life of one who occupied a prominent place among the Civil Engineers
who practised during the beginning of the present, and end of the
last century, shortly after British Engineering, with Smeaton as its
founder, may be said to have had its origin.
D. S.
EDINBURGH, JULY 1878.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
EARLY LIFE.
PAGE
Birth--Mr. Smith’s improvements in Lighthouse illumination--
Origin of the Scottish Lighthouse Board--Acts as Assistant
to their Engineer--Student at Andersonian Institution,
Glasgow, and University of Edinburgh--Succeeds Mr. Smith
as Engineer to the Northern Lighthouse Board--Tour of
inspection of English lights in 1801--Is taken for a
French spy 1
CHAPTER II.
BELL ROCK LIGHTHOUSE.
Resolves to practise as a Civil Engineer--Journals--Reports--
Design for the Bell Rock Lighthouse--Improvements on Smeaton’s
design--Application to Parliament for Act in 1802--Act of
Parliament passed in 1806--Works begun in 1807--Tender breaks
adrift--Life in the floating light--Boating between the
lightship and the rock--Anxiety for workmen--Sunday work--Life
in the Barrack or Beacon--Visits the Eddystone in 1813 and
1818--Sir Walter Scott’s visit to the Bell Rock 12
CHAPTER III.
LIGHTHOUSE ILLUMINATION.
Early modes of illumination--Facet reflectors and lamps--Silvered
copper reflectors and Argand lamps--Isle of May coal light--
Improvements in catoptric lights--Distinctions for lighthouses
invented by Mr. Stevenson, viz., flashing, intermittent, and
double lights--Floating light lantern--Lighting of stage of
Covent Garden Theatre--Dioptric system of lighthouse
illumination 48
CHAPTER IV.
ROADS.
Early roads and road-making--Edgeworth and M’Adam’s systems of
roads--Stevenson’s system of roads--Cast iron and stone tracks 64
CHAPTER V.
IMPROVEMENT OF EDINBURGH.
Design for approaches to Edinburgh from the East by Regent and
London Roads, and opening up access to the Calton Hill--Sites
for the new Jail and Court of Justiciary, and buildings
in Waterloo Place--Regent Bridge--Feuing Plan for Eastern
District of Edinburgh--Improvement of accesses to Edinburgh
from the West and North, and from Granton--Removal of old
“Tolbooth” Prison--Removal of University Buildings 74
CHAPTER VI.
FERRIES.
Ferry Engineering--Extracts from Report on the Tay Ferries--
Reports on various Ferries--Orkney and Shetland Ferry, etc. 101
CHAPTER VII.
RAILWAYS.
Canals and Railways on one level--Haulage on Railways--Railways
in Scotland--Edinburgh and Midlothian, Stockton and
Darlington, and Edinburgh and London Railways--Uniform gauge
proposed--Notes on Railways for the Highland and Agricultural
Society--Letter from George Stephenson 111
CHAPTER VIII.
HARBOURS AND RIVERS 130
CHAPTER IX.
PRESERVATION OF TIMBER 155
CHAPTER X.
BRIDGES.
Marykirk, Annan, Stirling, and Hutcheson stone bridges--
High-level bridge for Newcastle--Timber bridge of built
planks--Winch Chain Bridge--American bridges of suspension--
Runcorn Bridge--Menai Chain Bridge--New form of suspension
bridge 160
CHAPTER XI.
WOLF ROCK LIGHTHOUSE 168
CHAPTER XII.
CARR ROCK BEACON 177
CHAPTER XIII.
CRANES 181
CHAPTER XIV.
FISHERIES 184
CHAPTER XV.
MARINE SURVEYING 196
CHAPTER XVI.
CONTRIBUTIONS ON ENGINEERING AND SCIENTIFIC SUBJECTS.
Contributions to _Encyclopædia Britannica_ and _Edinburgh
Encyclopædia_--The alveus or bed of the German ocean--Sectio
planography--Wasting effects of the sea at the Mersey and
Dee--Density of fresh and salt water--The Hydrophore 203
CHAPTER XVII.
EXTRACTS FROM EARLY REPORTS.
Wide range of subjects on which Mr. Stevenson gave advice--
Reports on ruins of Aberbrothock Abbey--St. Magnus Cathedral,
and Earl’s Palace, Kirkwall--St. Andrews Cathedral--Montrose
Church Spire--Melville Monument, Edinburgh--Lipping of joints
of masonry with cement--Provision for flood waters in bridges
--Hydraulic mortar--Protection of foreshores--Cycloidal sea
wall--Checking drift sand--Night signal lamps--Cause of heavy
seas in Irish Channel--Sea routes across Irish Channel--Build
of Ships--Prospective increase of population--Tidal scour--
Unscrewing of bolts by the waves--Cement Rubble cofferdams--
Buoyage system--Observations on fog signals--Regulations for
steam vessels--Notes on shipwrecks 236
CHAPTER XVIII.
RETROSPECT OF MR. STEVENSON’S LIFE 264
APPENDIX 274
INDEX 277
LIST OF PLATES.
FRONTISPIECE, _To face Title-page._
_To face page_
I. ELEVATION OF BELL ROCK LIGHTHOUSE, 25
II. SECTION OF BELL ROCK LIGHTHOUSE, 25
III. VIGNETTE OF BELL ROCK LIGHTHOUSE, WITH FACSIMILE OF LINES
WRITTEN IN BELL ROCK ALBUM BY SIR WALTER SCOTT, 47
IV. PLAN OF APPROACHES TO EDINBURGH BY REGENT AND LONDON ROADS,
1814, 77
V. DESIGN FOR BUILDING ON THE CALTON HILL, EDINBURGH, 90
VI. ELEVATIONS OF ANNAN AND MARYKIRK BRIDGES, 160
VII. ELEVATIONS OF HUTCHESON AND STIRLING BRIDGES, 160
VIII. DESIGN FOR HIGH LEVEL ROAD BRIDGE AT NEWCASTLE ON TYNE,
161
IX. DESIGN FOR WOLF ROCK LIGHTHOUSE, 174
X. CARR ROCK BEACON, 179
XI. MOVEABLE JIB AND BALANCE CRANES, 182
XII. CHART OF THE NORTH SEA OR GERMAN OCEAN, WITH SECTIONS OF
THE DEPTHS OF WATER, 1820, 207
CHAPTER I.
EARLY LIFE.
1772-1798.
Birth--Mr. Smith’s improvements in Lighthouse illumination--Origin
of the Scottish Lighthouse Board--Acts as Assistant to their
Engineer--Student at Andersonian Institution, Glasgow, and
University of Edinburgh--Succeeds Mr. Smith as Engineer to the
Northern Lighthouse Board--Tour of inspection of English lights
in 1801--Is taken for a French spy.
Robert Stevenson, maltster in Glasgow, was born in 1720, and, as stated
on his tombstone, in the burial-ground of the Cathedral, died in 1764.
His fourth son, Alan, was partner in a West India house in Glasgow, and
died of fever in the island of St. Christopher, in 1774, while on a
visit to his brother, who managed the foreign business of the house at
that place.
The only son of Alan Stevenson was Robert, the subject of this Memoir,
who was born at Glasgow on the 8th of June 1772.
When his father died, Robert Stevenson, then an infant, was left in
circumstances of difficulty, for the same epidemic fever which deprived
him of his father carried off his uncle also, at a time when their loss
operated most disadvantageously on the business which they conducted;
and, strange to say, on account of legal difficulties, nearly half a
century elapsed before any patrimonial funds in which my father had an
interest were realised.
Under these circumstances his mother (Jean Lillie, daughter of David
Lillie, builder in Glasgow, who died, as stated on his tombstone, in
the Cathedral burying-ground, in 1774) resolved to go to Edinburgh to
reside with a married sister, and when her son reached the age of being
able for school she wisely took advantage of one of the hospitals in
that city for his education; and the spirit of the man is well brought
out by the fact that he devoted his first earnings in life, at the
Cumbrae Lighthouse, to making a _contribution_ to the funds of the
Orphan Hospital in payment of what he regarded as a _debt_.
It appears from “Memoranda” left by my father for the information
of his family, that his mother was a woman of great prudence and
remarkable fortitude, based on deep convictions of religion; and,
even in their time of trial, which lasted over his school days,
he says,--“My mother’s ingenuous and gentle spirit amidst all her
difficulties never failed her. She still relied on the providence of
God, though sometimes, in the recollection of her father’s house and
her younger days, she remarked that the ways of Providence were often
dark to us. The Bible, and attendance on the ministrations, chiefly of
Mr. Randall of Lady Yester’s Church, afterwards Dr. Davidson of the
Tolbooth,[1] and at other churches, where I was almost always her
constant attendant, were the great sources of her comfort.
“Her intention was that I should be trained for the ministry, with a
view to which I had been sent, after leaving my first school, to Mr.
Macintyre, a famous linguist of his day, where I made the acquaintance
of Patrick Neill, afterwards the well-known printer, and still better
known naturalist, who remained my most intimate friend through life,
and of William Blackwood, the no less celebrated publisher.”
* * * * *
Circumstances, however, occurred which entirely changed my father’s
prospects and pursuits. Soon after he had attained his fifteenth year
his mother was married to Mr. Thomas Smith--son of a shipowner, and
member of the Trinity House of Dundee,--who himself was, my father
says, a “furnishing iron-merchant, shipowner, and underwriter”
in Edinburgh, and who being also a lamp-maker and an ingenious
mechanician, appears at a very early date to have directed his
attention to the subject of lighthouses, and endeavoured to improve the
mode of illumination then in use, by substituting lamps with mirrors,
for the open coal-fires which were at that early time the only beacons
to guide the mariner.
Mr. Smith’s improvements attracted the notice of Professor Robison,
Sir David Hunter Blair, and Mr. Creech, the publisher and honorary
secretary to the Chamber of Commerce. I find from the minutes of that
body, that in 1786, a complaint was made to them by shipmasters as to
the defective state of the coal light on the Isle of May, which was a
“private light” belonging to the family of the Duke of Portland.
The Chamber sent a deputation of their number to inquire into the truth
of the objections that had been made, who fully confirmed the justice
of the complaints.
When the result of the examination was reported to the Chamber of
Commerce, Mr. Smith submitted to them “a plan for improving the light
by dispensing with the coal-fire,” and after fully considering his
suggestions, the Chamber, at their meeting of 24th May 1786, resolved
“that while they allowed much ingenuity to Mr. Smith’s plan of
reflectors, they were of opinion that a coal light should be continued.”
* * * * *
The Board of Northern Lighthouses was constituted by Act of Parliament
in 1786; its members were the Lord Advocate and Solicitor-General,
the chief magistrates of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Inverness, and
Campbeltown, and the Sheriffs of the maritime counties of Scotland.
These Commissioners, happily for the interests of navigation, took a
more enlightened view of their duties than the Chamber of Commerce of
Edinburgh, and after hearing and considering Mr. Smith’s proposals,
formally appointed him their Engineer.
The preamble of the Act constituting the Northern Lighthouse Board,
states that it would greatly conduce to the security of navigation and
the fisheries if _four_ lighthouses were erected in the north part of
Great Britain. Such, it would seem, was the limited state of trade in
Scotland, that the erection of these four lighthouses was all that was
contemplated, on a coast, extending to about 2000 miles, of perhaps
the most dangerous navigation in Europe. It is now marked by sixty
lighthouse stations for the guidance of the sailor, but new claims
continue to be made, and new lighthouses are still admitted to be
required.
The newly established Lighthouse Board at once entered on its important
duties, and the first light they exhibited was Kinnaird Head, which was
designed by Mr. Smith and lighted in 1787.
* * * * *
These pursuits being very congenial to my father’s mechanical turn of
mind, he had rendered himself useful to Mr. Smith in carrying them
out, and was intrusted, at the early age of nineteen, to superintend
the erection of a lighthouse on the island of Little Cumbrae, in the
river Clyde, according to a design which Mr. Smith had furnished to the
Cumbrae Light Trustees. This connection soon led to his adoption as Mr.
Smith’s partner in business, and, in 1799, to his union with his eldest
daughter by a former marriage.
During the cessation of the works at Cumbrae in winter, my father, who
had determined to follow the profession of a Civil Engineer, applied
himself, as appears from class note-books in my possession, with great
zeal to the practice of surveying and architectural drawing, and to the
study of mathematics at the Andersonian Institution at Glasgow. Of the
kindness of Dr. Anderson, who presided over that Institution, he ever
entertained a most grateful remembrance, and often spoke of him as one
of his best advisers and kindest friends, and in the Memoranda already
noticed he records his obligations to him in the following words:--“It
was the practice of Professor Anderson kindly to befriend and forward
the views of his pupils; and his attention to me during the few years
I had the pleasure of being known to him was of a very marked kind,
for he directed my attention to various pursuits, with the view to my
coming forward as an engineer.”
After completing the Cumbrae Lighthouse he was further engaged, under
Mr. Smith, in erecting two lighthouses on the Pentland Skerries in
Orkney, where, in view of what lay before him at the Bell Rock, he had
the useful experience of living four months in a tent on an uninhabited
island, and arranging the landing of the whole of the materials of the
lighthouses in the difficult navigation of the Pentland Firth. But here
also he had a personal experience of God’s overruling Providence, which
clung to him through life, and, as we shall find, proved his stay in
times of danger, when personal resources had ceased to prove availing.
In returning from the Pentland Skerries, in 1794, he embarked in the
sloop ‘Elizabeth’ of Stromness, and proceeded as far as Kinnaird Head,
when the vessel was becalmed about three miles from the shore. The
captain kindly landed my father, who continued his journey to Edinburgh
by land. A very different fate, however, awaited his unfortunate
shipmates. A violent gale came on, which drove the ‘Elizabeth’ back
to Orkney, where she was totally wrecked, and all on board unhappily
perished.
Notwithstanding my father’s active duties in summer, he was so
zealous in the pursuit of knowledge that he contrived, during several
successive winters, on his return from his practical work, to avail
himself of the Philosophical classes at the University of Edinburgh.
In this manner he attended Professor Playfair’s second and third
Mathematical courses, two sessions of Robison’s Natural Philosophy,
two courses of Chemistry under Dr. Hope, and two of Natural History
under Professor Jameson. To these he added a course of Moral Philosophy
under Dugald Stewart, a course of Logic under Dr. Ritchie, and one
of Agriculture under Professor Low. “I was prevented, however,” he
remarks, in the Memoranda, “from following my friend Dr. Neill for my
degree of M.A. by my slender knowledge of Latin, in which my highest
book was the Orations of Cicero, and by my total want of Greek.” Such
zeal in the pursuit of knowledge, and views so enlarged of the benefits
and value of a liberal education, were characteristics of a mind of no
ordinary vigour; so that, early trained to practical work, and inspired
with a true love of his profession, it was not unnatural that on the
resignation of Mr. Smith the Board should have appointed Mr. Stevenson
to succeed him as their Engineer.
The first annual report made by him to the Board is dated June 1798,
and he continued annually to prepare one up to the time of his
resignation in 1843.
The first occasion on which he was sent by the Board on a special
mission was in 1801, when he was deputed by the Commissioners to visit
and report on the Lighthouses on the coasts of England, Wales, and the
Isle of Man. The report he submitted to the Board is a most elaborate
and valuable document. After describing upwards of twenty Public,
Private, and Harbour lights which he had examined, he proceeds fully to
discuss the different systems of management in use, and particularly
to compare the system adopted by the Scotch Board with that practised
in England by the Trinity House, most readily advising the adoption
of what seemed improvements in the administration of the Southern
Board. In reporting as to the Isle of Man he takes occasion to suggest
that the lighting of that island should be taken up by the Northern
Commissioners--a proposal which was acted on in 1815. He says:--
“I had several communications with William Scott, Esq.,
Receiver-General of the Customs, upon the subject of Lighthouses.
At his request I went to the Point of Langness, and to the Calf
of Man; the former a very dangerous point of land, the latter a
situation that seems every way answerable to the general purposes
of a site for a lighthouse.
“As this island occupies a middle situation between Great Britain
and Ireland, and is not included in any of these Acts of Parliament
which relate to the erecting or maintaining of Lights, on either
side of the Channel, perhaps it might answer to include the Isle of
Man under the same Act which refers to the Northern Lighthouses;
and by extending your powers this island might no longer stand a
monument of darkness, and a great obstruction to the navigation of
St. George’s Channel, particularly from the want of a light upon
the Calf of Man.
“Such a light, together with the late improvement of the Copeland
light, and the erection of the Kilwarlin light upon the Irish
coast, would in an eminent degree improve the navigation of the
Irish Channel. From the central situation of the Isle of Man, a
light would soon pay itself, by serving the trade of Maryport,
Workington, Whitehaven, Lancaster and Liverpool, on the one side of
the Channel, with Dublin and Newry on the other.”
With reference to this suggestion the Commissioners, in January 1802,
adopted the following resolution:--
“In the above report Mr. Stevenson has stated very strongly the
great utility of a lighthouse upon the Calf of Man; but not being
within the jurisdiction either of the Trinity House of London, or
of the Commissioners for the Northern Lighthouses, both of them
are thereby prevented from accomplishing an object so much wished
for by mariners, as it would prove a great additional security to
the navigation between a great number of the ports on the west of
England, and Dublin, and other ports in Ireland. In order therefore
that this circumstance may not be overlooked, the Commissioners
directed this notice to be taken of it in their Minutes, in order
that if any application to Parliament shall at a future period be
deemed necessary, the Commissioners may judge how far it may not be
proper to apply for power and liberty to erect a lighthouse upon a
situation so very eligible as the Calf of Man, being the southmost
point of that island.”
The report was illustrated with plans of Douglas, Milford, Longships,
and Portland Lighthouses. The somewhat formidable journey he had
undertaken, involving 2500 miles of travelling, occupied eight weeks in
its performance, and the following amusing incident shows what peaceful
travellers, in those troubled times, had sometimes to encounter:--
“I left the Scilly Islands considerably instructed by the
examination of the machinery and apparatus of this lighthouse,
and very much gratified. I took my passage in a vessel bound
for Penzance, where, however, I had not been long landed, when
I met with a circumstance which, while it lasted, was highly
disagreeable, and as it is somewhat connected with the object of
the journey, I beg your indulgence while I lay it before you.
“Finding that I could not get any convenient mode of conveyance
from Penzance to the Lizard Lights, I set off on foot for Marazion,
a town at the head of Mounts Bay, where I was in hopes of getting
a boat to freight. I had just got that length, and was making
the necessary inquiry, when a young man, accompanied by several
idle-looking fellows, came up to me, and in a hasty tone said,
‘Sir, in the King’s name I seize your person and papers.’ To which
I replied that I should be glad to see his authority, and know
the reason of an address so abrupt. He told me the want of time
prevented his taking regular steps, but that it would be necessary
for me to return to Penzance, and there undergo an examination, as
I was suspected of being a French spy. Had I not been extremely
anxious to get on my journey, I would not have objected to this.
I therefore proposed to submit my papers to the examination of
the nearest Justice of Peace, who was immediately applied to and
came to the inn where I was. He seemed to be greatly agitated, and
quite at a loss how to proceed. The complaint preferred against me
was, ‘That I had examined the Longships Lighthouse with the most
minute attention, and was no less particular in my inquiries at
the keepers of the lighthouse regarding the sunk rocks lying off
the Land’s End, with the sets of the currents and tides along the
coast: that I seemed particularly to regret the situation of the
rocks called the Seven Stones, and the loss of a beacon which the
Trinity Board had caused to be fixed upon the Wolf Rock: that I had
taken notes of the bearings of several sunk rocks, and a drawing
of the lighthouse and of Cape Cornwall: further, that I had refused
the honour of Lord Edgecombe’s invitation to dinner, who happened
to be at the Land’s End with a party of pleasure, offering as an
apology that I had some particular business on hand, upon which I
immediately set off for the Scilly Islands. These circumstances
concurring with a report that a schooner had been seen off the Land
taking soundings, it was presumed that I was connected with her,
and had some evil intention in making these remarks.’
“In order to clear myself of this suspicion, I laid before the
Justice your letter directing me to make the journey, which was
signed by Mr. Gray (Secretary to the Board), as also several
letters he had procured for me to some of the members of the
Trinity House, London, together with a letter from the Trinity
House, Leith, to the Marquis of Titchfield. I produced also my
letter of credit from Sir William Forbes and Company, and, after
perusing these letters, the Justice of Peace very gravely observed
that they were ‘merely bits of paper,’ and was of opinion that I
should be kept in custody till the matter should be laid before
Lord Edgecombe, the Lord-Lieutenant of the county, and added, that
he would most likely order me to be _sent_ to Plymouth.
“I no sooner heard the opinion of this gentleman than I ordered a
chaise and immediately returned to Penzance, where I laid my papers
before the Justices of Peace, and waited their decision with much
anxiety. They no sooner looked them over than in the most polite
manner they cleared me of the suspicions I laboured under, and
left me at liberty to pursue my journey, which I did with so much
eagerness that I gave the two coal lights upon the Lizard Point
only a very transient look, and passed on to Plymouth.”