River and coast trade of Great Britain—The _Iona_, paddle
steamer—First screw collier _Q. E. D._—The _King Coal_ collier—Her
dimensions and crew, _note_—Improvement in care of seamen—Leith and
London traders—Dublin and Holyhead Mail-Packets—Their great speed
and regularity—Dimensions, power, capacity, and cost—Dover and
Calais Mail-Packets—The _Victoria_—Her speed—Proposed tunnel and
other modes of crossing the Straits of Dover—Mr. Fowler’s plan—The
_Castalia_—The _Bessemer_—Her swinging saloon—The cigar-ship built
at Baltimore, 1858—Similar ship built on the Thames, 1864—Perkins’s
economical steam-engine and proposed fast boat—The Engine of the
_Comet_—Modifications in the construction of Marine Engines—Ratio
of speed to power—The Compound Engine more economical than the
simple—Great skill required for building perfect ships, and especial
importance to England of having the best ships—But her ships not yet
perfect, though great progress has been made during the last half
century
APPENDICES.
PAGE
APPENDIX No. 1 587
APPENDIX No. 2 591
APPENDIX No. 3 593
APPENDIX No. 4 594
APPENDIX No. 5 595
APPENDIX No. 6 599
APPENDIX No. 7 600
APPENDIX No. 8 601
APPENDIX No. 9 603
APPENDIX No. 10 606
APPENDIX No. 11 608
APPENDIX No. 12 609
APPENDIX No. 13 611
APPENDIX No. 14 612
APPENDIX No. 15 613
APPENDIX No. 16 614
APPENDIX No. 17 617
APPENDIX No. 18 633
APPENDIX No. 19 634
APPENDIX No. 20 635
APPENDIX No. 21 637
APPENDIX No. 22 637
APPENDIX No. 23 639
APPENDIX No. 24 641
APPENDIX No. 25 643
APPENDIX No. 26 644
APPENDIX No. 27 645
INDEX 647
ILLUSTRATIONS.[1]
PAGE
S.S. “GREAT EASTERN” (LONGITUDINAL SECTION AND SCALE) Frontispiece.
S.S. “GREAT EASTERN” VIEW OF DECK Frontispiece.
S.S. “GREAT EASTERN” WHEEL-HOUSE AND STEERING
APPARATUS Frontispiece.
S.S. “GREAT EASTERN” LAYING CABLE Frontispiece.
S.S. “GREAT EASTERN” AT SEA Frontispiece.
THE PAPER NAUTILUS 3
HERO’S STEAM CAULDRON (FIRST IDEA OF THE POWER OF STEAM,
B.C. 120) 5
HERO’S STEAM ÆOLIPILE (FIRST STEAM MACHINE) 6
FIRST VESSEL PROPELLED BY WHEELS (SEVENTH CENTURY) 10
ILLYRIAN BARGE WITH OXEN DRIVING PADDLE-WHEELS 19
CURIOUS VESSEL BUILT IN ROTTERDAM, A.D. 1653 20
FIRST STEAM-BOAT (BY JONATHAN HULLS OF CAMPDEN, GLOUCESTERSHIRE),
1736 26
MURRAY RIVER STEAMER 27
WATER-WHEEL 33
MILLER’S TREBLE VESSEL, TO WHICH A STEAM-ENGINE WAS APPLIED,
1787 33
SECTIONAL VIEW OF THE S.S. “CHARLOTTE DUNDAS” 37
FIRST AMERICAN STEAM-BOAT BY JOHN FITCH, U.S., 1786 42
SECOND AMERICAN STEAM-BOAT BY JOHN FITCH, FIRST USED, 1790 44
S.S. “CLERMONT” BY ROBERT FULTON, U.S. FIRST STEAM-VESSEL
USED SUCCESSFULLY IN AMERICA, 1807 51
S.S. “COMET.” FIRST PASSENGER STEAMER ON THE RIVER CLYDE,
SCOTLAND, 1812 66
THAMES SAILING BARGE 75
STATIONERS’ COMPANY’S SAILING BARGE 76
S.S. “UNITED KINGDOM” (LONDON AND EDINBURGH) 81
GALLOWAY’S PATENT PADDLE-WHEEL 99
DIFFERENT FORMS OF SCREWS 101
SCREW STEAMER “ROBERT F. STOCKTON” 114
WOODCROFT’S VARYING-PITCH SCREW-PROPELLER 117
EARLY AMERICAN LAKE SCREW-PROPELLER 133
AMERICAN RIVER STEAMER “NEW WORLD” 145
LONGITUDINAL AND TRANSVERSE MIDSHIP SECTIONS OF PROPOSED
LARGE AMERICAN STEAMER 158, 159
FIRST CUNARD STEAM-SHIP “BRITANNIA” 182
STEAM-SHIP “GREAT BRITAIN” 188
AUXILIARY U.S. STEAM-SHIP “MASSACHUSETTS” 191
AMERICAN STEAM-SHIP “WASHINGTON” 196
COLLINS’S U.S. STEAM-SHIP “ATLANTIC” 206
CUNARD’S STEAM-SHIP “SCOTIA” 229
CUNARD’S STEAM-SHIP “BOTHNIA” 233
HARFIELD’S STEAM WINDLASS 234
SALOON CABINS S.S. “BOTHNIA” AND “SCYTHIA” 236
INMAN’S SCREW STEAM-SHIP “CITY OF MANCHESTER” 252
INMAN’S SCREW STEAM-SHIP “CITY OF CHESTER” 258
WHITE STAR STEAM-SHIP “BRITANNIC” 278
SCREW-SHAFT OF S.S. “BRITANNIC” 280
MIDSHIP SECTION OF “BRITANNIC” 281
ANCHOR LINE S.S. “VICTORIA” 289
ROYAL MAIL WEST INDIA S.S. “FORTH” 303
ROYAL MAIL WEST INDIA S.S. “AMAZON” 306
PACIFIC COMPANY’S S.S. “PERU” 319
PACIFIC COMPANY’S S.S. “CHIMBORAZO” 325
PACIFIC COMPANY’S S.S. “SANTA-ROSA” 328
S.S. “ENTERPRISE.” FIRST STEAMER THAT DOUBLED THE CAPE
OF GOOD HOPE 340
MAP OF SUEZ CANAL AND SURROUNDING DISTRICT 364
PENINSULAR AND ORIENTAL COMPANY’S S.S. “ROYAL TAR” 380
PENINSULAR AND ORIENTAL COMPANY’S S.S. “KHEDIVE” 411
LEYLAND AND COMPANY’S S.S. “BAVARIAN” 420
LINDSAY’S AUXILIARY STEAM-SHIPS 429
SWIRES’ YANG-TSE STEAMER “HANKOW” 471
CHINESE TEA-BOAT 475
JAPANESE CARGO-BOAT 485
PLATFORM ON WHICH S.S. “GREAT EASTERN” WAS BUILT 497
TRANSVERSE MIDSHIP SECTION OF “GREAT EASTERN” 498
TRANSVERSE MIDSHIP SECTION OF ENGINE-ROOM OF “GREAT EASTERN” 501
GRAND SALOON CABIN OF “GREAT EASTERN” 506
S.S. “GREAT EASTERN” READY TO BE LAUNCHED 517
S.S. “GREAT EASTERN” AT SEA UNDER FULL SAIL 527
MODERN SCREW COLLIER “KING COAL” 548
CHANNEL PACKET S.S. “VICTORIA” 556
FOWLER’S PROPOSED CHANNEL STEAM FERRY 559
CHANNEL PACKET S.S. “CASTALIA” 562
CHANNEL PACKET S.S. “BESSEMER” 565
PERKINS’ PROPOSED TRANSATLANTIC STEAM-SHIP 572
TRANSVERSE MIDSHIP SECTION OF DITTO 572
ENGINE OF THE FIRST CLYDE STEAMER “COMET” 574
LATEST AND MOST IMPROVED COMPOUND SURFACE MARINE STEAM
ENGINE 578
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The whole of these Illustrations have been re-drawn on block, and a
great many of them are original. It is, however, only due to the memory
of a truly good and unassuming man to state, more especially as he was
a thorough genius in the illustration of all nautical subjects, that
many of the drawings are reduced copies from those of the late Edward
Weedon, who, for many years, and up to his untimely death in 1874, was
one of the staff of artists of the _Illustrated London News_.
MERCHANT SHIPPING.
CHAPTER I.
Earliest modes of propulsion—Suggested partly by nature—Hero of
Alexandria, B.C. 120—Dancing steam ball—Æolipile—Application
of science to superstitious purposes—Revival of
learning—Robertus Valturius, 1472—Blasco de Garay—Story
of his experiment, 1543—Disproved by Mr. MacGregor’s
investigations, _note_—Progress of invention—Bourne—Solomon
de Caus, Marquess of Worcester, &c.—Morisotus’ _vessel with
paddle-wheels_—Hollar’s drawing—Absurd patents—Phillips and
his windmill—Papin and Morland—Savery—Jonathan Hulls—James
Watt’s engine—Matthew Wasborough—Marquis de Jouffroy—Bramah’s
screw-propeller—Mr. Miller of Dalswinton—Mr. Symington and
Mr. Taylor—The _Charlotte Dundas_—Rumsey and Fitch—J. C.
Stevens—Oliver Evans—Robert Fulton and Mr. Livingston—Plan
really derived from the English experiments of Symington—Fulton
builds steamers in the U. S.—The _Clermont_—Merits and demerits
of Fulton—At all events the first to “run” a steam-vessel
regularly, and to develop its power and usefulness—First
steam-boat on the St. Lawrence, 1813.
[Sidenote: Earliest modes of propulsion.]
Modern investigation has confirmed the opinion that the knowledge of
the ancients was more varied and extensive than has hitherto been
generally supposed, and that there is indeed “nothing new under the
sun.” Iron chain-cables, supposed to have been the invention of the
present century, were, as already shown,[2] used by the shipowners of
Tyre, while the iron-clad rams of to-day are but copies of the prows
of the war galleys of ancient Carthage, Rome, or Nineveh:[3] and,
although, on the sculptures of Egypt and Assyria there is no trace of
the application of wheels or machinery of any kind, as a propelling
power, the mechanical knowledge ancient inventions exhibit leads to the
conviction that other modes of propulsion than those of poles, oars,
and sails must have been understood in remote ages. Indeed, Nature
herself, at the dawn of knowledge, must have suggested to men widely
removed one from the other, appliances for lessening manual labour,
while some of these were undoubtedly carried into practice during the
earliest period of the existence of the human race.
[Sidenote: Suggested partly by nature.]
That such was the case may be reasonably inferred from the ancient
stone sculptures exhumed by Layard and others, showing as these do
beyond question that the people of Egypt, Assyria and Babylonia, when
floating on bundles of reeds or on inflated skins, propelled them by
the motion of their legs,[4] just as an animal swims by using its
limbs for the purpose of propulsion in the water which supports it. In
aquatic animals may be seen the types of almost every kind of machinery
now adopted by man to lessen bodily toil. The cuttle-fish moves forward
by fins, and backwards by ejecting water from a tube; whelks suggest
the art of punting and towing; the value of paddles may be learned from
ducks or other aquatic birds in their motion through the water, and the
use of a folding feather from the lobster; while the combined action of
the paddle-wheel and screw-propeller will be found in the microscopic
insects “Paramacium caudatum” and “Paramacium compressum.” The marine
animals “Vebella” and “Physalia,” familiarly known as the “Portuguese
men-of-war,” whose bodies resemble an inflated bladder, float on the
water and are propelled by the wind acting on their extended membranes.
Swans extend their feathers to sail with the wind; and, though that
fairy-looking, fragile thing, the paper-nautilus, seems to be the sport
alike of the gale and of the most gentle breeze, it possesses in itself
the power of propulsion by projecting water.[5]
[Illustration]
But the common fish of every sea would have suggested to man, in the
most remote ages, a mode of supplementing manual labour: the fin giving
him the idea of a paddle or of an oar, and the tail teaching him the
art of sculling, the principle in each case being the same: the tail,
moving from side to side, by oblique pressure on the water, propels the
fish forward along a diagonal line, the resultant of the forces acting
from the right and the left sides of the fish, and is, thus, the chief
instrument of motion, while the fins serve to direct and steady it.[6]
[Sidenote: Hero of Alexandria, B.C. 120.]
Nor, indeed, is there much doubt that the ancients were acquainted
with the power of steam, though they cannot be said to have applied
this knowledge to any useful purposes. A treatise is still in
existence “On Pneumatics,” by Hero,[7] a philosophic mathematician
who lived at Alexandria about B.C. 120, in which he gives an account
of seventy-eight miscellaneous experiments, most of them probably
adapted for the superstitious purposes of the heathen priesthood, but
some also as certainly foreshadowing the definite application of steam
as a motive force. The following, we notice as, in themselves, of
considerable interest.
[Illustration]
[Sidenote: Dancing steam ball.]
[Sidenote: Æolipile.]
“First,” he says (exper. No. 45), “let there be a cauldron with water
in it and a covered top; and let a fire be lighted under it. From
the cover let a tube run upward, and place at its extremity a hollow
hemisphere, in like manner perforated. Then, if a light ball be cast
into the middle of the hemisphere, the vapour (steam) raised from
the cauldron through this tube will lift the ball so that it seems
suspended.” This is no doubt an ingenious and amusing philosophical
toy, but has no further value. His next experiment, however (No. 50),
is of greater importance, not only as showing a clear and distinct
appreciation of the motive power of steam, but because its principle
is embodied in the well-known mode of driving potters’ wheels and in
the modern turbine. He says, “Let a fire be lighted under a cauldron
with water in it and covered with a lid; and attach to this cauldron a
bent tube with the extremity fitting into a hollow ball. Opposite to
the extremity of this tube place a pivot fastened to the lid, and let
the ball have various tubes communicating with it at opposite ends of
the diameter, with their bendings at right angles (i.e., in opposite
directions). Then when the fire is lighted, the steam passing through
the first tube (i.e., from the cauldron) into the ball, will pass out
through the bent tubes towards the lid, causing the ball to revolve
after the fashion of dancing figures.”[8] This machine was called the
Æolipile.
[Illustration]
In these few words we have a clear indication of the power of steam,
of the nature and effect of a vacuum, and of a rotatory engine moved
by this force: we thus see that the ancients knew more than has been
generally admitted of the wonderful power which, in our own time, has
brought about the most extraordinary changes in the seats and centres
of maritime commerce, affording to mankind a facility of intercourse
between different nations, while at the same time increasing the
wealth, and, what is of much more importance, promoting the comfort and
happiness of the human race to an extent far beyond the dreams of the
most sanguine enthusiast of any age or of any country.
From the uncontroverted facts here stated, there can be no doubt that
Hero was the first to record, even if he did not invent, this mighty
civilising instrument, and, if so, that Egypt was the land of its birth.
[Sidenote: Application of science to superstitious purposes.]
But many centuries elapsed before its power was applied to any useful
purpose; indeed, as suggested, there is reason for supposing that this
science was misapplied by the priests, and used as a means of deceiving
the people by inducing them to believe it to be a miraculous power
granted only to the professors of the craft of idolatry. “A fire,”
says Hero (experiment No. 70), “having been kindled on a transparent
altar, figures will appear to dance” on a drum driven round by steam,
“emitting sounds similar to those of a stringed instrument,”[9] which,
according to Pausanias, “resemble the snapping of the strings of a
harp;” thus, while delighting the young people of those days, as the
ornaments in churches now do, these experiments became instruments of
make-belief in the hands of the priests, who propounded as strange
theories about their supernatural powers as the so-called philosophers
of our own days still do, when they attempt to deal with the unrevealed
mysteries of creation and of a still more mysterious hereafter.[10]
[Sidenote: Revival of learning.]
Although the Romans did nothing towards applying the knowledge of the
power of steam to useful purposes, and little enough generally for the
mechanical arts, the true value of the works of Hero and of the older
mechanicians came to be appreciated in the dawn which succeeded the
darkness of the Middle Ages. Then the youths of a generation, which had
cast aside many of the superstitions of the ancients, and had found in
the doctrines of Christianity a wider and nobler field for their genius
and aspirations, began to study how the power Hero had described could
be best applied for the benefit and happiness of mankind. Then, indeed,
was the advent of an era wherein the foundation was laid of a fabric
which, though slow in its erection, and not yet completed, is destined
to eclipse all the other works of man. There can be, therefore, no
subject affecting the transitory interests of the human race more
worthy of the pen of the historian than the development of the power
and usefulness of steam traced from that remote period to our own
time, when we see in every quarter of the civilised world this power
compassing land and ocean, affording profitable employment to myriads
of the human race, and giving to the people of every nation and tongue
rapid and easy intercourse.
[Sidenote: Robertus Valturius, 1472.]
“Although an old work on China,” remarks Mr. MacGregor,[11] “contains
a sketch of a vessel moved by four paddle-wheels, and used perhaps in
the seventh century, the earliest distinct notice of this means of
propulsion appears to be by Robertus Valturius in A.D. 1472, who gives
several woodcuts representing paddle-wheels,”[12] one of which is as
follows.
[Illustration]
There is, however, no mention of any vessel propelled by _steam_ till
M. de Navarette directed attention to this subject in a letter[13]
received by him from Thomas Gonzales, Director of the Royal Archives
of Simancas of Spain, with an account of an experiment of the year
1543, in which a vessel is said to have been propelled by something
resembling a steam-engine.
[Sidenote: Blasco de Garay, story of his experiment, 1543.]
The substance of this letter is to the effect that, in that year, one
Blasco de Garay, proposed to the Emperor Charles V., the construction
of an engine (_ingenio_) capable of propelling large vessels in a calm,
and without the use of sails or oars. In spite of the opposition this
project encountered, the Emperor consented to witness the experiment,
which was accordingly made in the _Trinity_, a vessel of 200 tons,
laden with corn, in the port of Barcelona, on the 17th June, 1543.
Garay, however, would not uncover his machinery, or exhibit it
publicly: but it was evident that it consisted of a cauldron of boiling
water (_una gran caldera de agua hirviendo_) and of two wheels set in
motion by that means, and applied externally on each side (_banda_) of
the vessel.
The persons commissioned by the Emperor to report on the invention seem
to have approved it, commending specially the readiness with which the
vessel tacked. The treasurer Ravago, however, observed that a ship with
the proposed machinery could not go faster than two leagues in three
hours; that the apparatus was complex and expensive; and that there
was danger of the boiler bursting. The other commissioners maintained
that such a vessel might go at the rate of a league an hour, and would
tack in half the time required by an ordinary ship. When the exhibition
was over, Garay removed the apparatus from the _Trinity_, depositing
the wood-work in the arsenal at Barcelona, but retaining himself the
rest of the machinery. Notwithstanding, however, the objections urged
by Ravago, the Emperor was inclined to favour his project, but his
attention at the time was engrossed by other matters.[14] Garay was,
however, promoted and received a sum of money, besides the expenses
of the experiment made at Barcelona. The letter concludes with the
following statement:—
“This is the substance of the despatches and of the original registers
preserved in the royal archives of Simancas, among the State papers
of the province of Catalonia, and of those of the Secretary of War
(department of land and sea), in the said year, 1543.”
Mr. MacGregor, greatly to his credit, desirous of ascertaining whether
this report (which, from the well-known accuracy of M. de Navarette on
other subjects, had been accepted as correct) could be depended upon,
visited Spain in September, 1857, and made a thorough investigation at
Simancas, Madrid, and Barcelona into this interesting subject, but his
inquiries (reported, at length, January, 1858, to the Superintendent
of Specifications at the Great Seal Patent Office, and printed in
Part II., “Specifications relating to Marine Propulsion”), convinced
him “that there was not one particle of reliable evidence” in M. de
Navarette’s assertion.[15]
An attentive consideration of the subject leads to the conclusion
at which Mr. MacGregor has arrived. Even in the present day it
would require an engine and boiler of considerable size to propel
a vessel of 200 tons three miles an hour; moreover, the novel and
bulky machinery with which the experiment is said to have been
made, could not have been erected in the ship or removed from her
without attracting considerable public attention. Indeed, had such an
experiment been made before the Spanish Emperor, and made successfully
as the narrative leads us to suppose, a matter so important could
hardly have lain dormant for any great length of time: whatever,
therefore, Blasco de Garay’s invention may have been, it was evidently
not a steam-engine practically applicable for any useful purpose.
Witzen, no doubt, in confirmation of Garay’s experiment, furnishes
an illustration of a “Spanish bark without oars or sails,” but as,
unfortunately, there is not a single line of letter-press beyond the
few words quoted to throw the faintest light upon his drawing, it can
only be supposed from the descriptive title that it referred to the
vessel which Garay is said to have propelled. Indeed, De Garay’s whole
story looks very much as if it was an invention of the Spaniards; Mr.
Scott Russell,[16] as well as Mr. MacGregor, is of this opinion, and
Mr. Woodcroft, no mean authority on such matters, states that, having
made diligent inquiries at Simancas, he could find no trace of these
documents, thus confirming the result of the more minute researches of
Mr. MacGregor.[17]
[Sidenote: Progress of invention; Bourne, Solomon de Caus, Marquess
of Worcester, &c.]
About this period, however, frequent mention is made of other modes
of propulsion besides those hitherto in use. J. C. Scaliger (who died
1558) published at Frankfort a short notice of a vessel to be propelled
without oars. Bourne, in 1578,[18] says, in his own quaint style,
“you may make a boate to goe without oares or sayle by the placing
of certain wheeles on the outside of the boat in that sort that the
armes of the wheeles may go into the water, and so turning the wheeles
by some provision, and so the wheeles shall make the boate goe.” I.
Bessoni, in 1582, describes a vessel with two prows, or rather two
separate vessels attached to each other (not unlike the _Castalia_, now
running between Dover and Calais), between which a frame is suspended
on gimbles carrying at its lower end a circular reel worked by ropes
and a winch whereby they can be propelled.[19] A. Ramelli, in 1588,
furnishes a design of a flat-bottomed boat with a wheel on each side,
turned by men working upon a winch handle.[20] Indeed, long before
this, the celebrated Roger Bacon (A.D. 1214-1296) speaks of a “vessel
which, being almost wholly submerged, would run through the water
against waves and winds with a speed greater than that attained by the
fastest London pinnaces.”[21] Baptista Porta (the inventor of the magic
lantern) published in his “Pneumaticorum Libri Tres,” Naples, 1601,
many curious experiments on the power of steam, on its condensation,
and on its relative bulk as compared with water. In one of these a
vacuum is clearly indicated, the water being forced up by the pressure
of the atmosphere from without.
David Rivault, Seigneur de Flurance near Laval, published “Les Éléments
de l’Artillerie,” first in 1605 and secondly in 1668—and in this work
he describes the power of steam in bursting a strong bomb-shell partly
filled with water, tightly plugged, and then heated.
In 1615, Solomon de Caus (Engineer to Louis XIII.) published a treatise
(“Les Raisons des Forces Mouvantes”) in which he shows he was well
acquainted with the motive power of steam—as, in his fifth theorem, he
says, “water will mount by the help of fire higher than its level:” he
also shows, by an experiment, how a column of water may be driven up
a tube to such a height as will balance the elasticity of the heated
air confined in the boiler; and Arago, in his “Éloge de James Watt,”
considers that this experiment, though of little practical use, “will
make a noble figure in the annals of the steam-engine.”
In 1629, Giovanni Branca, an engineer of Loretto, applied steam to blow
against vanes attached to the external rim of a wheel, and, doubtless,
machinery with due mechanical contrivances could have been impelled by
it. He gives a picture of his machine in “Le Machine,” vol. nuovo, Pl.
XXV.
In 1618, David Ramsay obtained a patent for an invention “to make
boates for carriages running upon the water as swift in calmes and more
safe in storms than boats full sayled in great windes;” and in 1630 he
patented a plan “to make boats, ships, and barges to goe against the
wind and tide;” and “to raise water from lowe pitts by fire”[22] (the
steam-engine).
In 1637, Francis Lin and others patented a plan “to use and exercise
upon the River Thames, and any other river within England and Wales,
according to their owne way and inventing the sole drauinge and
workinge up of all Barges and other vessels without the use of horses;”
and, in 1646, Edward Ford proposed a similar plan for the navigation
of rivers, and one whereby he could “bring little ships, barges, and
vessels in and out of havens without or against any small wynd or tide,
and transport souldiers and passengers without or against wynde yf the
seas be not rough.”[23]
In 1652 (July 30th), Thomas Grant, Doctor of Physic, obtained a patent
“for several instruments, whereof the first is an instrument very
profitable when co[~m]on winds fayle for a more speedy passage of
calmed shipps or other vessells upon the sea or great rivers, which may
be called the wynds māty.”
In the recital of the inventions of the Marquess of Worcester, 8th
February, 1661, reference is made to one which was “applicable to make
a boat that roweth or letteth, even against wind and stream to any part
of the compass which way soever the streame runs or wind blows, and yet
the force of the wind or stream causeth its motion.” But though the
Marquess has generally had the credit of having applied a power other
than manual or animal labour for the purpose of propulsion, it has been
doubted from the description of his invention if it was a steam-engine
which could be applied to drive a boat.[24]
Petty, in 1663, used a double boat with success.[25] Chamberlaine and
Bushnell, in 1678, had also their plans for propelling boats against
wind and tide, while Hooke, in 1661, described windmills in which “we
have all the main features both of the screw-propeller and feathering
wheel.”[26]
[Illustration]
[Sidenote: Morisotus’ _vessel_ with _paddle-wheels_.]
From about this period much attention was directed to the use of
machinery for propulsion. Morisotus, moreover, who published his
views in 1643,[27] speaks of the paddle-wheel as a mode of propelling
vessels, known also, as he believed, to the ancients, and states that
the simple machinery employed was the same in fact as was in his day
used in mining operations in the Spanish Indies. Schefer, in his
instructive and interesting work, also makes mention of a remarkable
vessel described by Pancirolli (who wrote, in 1587, on naval and
military matters) as resembling what he had seen in an old bas-relief
of an Illyrian galley, a vessel apparently propelled by wheels similar
in character to those in the above wood-cut, from Morisotus.
[Sidenote: Hollar’s drawing.]
But, as no such clumsy vessel could have been employed in a seaway, her
movements must have been confined to rivers or inland waters. It is
just possible that such and similar vessels might at some period have
been used for ferrying rivers[28] or lakes. Very extraordinary notions,
however, appear to have been propounded about, and subsequently to,
this period, and, as a matter of curiosity, I furnish one of these
taken from Hollar’s engravings, which does not appear to have been
noticed by any writer on this interesting subject. The original
engraving, bearing date A.D., 1653, is to be found in the British
Museum. Various details[29] are furnished by the inventor.
[Illustration]
Besides the detailed explanation of this extraordinary looking craft,
which in “length is 72 feet, the height 12, the breadth 8,” there is
beneath the print the following description: “The true and perfect
form of the strange ship built in Rotterdam, 1653. The inventor of it
doth undertake in one day to destroy a hundred ships, it can go from
London to Rotterdam and back again in one day, and in six weeks to go
to the East Indies, and to run as fast as a bird can fly. No fire, nor
storme, nor bullets can hinder her unless it please God. Although the
ships mean to be safe in their havens, it is in vain, for she shall
come to them in any place. It is impossible for her to be taken unless
by treachery, and she cannot be governed by any one but himself” (the
inventor?). The motive power is not described, and there is no further
trace of the ship, of which the illustration is a vertical section.
She was built at the time when the Dutch were in the zenith of their
power, and most likely proved as worthless as numerous other inventions
since produced, though curious as showing the attention devoted at this
period to wheels as a mode of propelling vessels.
[Sidenote: Absurd patents.]
However, we find in the records of our own Patent Office, that
Englishmen were not behind the Dutch in curious and frequently very
absurd inventions. Thus, in 1675, one Miller[30] patented a windmill
fixed to a vessel’s deck to turn an endless rope, and thus, by “two
toothed wheels,” to drive a couple of paddle-wheels. Such commonplace
matters as storms at sea or adverse winds, still less the likelihood of
the whole of the top weight he proposed to erect on the deck of his
vessels being blown or rolled overboard, do not appear to have entered
into the fertile and imaginative brain of the inventor.
Again, in 1701, two gentlemen (whose names are not worth recording)
proposed to have “vanes or sails arranged between two wheels on the
same shaft,” the “sails or float-boards being so contrived as to be
able to play in a given space, being fixed perpendicularly on the wheel
and fastened by a cord or otherwise, so that when the wind blows from
any quarter three-fourths of the sails catch the wind, and, by driving
the wheel round, the sails, which are forced against the wind, come up
edgeways, but when past the centre immediately turn to the breeze, and
by that means produce a continued circular motion.”[31]
[Sidenote: Phillips and his windmill.]
About the same period another invention, of a somewhat similar sort,
was published by a person named Phillips, who proposed to erect between
two tall masts “a windmill of altogether an original description.”[32]
One is reminded when reading these grave proposals, of Don Quixote’s
ludicrous exploit with the windmill, and considering the care Mr.
Phillips seems to have bestowed upon his invention, he must have been
quite as enthusiastic and apparently as serious in his proposal as the
hero of Cervantes in his knight-errantry. But all these schemes, and
many others too numerous to mention, however impracticable and absurd
some of them may have been, had the germ of the great invention more or
less developed.
[Sidenote: Papin and Morland.]
During Papin’s residence in England, 1681, he witnessed one of the
interesting experiments made on the Thames, in which a boat constructed
from the design of the Prince Palatine Robert, fitted with revolving
oars or paddles, “left the King’s barge, manned by sixteen rowers, far
astern in the race of trial.” This experiment suggested to him, in
1688, the idea of an engine, and led to his proposal of using gunpowder
to create a vacuum under a piston, so that the piston would descend.
Two years afterwards, 1690,[33] Papin describes a steam cylinder, in
which a piston descends by atmospheric pressure when the steam below
it is condensed, and among the subsequent uses of such a machine he
mentions the propulsion of ships by “Rames volatiles” or paddle-wheels,
the axles of which, he thought, might be turned by several of his
cylinders acting alternately by the rack work shown in his drawing.[34]
In 1683, a little before Papin, Sir Samuel Morland, Master of Works
to Charles II., wrote a treatise on the “Élévation des Eaux par toutes
sortes de Machines,” &c., with four pages appended to it called “The
Principles of the New Force of Fire, invented by Samuel Morland in
1682, and presented to His Most Christian Majesty in 1683.” In this
work (still in MS. in the Harleian Collection of the British Museum),
it is stated that “water being converted into vapour by the force of
fire, these vapours shall require a greater space (about 2000 times)
than the water occupied, and sooner than be constantly confined would
split a piece of cannon.” It is remarkable that, so long before careful
experiments had been made on the expansibility of water when converted
into vapour, Morland should have given so near an approximation to the
true amount (about 1750 times).
[Sidenote: Savery.]
Thomas Savery, one of the most ingenious men of the age in which
he lived, proposed (1696) a mode of raising water and occasioning
motion “to all sorts of mill-work by the impelling force of _Fire_,”
adding,[35] “it may be very useful to ships, but I dare not meddle with
that matter, and leave it to the judgement of those who are the best
judges of maritime affairs.”[36]
In 1697, Papin (whose own invention had proved a failure) used
Savery’s engine, which had been greatly improved by Newcomen in 1705
to propel a _steam-boat_ on the Fulda.[37] In that year, too, Papin
proposed to drive a vessel by paddle-wheels turned by the stream, and
by boat-hooks which somehow pushed against or griped the bottom.[38]
Chabert, in 1710, described a vessel with large paddle-wheels working
in troughs cut through the hull;[39] and, in 1721, we read of a galley
built in France with revolving oars fastened to a drum or wheel with
paddle-vanes on hinges, capable of being set to any angle, and of being
worked by 200 men, the galley having three of these wheels on each
side.[40] John Allan, in 1722, proposed a mode of navigating a ship,
“by forcing water or some other fluid through the stern or hinder part,
at a convenient distance under the surface of the water, into the sea,
by proper engines placed within the ship.” He also proposed, as Papin
had previously done, a machine with the power of “firing gunpowder _in
clauso_,” with the view of navigating a ship in a calm.[41]
[Sidenote: Jonathan Hulls.]
In 1736, Jonathan Hulls made some practical progress in the idea so
long floating vaguely in the minds of his predecessors, and, on the
23rd December of that year, secured a patent for his invention “of a
machine for carrying ships and vessels out of or into any harbour or
river against wind and tide or in a calm,” of which the following is a
sketch.
[Illustration]
His specification[42] described how to drive a paddle-wheel by
converting a reciprocating rectilinear motion into a continuous
rotary one. But though Hulls’ mode of obtaining a rotary motion was
new and ingenious, and would, perhaps, enable a steam-boat in a calm
to be moved through the water, moreover is the first _steam-boat_
authentically recorded, it was probably not such as could be made
practically useful for the general purposes of commerce, and I have
been unable to find any record of this or of any such vessel having
been so used. At the same time, it must be added that boats not
unlike Hulls’ may now be seen trading in parts of the world remote
from each other, as, for instance, on the Murray in South Australia,
where various vessels, of which the following is an illustration, are
employed, and on the upper Thames where one, at least, to my knowledge
is now worked, which does not seem to be any very marked improvement on
the boat of Jonathan Hulls.[43]
[Illustration]
[Sidenote: James Watt’s engine.]
In 1756, Gauthier, a French mathematician, wrote a treatise on
“Navigation by Fire,” which attracted the attention of the Venetian
Republic.[44] But whatever merit some of these ingenious discoveries
may have possessed, it was not till the 5th January, 1769, when James
Watt obtained his patent, that any steam-engine could be effectually
adopted in marine propulsion.
Among various other improvements in the steam-engine patented by him,
the most important was one for causing the steam to act above the
piston, as well as below it, described as the “double impulse,” or,
now more commonly called, the double acting engine.[45] On the old
principle, when the weight of the atmosphere had pressed down the
piston, a valve opened in the bottom of the cylinder whereby a fresh
supply of hot steam rushed in from the boiler, which, acting as a
pressure in excess of that of the atmosphere above the piston, combined
with the weight of the pump rods at the other end of the lever, carried
that end down, and of course raised the piston in the steam cylinder.
The orifice for the emission of the steam having been then shut,
and the cock opened for injecting the cold water into the cylinder,
condensation took place, and another vacuum was made below the piston,
which was again forced down by the weight of the atmosphere: thus the
work was continued as long as water and fuel were supplied, and the
steam-engine rendered capable of successful application for pumping
purposes, a contrivance used even at the present day.[46] But the
method contrived by Watt rendered the power of the engine much more
effective by the use of a detached condenser, whereby the cooling of
the cylinders by the injection of water was prevented and considerable
economy obtained.[47]
[Sidenote: Matthew Wasborough.]
Matthew Wasborough, however, an engineer of the city of Bristol,
considering that something was still wanting to make the marine
engine a proper instrument of propulsion in concurrence with Watt’s
improvement of the double acting cylinder, obtained, on the 16th March,
1779, a patent for a practical mode of converting a rectilinear into
a continuous circular motion; one of his objects being to adapt his
invention “for moving in a direct position any ship or vessel.”[48]
His invention, however, did not answer, and was indeed superseded by
that of James Pickard, 23rd August, 1780, who, shortly afterwards
entering into partnership with Wasborough, patented a method of working
a mill with a rotary motion by means of the present connecting rod and
crank and a fly wheel, constituting the second important improvement
in the steam-engine, and enabling it to be of really practical service
in propelling vessels. In 1781 (25th October), James Watt obtained
another patent for his newly invented method of applying the vibrating
or reciprocating motion of steam or fire-engines to procure a continued
circular motion round an axis so as to turn the wheels of mills or
other machines. This invention is known as the “Sun and Planet”
motion.[49]
[Sidenote: Marquis de Jouffroy.]
In the same year (1781), the Marquis de Jouffroy is said to have
constructed a steam-boat at Lyons 140 feet in length, and to have
made with her several successful experiments on the Saone near that
city. Mr. MacGregor, however, has made particular inquiries[50] into
the authenticity of the claims of the Marquis, and, as no description
of the machinery of this vessel is discoverable earlier than that
given by himself thirty years afterwards, when he petitioned for
the use exclusively of steam-boats for fifteen years, these claims
are, to say the least, very questionable, while, in a report on his
improvements, the invention is said to be Rumsey’s, but more likely
that of his own countryman Gauthier, whose death prevented his plans
from being practically exemplified by the Venetian Republic. The French
Revolution, however, supervening, the Marquis had not an opportunity of
prosecuting his undertaking.
[Sidenote: Bramah’s screw-propeller.]
In 1785, Joseph Bramah, a man of great genius, and the inventor of the
hydraulic press, obtained a patent for an hydrostatical machine and
a boiler on a peculiar principle, in which the power of air, steam,
or any other elastic vapour, might be employed for the working of
engines. Another of his inventions is a mode of propelling vessels
by the improved rotatory engine described in the specification,
through the medium of either a paddle-wheel or what may be called a
screw-propeller. Bramah shows a vessel with a rudder placed in the bow,
and describes in his specification the nature of the “screw-propeller”
and of its mode of action in minute and specific terms.[51]
Although there is no record of Bramah having put his proposal into
practice, the description lodged by him at the Patent Office is
interesting, as showing clearly an indication of the now so well-known
screw-propeller. Moreover, in this invention, he obviously intended
that steam should be used so as to give circular motion to the
propeller shaft. Previously, however, to the time when he patented his
invention, the rotatory screw as a mode of propulsion had been proposed
by Watt, who, in 1770, suggested the application of a screw-propeller
to be turned by a steam-engine.[52]
But more than half a century elapsed before the screw, now in almost
general use, was practically applied; indeed, the first authentic
record we possess of the marine engine itself having been successfully
worked by paddle or any other means on board any vessel, dates no
further back than 1787, although, between 1774 and 1790, Fitch and
Rumsey were experimenting in America on boats (to which I shall
hereafter refer) to _work against streams_.
[Sidenote: Mr. Miller of Dalswinton.]
In that year (1787) Mr. Patrick Miller, of Dalswinton in Scotland,
a gentleman of position and fortune, published a pamphlet (given at
length by Mr. Woodcroft[53] in his interesting and instructive work on
steam navigation, with copies of Mr. Miller’s drawings illustrative
of his scheme), on the subject of propelling boats by means of
paddle-wheels _turned by men_, working on a capstan with five bars,
each 5 feet long, which drove a water-wheel, having the same object in
view as Messrs. Fitch and Rumsey, then engaged on similar works on the
other side of the Atlantic.
This wheel, of which the following is a sketch, drove the vessel in a
calm from 3 to 4 miles an hour; and, as Mr. Miller judged the capstan
the best mode of turning the wheel, he rejected for a time all other
modes, believing manual labour so applied more to be depended on than
any mechanical contrivances. For the purpose of his experiments he
built, from first to last, eight boats of different kinds, expending
no less than 30,000_l._ on them and their machinery. One was a treble
vessel, or rather three boats fastened together, of which the following
is a transverse representation of the fore part with the lower floats
of the wheels at their full dip.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
According to a written statement laid before the Council of the Royal
Society, London, December 20, 1787, Mr. Miller made various excursions
in this vessel in the course of that year; being attended in most of
these by a Mr. James Taylor, the tutor in his family, who, being a man
of considerable genius, urged Mr. Miller to apply steam to drive the
wheels of his boat. At last Mr. Miller was induced to employ a young
hard-working operative engineer, named Symington, to carry out Mr.
Taylor’s suggestion, and the combination of capital, energy, and genius
with practical knowledge soon produced the desired results.
[Sidenote: Mr. Symington and Mr. Taylor.]
About this time Symington, who was employed at the lead mines at
Wanlockhead, had succeeded in constructing a small steam-engine of a
new description, originally intended for the purpose of propelling
wheeled carriages, which he patented June 5th, 1787.[54]
His specification, accompanied by drawings, relates, 1, to heating the
cylinder of a steam-engine; 2, loading the piston; 3, placing a fire
round the cylinder; 4, a boiler; and, 5, “when rotatory motions of
whatever kind are wanted, two ratchet wheels will be placed upon one
or the same axis in such manner that, while the engine turns forward
one wheel, the other will be reversed without impeding the motion or
diminishing the power so as to be ready to carry on the motion by the
time the other wheel begins to be reversed.”
As this engine was considered suitable for the purpose Mr. Taylor had
in view, Symington[55] undertook to perform the work and Mr. Miller
agreed to employ him. When completed it was mounted in an oak frame
and placed on the deck of one of Mr. Miller’s pleasure-boats, a vessel
25 feet long and 7 feet wide, with two wheels, to be tested on Loch
Dalswinton. The engine performed its work beyond their most sanguine
expectations, driving the vessel at the rate of 5 miles an hour, though
the cylinders were only 4 inches in diameter. After being used in
cruising about the lake for a few days, the engine was removed from the
boat and conveyed to Mr. Miller’s house, where it remained as a piece
of ornamental furniture for a number of years.
The accounts which appeared in the Scottish newspapers at the time[56]
state that the first experiment was made on the 14th November, 1788,
and with such success that it was resolved to repeat it on a larger
scale upon the Forth and Clyde Canal. A double engine with cylinders
18 inches in diameter was consequently ordered to be built at Carron
Iron Works, and, in November of the following year, it was fitted on
board of another of Mr. Miller’s vessels and tried on Dalswinton Loch.
As, however, the floats of the wheels gave way, it was not until the
26th of December, by which time stronger wheels had been procured,
that an opportunity was afforded for fairly testing the capabilities of
this engine. From the accounts in the local papers of the period[57]
the experiment appears to have answered thoroughly, though made under
many disadvantages; a speed having been obtained of from 6½ to 7 miles
an hour, which, in the words of the report, “sufficiently shows that a
vessel properly constructed might accomplish 8, 9, or even 10 miles an
hour easily.”[58]
Such was one among the first efforts made in steam navigation. That
they were considered to be of practical value may in some measure
be determined by the fact that Mr. Taylor’s widow was, a few years
afterwards, awarded an annual pension of 50_l._, and that, in 1837,
Lord Melbourne’s administration presented 50_l._ to each of his four
daughters, who were in reduced circumstances, Mr. Symington having
previously (1825), in answer to his memorial to the Treasury for a
pension (he, too, being almost penniless), been awarded 100_l._ as a
gift from the Privy Purse, and subsequently a further sum of 50_l_.
Poor Symington![59] What a miserable return for labours of such
inestimable value!
[Sidenote: The _Charlotte Dundas_.]
Mr. Miller having expended a large fortune on these experiments,
found it, no doubt, inconvenient to continue them, or having other
projects in view, gave orders to dismantle the vessel in which his last
experiment had been made, and laid her up with her engines at Bence
Haven, at that time his property. More than ten years elapsed before
Mr. Symington found another patron, indeed, it was not till 1801, that
Thomas first Lord Dundas, employed him to fit up a steam-boat for the
Forth and Clyde Canal Company, in which he was a large shareholder.
Having availed himself of the many improvements made by Watt and
others, Symington patented his new engine on the 14th of March of that
year,[60] and fitting it on board the _Charlotte Dundas_, named after
his lordship’s daughter, produced, in the opinion of most writers who
have carefully and impartially inquired into this interesting subject,
“_the first practical steam-boat_.”[61] Mr. Woodcroft has furnished a
sectional drawing of this vessel of which the following is a copy on
a reduced scale;[62] it resembled in many respects the description
of vessel suggested by Jonathan Hulls, but not till now practically
applied.
[Illustration]
In March 1802, the _Charlotte Dundas_ made her trial trip on the Forth
and Clyde Canal. Embarking at Lock 20 a party of gentlemen, including
Lord Dundas, and taking in tow two vessels or barges of 70 tons burden,
she accomplished the trip to Port Dundas, Glasgow, a distance of 19½
miles, in six hours, or at the rate of 3¼ miles per hour, although it
blew so strong a gale right ahead during the whole day that no other
vessel on the canal attempted to move to windward.[63] Lord Dundas
entertaining a very favourable opinion of the experiment, recommended
the adoption of Symington’s steam-boat in a letter of introduction
to the Duke of Bridgewater, who gave him an order to construct eight
vessels similar to the _Charlotte Dundas_ to ply on his canal.
Elated by his success, Symington returned to Scotland to make
arrangements for carrying out the orders of his Grace with the hope
of realizing the advantages his ingenuity and perseverance so well
merited; but he was disappointed in his hopes, the Duke of Bridgewater
died before the details of the agreement had been definitely arranged,
and the Committee who had charge of the affairs of the canal after
his death, came to the conclusion that it would not be advisable to
use steamboats on it for fear of injury to its banks. We may presume
that the Forth and Clyde Canal Company arrived at somewhat similar
conclusions, for the _Charlotte Dundas_ does not appear to have been
again used.
Here it may be desirable to add that the _Charlotte Dundas_ had an
engine with the steam acting on each side of the piston (Watt’s
patented invention) working a connecting rod and crank (Pickard’s
patented invention)[64] together with the union of the crank to the
axis of Miller’s improved paddle-wheel, thus combining for the first
time the essential characteristics of the existing marine engines:
nevertheless, she was laid up in a creek of the canal near to Bramford
Drawbridge, where she remained for many years exposed to public view,
as a curiosity—doubtless, also, as a warning to speculators![65]
Symington’s limited means were now nearly exhausted, and the little
that remained was expended in defending himself from attacks made
on him by the relations of Mr. Taylor for having patented, as they
alleged, the inventions of that gentleman. But the contentions of
rival parties, _inter se_, rarely deserve commemoration except for the
elucidation of the truth. It is, however, to be regretted that each
of those persons who respectively contributed to the maturity of this
invention, did not reap more material advantages from it in return for
the time and labour they bestowed in perfecting a machine which has
done so much for the benefit of mankind.
In 1797, an experiment in canal steam navigation, copied no doubt from
Symington’s original boat, was made in the neighbourhood of Liverpool,
which is alluded to as follows in the _Monthly Magazine_ for July of
that year:—“Lately, at Newton Common in Lancashire, a vessel, heavy
laden with copper slag, passed along the Sankey Canal without the aid
of haulers or rowers, the oars performing eighteen strokes a minute by
the application of _steam only_! After a course of 10 miles the vessel
returned the same evening by the same means to St. Helens whence she
had set out.”
While these experiments were being made with success in Great Britain,
and especially in Scotland, there were not wanting claimants—some
of them of somewhat earlier date—to this great invention in other
and distant parts of the world. To that of Gauthier we have already
referred. In 1776, a countryman of his, Guyon de la Plombiere,
suggested the use of a steam-engine for propelling a vessel;[66] and,
in that year, the Marquis de Jouffroy states he used, besides the one
already mentioned, a steam boat (40 feet long and 16 feet wide) on
the Doubs, with propellers moved by a chain from a single cylinder
and counterpoise, which opened and closed like louvre boards;[67]
applying, in 1780, an engine to his boat with a duck-foot propeller,
two cylinders, inclined at an angle, and turned by a chain round a
barrel.[68]
In 1782, Dixblancs sent to the Conservatoires des Arts et Metiers a
model of a steamboat moved by a chain of floats carried on wheels at
its sides turned by a horizontal cylinder;[69] and in 1796, it is
stated that one Seraffino Serrati, an Italian, had some time previously
placed a steam-boat on the Arno, near Florence.[70]
[Sidenote: Rumsey and Fitch.]
The Americans, as already stated, had, also, at an early period turned
their attention to new modes of propelling vessels. In 1784, James
Rumsey mentioned to General Washington a project of steam navigation,
but, having been refused a patent in Pennsylvania, came to England and
succeeded in inducing a wealthy countryman of his own, then resident
in London, and others, to disburse the expenses of an experiment, for
which he obtained a patent in 1788. The particulars of his plan are
given at length by Mr. Woodcroft[71] and will also be found in the
Rolls Chapel Reports.[72] They were altogether impracticable for any
useful purpose. In 1786, Mr. John Fitch, also an American by birth,
proposed to use vertical oars worked by cranks turned by a horizontal
steam-engine of which the following is an illustration.[73]
[Illustration]
Although the Legislature of the State of Pennsylvania had, in 1784,
turned a deaf ear to the applications of Messrs. Rumsey and Fitch,
these gentlemen, in the following year, obtained from the Legislatures
of Virginia and Maryland the exclusive right to run steamboats on the
waters of those States, while Pennsylvania and New York having, in
1786, granted to Mr. Fitch himself similar exclusive rights, he in
that year made a trial of his machine at Shepherdstown, Pennsylvania,
in a boat of 9 tons, obtaining, it is said, the speed of 4 or 5 miles
an hour against the current of the Potomac. In 1787, Mr. Fitch[74]
built another vessel, 12 feet beam, and 45 feet long, with a 12-inch
cylinder, the mode of propulsion being somewhat similar, in which he
is reported[75] to have made the trip from Philadelphia to Burlington
at an average rate of 7 miles an hour. In 1790, he completed another
and a larger boat, propelled in a different manner: and, by referring
to the _Federal Gazette and Philadelphia Advertiser_, of 26th July,
1790, the following advertisement will be found: “_The steam-boat_ sets
out to-morrow morning at ten o’clock from Arch Street Ferry, in order
to take passengers for Burlington, Bristol, Bordingtown, and Fenton:”
there is, therefore, no doubt that this boat actually traded with
passengers on the Delaware.
But a glance at the second boat built by Fitch, of which the following
is an illustration, will show that the grasshopper paddles which he now
employed, however well they may have answered for a time on the smooth
waters of the Delaware, were not adapted for the general purposes of
navigation any more than the treadles in his first invention.[76]
Indeed, Fitch himself did not follow up the line of steam service he
had commenced at so early a date, but on the invitation, as he alleged,
of the French Government, he soon afterwards visited Paris with the
view of constructing vessels on his plan. As he was not, however,
supplied with the necessary funds (no doubt arising from the fact
that the French engineers were not satisfied with the practicability
or desirability of his mode of propulsion) no vessel on his plan was
built in France, and he was obliged to return to the United States,
at the expense of the American Consul. As no further mention is made
of vessels fitted on the plans[77] suggested by Fitch, it may be
inferred that they were not adapted for practical or useful purposes,
or that the machinery was too complicated or too expensive to work
remuneratively.
[Illustration]
[Sidenote: J. C. Stevens.]
In 1791, John Cox Stevens, of New York, commenced improvements on
steam navigation; but it was not until 1804 that any of these were
carried into practice; and even after an expenditure, as he states,
of “twenty thousand dollars,” and the constant devotion “of thirteen
years of the best period of his life” to the project, he admits that
his attempts were on the whole unsuccessful. These consisted of a plan
for propelling a boat 25 feet long and 5 feet wide, by a rotatory
engine, on the axle of which revolved a wheel, like a windmill or
smoke-jack, worked at the stern, but he found it impossible to preserve
a sufficient degree of tightness in the packing of the engine. A second
modification of his rotatory apparatus proving on trial no better
than the first, he had recourse to Watt’s engine, omitting the beam,
and having a cylinder 4½ inches diameter with a nine-inch stroke; the
boiler, which was only 2 feet long, 15 inches wide, and 12 inches
high, consisting of no less than forty-one copper tubes, each an inch
in diameter. This boat (which is interesting as the first in which
we have a direct account of the use of tubular boilers) was tried
in May 1804, and attained a velocity of 4 miles an hour.[78] After
having made repeated trials with her, his son undertook to cross
from Hoboken to New York, when, unfortunately, as she approached the
wharf, the steam-pipe gave way. The boiler having also been damaged,
he constructed another with the tubes placed vertically, and for this,
perhaps the only portion of his invention worth securing, he, in the
year 1805, obtained a patent in England,[79] where he then resided.
[Sidenote: Oliver Evans.]
While Fitch and Stevens were employed in the manner I have described,
another American citizen, Oliver Evans, an ingenious mechanic, was
endeavouring to mature a plan for using steam of a very high pressure,
to be employed in propelling waggons on common roads, and in an account
of his plans which he published in 1786,[80] he suggests a mode of
propelling vessels by steam. From this circumstance he has been
regarded by some authors as the contriver of a practicable steam-boat:
his pretensions, however, rest solely on his own allegations. He states
that, in 1785, he placed his engine, used to cleanse docks, in a boat
upon wheels, the combined weight being equal to 200 barrels of flour,
which he transported down to the water, and, when it was launched, he
fixed a paddle-wheel to the stern, and drove it down the Schuylkill
to Delaware and up the Delaware to the city, “leaving all the vessels
going up behind me at least half-way, the wind being ahead.”
In 1794, one Samuel Morey, of Connecticut, is said to have built a
steam-boat which he propelled at 5 miles an hour on the Connecticut
River, and, in 1797, he built another, with side wheels, at Bordentown,
New Jersey, which was publicly exhibited and made a passage to
Philadelphia, but which does not appear to have been afterwards
employed.
[Sidenote: Robert Fulton.]
In 1793, Robert Fulton, of whose exertions in the development of
steam-engines and their early application to useful purposes[81]
the Americans are justly proud, is said to have conceived some time
previously the idea of propelling vessels by steam. It was not,
however, until 1796 that any of his inventions were brought under
notice: when, in that year, his plan for using small canals as a means
of transit and for raising and lowering vessels on them by inclined
planes was published. In the same year, 1796, it is said that he
also suggested and used an apparatus for propelling vessels under
water, to be employed in war,[82] but it was not until 1798 that he
tried successfully to propel a boat with a steam-engine and a four
bladed screw-propeller.[83] That he had shown an early taste for
mechanical pursuits there can be no doubt, and, in 1801, when Napoleon
contemplated the conquest of England, we know that Fulton made the
friendly proposal to convey the legions of French soldiers who were to
invade our shores by means of rafts propelled by steam; but, though
the Emperor rejected the proposal as chimerical, Fulton, by his
intercourse with the French Government, was afforded an opportunity
of becoming intimately acquainted with Mr. Livingston, at that time
Minister of the United States at Paris, with whom he frequently
conversed on the subject of steam navigation, these communications
having in the sequel very important results.
[Sidenote: And Mr. Livingston.]
Mr. Livingston, who had previously been associated with Stevens in the
United States in experiments and in various plans for promoting steam
navigation, entered readily into the proposals of Fulton, and, on his
suggestion, a boat was built on the Seine, the engine for which was
ordered in England. This experimental boat, 66 feet long, and 8 feet
wide, was completed in 1803. When on the point of making her first
trial, the weight of the machinery broke the boat in two and both sank.
They were, however, soon raised and the necessary repairs were shortly
completed, but, on trial, the boat did not move with as much speed as
Mr. Fulton expected.
[Sidenote: Plan really derived from English experiments of Symington.]
Before describing Fulton’s further experiments, it may be convenient
to direct attention to a statement made by Symington soon afterwards
in the newspapers of the period, which remains uncontradicted, for
the purpose of showing that whatever merit is due to Fulton, his
information was derived from others.
There is, indeed, no doubt that, in 1802, when Symington was conducting
his experiments under the patronage of Lord Dundas, a stranger came
to the banks of the Forth and Clyde Canal and requested an interview,
announcing himself as Mr. Fulton of the United States,[84] whither
he intended to return, and expressing a desire to see Mr. Symington’s
boat and machinery, and to procure some information of the principles
on which it was moved, before he left Europe. He remarked that, however
beneficial the invention might be to Great Britain, it would be of more
importance to North America, considering the numerous navigable rivers
and lakes of that continent, and the facility for procuring timber for
building vessels and supplying them with fuel; that the usefulness
of steam-vessels in a mercantile point of view could not fail to
attract the attention of every observer; and that, if he was allowed
to carry the plan to the United States, it would be advantageous to
Mr. Symington, as, if his engagements would permit, the constructing
or superintending of the construction of such vessels would naturally
devolve upon him. Mr. Symington, in compliance with the stranger’s
request, caused the engine fire to be lighted, and the machinery put
in motion. Several persons entered the boat, and along with Mr. Fulton
were carried from where she then lay, to Lock No. 16 on the Forth and
Clyde Canal, about four miles west, and returned to the starting-place
in one hour and twenty minutes, being at the rate of six miles an hour,
to the astonishment of Mr. Fulton and the other gentlemen.[85]
Mr. Fulton obtained leave to take notes and sketches of the size
and construction of the boat and apparatus; but he never afterwards
communicated with Mr. Symington. From the concurrent testimony of
Mr. Jacob Perkins, and the oaths of those present in the boat during
the experiment, it is evident that Fulton availed himself of the
information obtained from Symington, and ordered from Messrs. Boulton
and Watt of Birmingham, a steam-engine for propelling a boat intended
to be built in the United States.[86]
[Sidenote: Fulton builds steamers in the United States.]
In 1806 Mr. Fulton, in conjunction with Mr. Livingston, commenced
building a steam-boat in America, in the yard of Charles Brown on the
East (Hudson) River. She was decked for a short distance only at stem
and stern. The engine was open to view, and a house, like that of a
canal boat, was raised to cover the boiler and the apartments for the
passengers and crew. There were no wheel-guards. The boiler was set
in _masonry_. She was launched in the spring of 1807, and the engines
ordered from Boulton and Watt[87] were fixed in that boat. The engine
differed very little from that of the _Charlotte Dundas_, whose piston
had a four-foot stroke, with a cylinder 22 inches in diameter, while
that of the _Clermont_ (as the American boat was named, after the
residence of Mr. Livingston on the Hudson) had also a piston with a
four-foot stroke, and a cylinder 24 inches in diameter. Such similarity
in the dimensions of the engines could hardly have arisen from a mere
accident.
But whatever information Fulton derived from Symington, he claimed no
patent for the assumed discovery. On the first trial of the _Clermont_
her speed was 5 miles an hour. Fulton perceiving that her paddles
entered too deep into the water had them removed, and placed nearer
the centres of the wheels. He afterwards made a further trip in her,
leaving New York at one o’clock on Monday, and arrived at Clermont,
the seat of Mr. Livingston, at one o’clock on Tuesday, performing in
twenty-four hours a distance of 110 miles. On the voyage from Clermont
to Albany, a distance of 40 miles, the time was eight hours, equal on
the average of both passages to nearly 5 miles an hour.
[Sidenote: The _Clermont_.]
The _Clermont_ was soon afterwards lengthened and considerably improved
in appearance and usefulness—indeed, almost wholly rebuilt. Her hull
was covered from stem to stern with a flush deck, beneath which two
cabins were formed, surrounded by double ranges of berths, and fitted
up for comfort in a manner then unexampled. Her dimensions now were,
“Length, 130 feet; breadth, 16½ feet; with an engine of only eighteen
horse-power,[88] though her burden was 160 tons, the boiler being 20
feet long, 7 feet deep, and 8 feet broad; the axle of her paddle-wheel
was cast iron, but it had no outer support; the diameter of the
paddle-wheels was 15 feet, and the paddles were 4 feet long, dipping
into the water 2 feet.”
It appears from a paragraph in the _American Citizen_ (newspaper) of
the 17th August, 1807,[89] that Mr. Fulton’s original intention was to
ply with his boat on the Mississippi; but the passenger trade on the
Hudson then offered greater inducements. Various accounts have been
given of the performances of the _Clermont_, but, without referring to
these, it is better to furnish Fulton’s own description of the trial,
which he gave in a letter addressed to the above newspaper,[90] as this
is more likely to be accurate than any other account, and has never
been contradicted; indeed, had his statements been exaggerated, they
would certainly have been questioned at the time, the more so that
his great experiment was bitterly opposed by the owners of all the
sailing-vessels then employed on the Hudson.
The following is a representation of the _Clermont_ as she appeared on
the Hudson after being improved,[91] and where she continued to ply
with goods and passengers between New York and Albany for some years.
[Illustration]
[Sidenote: Merits and demerits of Fulton.]
But though the _Clermont_ was unquestionably a great practical success,
and the first boat in the world regularly and continuously engaged in
passenger traffic, she encountered many difficulties in her commercial
operations.[92] In overcoming these difficulties and persevering
with his novel undertaking, much credit is due to Robert Fulton; and
though he was not, indeed he never claimed to be, the inventor of the
steam-engine as applicable to marine propulsion, the manner in which
various English authors of note have written,[93] and the tone in which
an eminent English engineer has spoken of him, do not become men in
their positions.[94] If we do not consider it necessary to be generous
to the genius or, rather, to the persevering industry of men of other
nations, we ought at least to be just, and not to overlook important
facts or allow our judgment to be biased, because the man whose labours
we are describing was not a countryman of our own.
[Sidenote: At all events, the first “to run” a steam-vessel regularly;]
Even when the fact is clearly established, and there is, without
doubt, every reason to suppose that Fulton borrowed largely from
Watt, Pickard, and Symington, and, it might be added, from his own
countrymen, Fitch and Rumsey, this ought not to detract from his
merit in putting all the inventions of these men and others together,
and in first applying them to practical and useful purposes. He did
what no other man had done before him; he commenced and _continued to
run_ the steam-ship which now traverses every river, every coast, and
every ocean, and which, of all the inventions of man, is the mightiest
harbinger of peace and good-will among nations the world has ever
seen. If his was a combination of the inventions of others, if he were
a “quack,” it was only on a small scale compared to those persons
who combine the inventions of men of all nations in the magnificent
steam-engines of the present day. Do we, however, think less of any one
of these engines when we see it in motion, and know that that beautiful
machine, more like a living thing than any other work of man, is not
the invention of any one man, or of any one nation? And ought we to
think less highly of Robert Fulton when we know the labour he bestowed
to collect the inventions of the age in which he lived, the hardships
he endured to put them into operation, and the difficulties he had to
overcome in applying them to useful purposes?
That these difficulties were very great, so great indeed that to most
men they would have been insurmountable, may be known from the fact
that the _Clermont_ was often, intentionally, run into by rival vessels
on the river Hudson, and that the legislature was compelled to pass
a law punishing by fine and imprisonment any person who attempted to
destroy or injure her. Nor did his troubles end here. When the State
of New York, convinced of the practical utility of his invention,
granted him the exclusive privilege of navigating its rivers for a
certain number of years, he was harassed by numerous law suits, and
at last so thoroughly broken down by the oppressive influence of men
of capital, who were either interested in the sailing-vessels, or in
other inventions, that the State, in deference to the opinions of
those sticklers who grudged him the merit of his labours, rescinded
its concession, and passed a resolution that the boats built by Fulton
were in substance the invention of his countryman, Fitch; a most unjust
decision, as both of Fitch’s models, as I have shown, were valueless,
while Fulton’s were practicable.
[Sidenote: and to develop its power and usefulness.]
But, to whomsoever the invention belonged, the merit of first
permanently developing its power and usefulness belongs to Robert
Fulton. He it was who showed how it could be made not merely an
instrument of vast importance to mankind, but also an immense source of
profit to all who adopted it, though he himself, if reports be true,
derived no advantage from it, but died in 1815 very poor and almost
broken-hearted through the persecution of jealous and narrow-minded
rivals, leaving his family in greatly embarrassed circumstances, but at
the same time leaving behind him an everlasting memorial of his energy
and perseverance, and an enduring stigma on those who had taunted him
with a “_Fulton’s folly_.”
The application of the new power to the propulsion of vessels was
rapidly followed up in America, and, in 1809, the first steamboat was
launched on the St. Lawrence of which an account at the time appeared
in the _Quebec Mercury_.[95]
[Sidenote: First steam-boat on the St. Lawrence, 1813.]
In the spring of 1813, a second boat of increased dimensions was
launched from the banks of the St. Lawrence. She was 130 feet in
length of keel, and 140 feet on deck with a width of 24 feet, and by
the account given by the _Mercury_ she made the passage from Montreal
to Quebec in twenty-two and a half hours, notwithstanding that the
wind was easterly the whole time and blowing strong. But though the
_Swiftsure_, for such was her name, beat the most famous of the sailing
packets on the line (fourteen hours in a race of thirty-six hours), her
owners do not seem to have been very confident of her movements under
all circumstances or of the number of passengers who would patronize
her, for she was advertised to “sail as the wind and passengers may
suit.” The success of the _Clermont_ for the purposes of passenger
traffic on rivers soon, however, spread to other countries.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] _Ante_, vol. i. Introd. p. xxxi. Arrian, Exped. Alex. 11, 21.
[3] Galley from Koyunjik, _ante_, vol. i. p. 276.
[4] See the bas-reliefs from Nineveh, British Museum.
[5] Owen’s “Lectures on Comparative Anatomy,” 2nd. ed. p. 605.
Carpenter’s “Physiology,” 645. “Woodcroft on Marine Propulsion,” note,
p. 1, and drawing of Nautilus in frontispiece to Woodcroft’s “Steam
Navigation.” See also an interesting paper, read at the Society of Arts
on the 14th of April, 1858, by John MacGregor, Esq., M.A., Barrister at
Law.
[6] There is little difference between the action of an oar in sculling
and that of the modern screw-propeller, which is fast superseding the
paddle-wheel in all ocean-going steamers: the one has an alternate
lateral motion, like the tail of a fish; the other is rotatory, but
with the same effect. It may be added that fishes often have the power
of “feathering” their tails, by puckering their lobes in their forward
motion, and expanding them on their return, so as to displace as
little water as possible, while they, at the same time, rely for their
advancement on the reaction of the water in the direction of their
body. These points have been carefully considered in the construction
and arrangement of the blades of the screw, as well as the important
fact that the tail of the fish or the sweep of an oar in their motions
displace a quantity of water, great in proportion to the length of the
instruments employed; and further, that it is by the resistance the
water makes to this displacement by the oar or tail, in their continued
oscillation, coming as these do from their extreme sweep to the axis of
the boat or fish, that either is urged forward.
[7] An edition of Hero’s “Pneumatics” has been published by Mr.
Woodcroft. Lond., 4th ed. 1851. His second experiment is referred to in
Muirhead’s “Life of James Watt,” 2nd ed. p. 107.
[8] The principle of Hero’s steam-machine depends on the physical
law that, when any fluid issues from a vessel in which it has been
confined, the vessel is acted on by a force equal to that with which
the fluid escapes, but in the opposite direction. Thus, if water
issues from an orifice, a pressure is produced behind the orifice
corresponding to the force with which the water escapes: hence, the
recoil of a gun when fired. If the muzzle were turned at right angles
to the length of the gun, the explosive gases would escape sideways,
and the shooter, instead of being forced back, would spin round. The
orifices in each case are exposed to the atmosphere, which tends to
rush in with a force of a little less than 15 lbs. on the square inch:
the force, therefore, with which the steam escapes represents the
excess of its elasticity over that of the atmosphere, which furnishes,
as it were, the fulcrum, and thus gives motion to the machine. Mr.
Bourne states that the principle of the Æolipile is the same as that
embodied in Avery and Ruthven’s engines for the production of rotatory
power. “These engines,” he says, “are more expensive in steam than
ordinary engines and travel at an inconvenient speed; but in other
respects they are quite as effectual, and their construction is
extremely simple and inexpensive.”
[9] In another experiment (No. 37), Hero shows “how temple doors may be
opened by fire on an altar.” He says, “Let the proposed temple stand on
a pedestal, on which is also a small altar. Through the altar insert
a tube, of which one mouth is within the altar, and the other nearly
at the centre of a globe. The tube must be soldered to the globe in
which a bent syphon is placed. Let the hinges of the doors be extended
downwards, turning freely on pivots, and from the hinges let two chains
running into one be attached by means of a pulley to a leaden weight,
on the descent of which the doors will be shut, let the outer leg of
the syphon bend into a suspended vessel and fill the globe half full of
water. When the fire becomes hot, the heated air in the altar expands
and, passing through the tube into the globe, will drive the liquid
through the syphon into the suspended vessel which, descending by its
weight, will tighten the chains and open the doors.”
[10] Although there may be a doubt how far the inventions recorded by
Hero were used for superstitious practices, there is no question that,
somewhat later, the agency of steam was employed for purposes anything
but legitimate. Thus Gibbon (c. xl.) gives an amusing account of how
Anthemius, the architect of Sta. Sophia at Constantinople, avenged,
himself on Zeno, the orator. “In a lower room,” says he, “Anthemius
arranged several vessels or cauldrons of water, each of them covered
by the wide bottom of a leathern tube, which rose to a narrow top, and
was artificially conveyed among the joints and rafters of the adjacent
building. A fire was kindled beneath the cauldron; the steam of the
boiling water ascended through the tubes; the house was shaken by the
effects of imprisoned air, and its trembling inhabitants might wonder
that the city was unconscious of the earthquake they had felt.” Still
later, Arago, in his “Éloge de James Watt,” notices an ancient Teutonic
god, called _Bustarich_, on the banks of the Weser, who was made by the
priests to show his displeasure through the agency of steam. The head
of the metal God was hollow and had within it a pot of water. Its mouth
and another hole having been plugged, a charcoal fire was cleverly
lighted under it, in such a way as not to be perceived by the expectant
worshippers. After a while, the imprisoned steam forced out the plugs,
with a loud report, followed by two jets of steam, which formed a dense
cloud round the god and concealed him from his astonished worshippers.
[11] Paper read at the Society of Arts 14th of April, 1858, by John
MacGregor, Esq., Barrister at Law.
[12] This work in Latin, printed at Verona, 1472, is the first book
with woodcuts printed in Italy.
[13] This letter is written from Simancas, and bears the date
27th August, 1825. It was published 1826, in Lack’s “Astronomical
Correspondence.”
[14] The interview with the Pope took place at Bupeto, 22nd of June,
1543, and the campaign against the duke of Cleves, the ally and general
of Francis, followed.
[15] “On the 23rd of September last (1857),” remarks Mr. MacGregor, “I
visited the town of Simancas, near Valladolid in Spain, with Captain
John Ussher, to inspect some letters of Blasco de Garay, which are
there preserved among the national archives.
“Having obtained the requisite Royal permission, I was allowed, after
much difficulty, to read (but not to copy) two letters signed by Blasco
de Garay, written clearly in Spanish and well preserved. One of these
was addressed from Malaga, the other from Barcelona; and both were
dated, A.D. 1543. They describe two separate experiments with different
vessels, both of them moved _by paddle-wheels turned by men_.
“One vessel was stated to be of two hundred Spanish tons burthen,
propelled by a paddle-wheel on each side, worked by twenty-five men.
The other vessel was moved in a similar manner by forty men (in all).
The speed attained is mentioned in the text, and is stated in a side
note (written in a different hand) to have been one league, about three
and a half English miles per hour. Various calculations, as to the
tonnage, the motive power, the cost, and other matters are contained
in the letters, and it is said that the vessel thus moved was found
to steer well, but could be propelled more easily for a long time by
oars. Also that, like other inventions, this would probably be improved
by the experience of further trials. We read the letters carefully
through, and neither of them contained any mention whatever of the use
of steam, or any expression to indicate that this was contemplated.
“The officer left in charge of the documents, Don Manuel Garcia, said
that he did not know of any other letters of Blasco de Garay, or of any
other authentic papers relating to his experiment; that he believed
most certainly Blasco de Garay did not invent or suggest the use of
steam for propulsion; and that the assertion he had made was ‘_un
mensonge historique_.’”
[Sidenote: Disproved by Mr. MacGregor’s investigations.]
On October 15th, 1857, and following days, Mr. MacGregor made diligent
inquiries at Barcelona respecting Blasco de Garay, and after writing
a letter inviting information on the subject to the _Diario de
Barcelona_, 19th October, 1857, Señor Michel Mayor undertook to satisfy
his inquiries. In the Archives of Aragon, the Director said that no
trace of any document relating to Blasco de Garay was to be found, and,
that the MSS. in that library were only by order of reigns, and not
by dates. With the assistance of Don Gregorio and Fidil Clares, Mr.
MacGregor states that he inspected the catalogue of the Bibliotheca
Publica and of the Bibliotheca Publica Episcopal without any better
result, the keepers of these libraries declaring they knew nothing
of any other letter of Blasco de Garay; one of these officers said
he believed that men only had been used to move the vessel, and the
Government Inspector of Mines assured him that he was of the same
opinion. But a Spanish engineer mentioned that some of the actual
_steam-engine machinery_ used in the vessels was still to be seen at
the School of Artillery; after, however, diligent inquiry there, Mr.
MacGregor could find no trace of any of these relics.
But after these investigations, it was reported to Mr. MacGregor
through Colonel Stopford, of Madrid, that there was another letter
of Blasco de Garay, in which he alludes to the steam-boat, and that
this document was kept secret at Madrid, which, as Mr. MacGregor adds,
“would not probably be the case if by its means the claim of a Spaniard
to the invention of the steam-boat could be substantiated;” and he
remarks in conclusion that, _if_ Blasco de Garay used a steam-engine
to propel a vessel, the evidence of this fact is not supported by his
two letters at Simancas, and, further, that it has not been produced,
if it is known there or at Barcelona, by the public officers and others
interested in supporting such a claim.
[16] “Steam and Steam Navigation;” and article, “Steam Navigation,”
_Encyclopædia Britannica_, 8th ed., vol. xx. p. 636.
[17] Since Mr. MacGregor’s visit, M. Bergenroth, who has done so much
towards the elucidation of the manuscript treasures at Simancas, has
been able at his leisure to copy the documents relating to De Garay,
preserved there, they are;—1. A holograph from him to the Emperor,
dated Malaga, September 10th, 1540, containing his report on the trial
of one of his paddle-wheel ships. 2. The report of Captain Antonio
Destigasura on the same trial trip. 3. The report of the Proveedores of
Malaga concerning the same trip, dated July 24th, 1540. 4. The report
of Blasco de Garay to the Emperor, dated July 6th, 1543, concerning
the trial trip of another of his paddle-wheel ships, made at Barcelona
in June, 1543. 5. A letter of Blasco de Garay to Carrs, dated June
20th, 1543. In none of these is any reference to steam-power to be
found—thus completely confirming Mr. MacGregor’s previous statements.
[18] “Inventions and Devises,” by William Bourne, p. 15; London, 1578.
[19] Woodcroft’s “Manuscript Collection” and “Marine Propulsion,” vol.
i. p. 7.
[20] “Marine Propulsion” from Patent Office, Woodcroft, vol. i. p. 8.
[21] Works of Roger Bacon, Hamburg, ed. 1598, pp. 74-75.
[22] “Woodcroft on Steam Navigation,” pp. 3 and 4.
[23] Ibid., p. 5.
[24] Although there is no evidence that the Marquess of Worcester
did employ steam to propel any boat, it must be allowed (in spite of
the perhaps natural desire of Mr. Muirhead to exalt the genius of
his relative, James Watt) that he was the first to make an actual
steam-engine. Certain important points are clear from his description,
viz., that the vessel in which the water was evaporated was distinct
from that containing the water to be raised; that there were two
vessels of similar description, the contents of which were alternately
raised by the pressure of the “water rarefied by fire;” and that
the water was lifted in a continuous stream by the aid of two cocks
communicating with these vessels, and with the boiler. Now this
is exactly the agency of steam at the present time, in that it is
generated in one vessel, and used for mechanical purposes in another:
indeed, it is just this distinction which shows the invention to have
been a true one—for had the action of the steam been confined to
the vessel in which it was produced, it would have been of no more
practical use than were the experiments of Hero, De Caus, or Rivault.
Complaint has been often made of the indistinctness and incompleteness
of the descriptions furnished by the Marquess in his famous “Scantlings
of one hundred Inventions,” but it may be doubted whether the author’s
intention was really to convey knowledge of the mechanism he used,
or even to indicate the physical principles on which they depend.
His statement, however, is sufficient to enable any one possessing
a knowledge of the mechanical qualities of steam, to understand the
general nature of the machine produced. It ought also to be remembered
that many of the ideas of inventions thrown out by the Marquess, as
stenography, speaking statues, combination locks, &c., &c., have been
since his time carried into effect.
[25] “Buchanan on Steam Propelling,” Glasgow, 1816, p. 161.
[26] “Bourne on the Screw-Propeller,” pp. 5 and 9.
[27] Morisotus, “Orbis Maritima,” Generalis Historia divisio, fol.,
1643.
[28] The ferry boats at Quebec plying between the opposite sides of the
river St. Lawrence were, at a very recent period, if they are not so
still, propelled by horses and oxen walking along circular platforms
so as to produce a power applied to the paddle-wheels of the boat. And
a boat of a somewhat similar kind was, in the course of the present
century, employed for some time between Yarmouth and Norwich in this
country.
[29] 1. The middle beam. 2. The end with iron bars wherein the strength
of the ship lyeth both ends alike. 3. Rudder of the ship. 4. The keel.
5. Iron bolts with screws. 6. Depth of the inner beam. 7. The wheel
that goeth round it hath its motion. 8. The scuttles or hatchways. 9.
The gallery where they walk.
[30] “Specifications relating to Marine Propulsion,” Woodcroft, Part I.
p. 29.
[31] Woodcroft, Part I. p. 51; and see Drawings, “Repository of Arts,”
vol. i. (second series), p. 11.
[32] “He was a foolish man,” says Dr. Arnott, “who thought he had
found the means of commanding always a fair wind for his pleasure
boat by erecting an immense bellows in the stern. The bellows and the
sails acted against each other, and there was no motion: indeed, in a
perfect calm, there would be a little backward motion, because the sail
would not catch all the wind from the bellows.”—Arnott, “Elements of
Physics,” p. 120.
[33] “Specifications of Marine Propulsion,” Woodcroft, vol. i. pp. 16
and 17.
[34] Papin was driven from France by the revocation of the Edict of
Nantes, and was associated with Robert Boyle in many of his experiments
on the air-pump—he was elected F.R.S. in 1681, and was for a time, the
secretary of the society. He was invited to Germany by the Landgrave
of Hesse, was some years Professor of Mathematics at Marburg and
died there, 1710; he seems the first to have clearly discerned the
necessity of the vacuum under the cylinder, and that the pressure of
the atmosphere alone is enormous. (A cylinder 1 foot in diameter, has
a surface of 113 square inches, hence, the atmospheric pressure in it
is 113 ⨉ 15 = 1695 lbs.). Papin first proposed to exhaust the air by
pumps, and in 1687 laid this plan before the Royal Society; but such a
plan would only have been a transference of power, the effect being the
same in character as that of lifting the water to the water-wheel. His
most important invention was that of a method of producing a vacuum by
the condensation of steam—the reversal, in fact, of the process of the
previous machines of De Caus and Lord Worcester. He drew the inference
that, if water in its conversion into steam swelled many hundred
times, it must follow that steam reconverted into water would shrink
into its primitive dimensions. He was also the first to suggest the
safety-valve, but he did not, strange to say, apply it to the machine
subsequently invented. It has been asserted, though not proved, by some
writers that Papin derived many of his ideas from Otto von Guericke,
who had invented an air-pump as early as 1654.
[35] The “Miners’ Friend,” &c. A paper published by Savery in 1702.
[36] Thomas Savery was born about 1650, and, in early life, served as
a military engineer; he then gave himself to the study of mechanics,
and constructed a clock still in existence. He also made a boat with
paddle-wheels, turned by a capstan, his object being, as he says, to
enable ships to be moved independently of the wind. He next invented
what he called his “Fire-machine,” and exhibited it to William III.
and the Royal Society in 1699. He applied his engine largely to the
pumping out of mines, and, though it was found ultimately to have too
little power, and was superseded by that of Newcomen, Savery may fairly
claim the credit of having constructed the first really practicable
steam-engine. He invented also a very ingenious plan for determining
the height of the water in the boiler of the steam-engine, which is
still sometimes used.
[37] Letters to Leibnitz, “Dictionnaire des Inventions,” Migne’s N.
Encycl., Paris, 1852, vol. xxxvi., art. “Vélocipèdes,” p. 317. Thomas
Newcomen was a working blacksmith in the town of Dartmouth (Devon). He
was assisted in his inventions by John Calley, a glazier of the same
place, with whom he subsequently entered into partnership, and erected
more than one engine which successfully pumped water from mines.
[38] “Acta Eruditorum,” 1737, p. 80.
[39] Ibid., 1709, p. 282.
[40] Gill’s “Technical Repository,” 1829, p. 251.
[41] “Specifications of Marine Propulsion,” Woodcroft, vol. i. p. 21.
[42] The reader will find this plan described at length in Woodcroft’s
“Specifications of Marine Propulsion,” pp. 23 and 34 (note). Hulls
“placed a paddle-wheel on beams projecting over the stern, and it
was turned by an atmospheric steam-engine acting in conjunction with
a counterpoise weight upon a system of ropes and grooved wheels”
(MacGregor).
[43] Jonathan Hulls was born at Campden, in Gloucestershire, in 1699,
and made his first experiments on the Avon at Evesham. In 1737 he
published a pamphlet entitled “A Description and Draughts of a New
Invented Machine;” in this he proposed to put a Newcomen engine on
board a tow-boat to work a paddle-wheel placed in the stern.
Mr. Smiles (“Lives of Boulton and Watt,” p. 63) observes, “It has been
stated that Newcomen took out a patent for his invention in 1705;”
but this is a mistake, as no patent was ever taken out by Newcomen.
It is supposed that Savery, having heard of his invention, gave him
notice that he would regard his method of producing a vacuum as an
infringement of his patent, yet the principle on which Newcomen’s
engine worked was entirely different from that of Savery.
[44] He died shortly after his arrival at Venice, and his plans were
never put into practical operation.
[45] The now well-known principle of a steam-engine is this: there is a
cylinder with its rod fixed to one end of a lever, which is worked by
the combined pressure of the atmosphere and the steam upon a piston, a
temporary vacuum being made below it by suddenly condensing the steam,
which had been let into the cylinder where this piston works, by a jet
of cold water thrown into it. A partial vacuum being thus made, the
weight of the atmosphere presses down the piston and raises the other
end of the straight lever, thereby drawing up water from a mine, or,
by the numberless improvements made of late years, communicating a
mechanical power which may set in motion every description of machinery.
[46] “Woodcroft on Steam Navigation,” p. 14; “Cabinet Cyclopædia,”
Mechanics, p. 258.
[47] Letter to Dr. Small, with a drawing; Muirhead’s “James Watt,”
London, 1854, vol. ii. pp. 4, 8, 11.
[48] There seems little doubt (see Lardner, p. 186, and Muirhead’s
“Life of Watt,” p. 273), that Watt was the real inventor of the crank
for which Mr. Wasborough obtained the credit. Mr. Watt says distinctly,
that, having noticed, in 1778 or 1779, certain defects in the “ratchet
wheels” invented by Wasborough, he proceeded to remedy them, but having
neglected to take out a patent for these improvements, a workman
employed to make Mr. Watt’s model told “some of the people about Mr.
Wasborough,” on which he took a patent for the application of the crank
to steam-engines.
[49] In the Patent Museum, London, may be seen now (1875), the same
“Sun and Planet” engine (a great curiosity), which Watt constructed in
1788 at Soho, near Birmingham.
[50] See “Specifications relating to Marine Propulsion” (Part II.), p.
109, in which the existing documents are recapitulated and described.
[51] There is more in Bramah’s inventions than at first appears,
and the scientific reader would do well to study that part of them
referring to the “boiler.” The following remarks have reference to the
screw:—
“Instead of the (paddle-wheel) A, may be introduced a wheel with
inclined fans or wings, similar to the fly of a smoke-jack, or the
vertical sails of a windmill: this wheel or fly may be fixed on the
spindle C alone, and may be wholly under water, where it would, by
being turned round either way, cause the ship to be forced backwards
or forwards, as the inclination of the fans or wings will act as oars
with equal force both ways, and their power will be in proportion
to the size and velocity of the wheel; allowing the fans to have a
proper inclination, the steam-engine will also serve to clear the ship
of water with singular expedition, which is a circumstance of much
importance. This “apparatus for working the ship” is fixed in or beyond
the stern, in or about the place where the rudder is usually placed,
and its movement is occasioned by means of an horizontal spindle or
axletree conveyed to the engine through the stern end of the ship.”
[52] See letter to Dr. Small (who replies he had tried it); Muirhead’s
“James Watt,” London, 1854, vol. ii. pp. 4, 8, 11.
[53] “Woodcroft on Steam Navigation,” p. 20, _et seq._
[54] “Specifications relating to Marine Propulsion,” Part I. p. 36.
[55] It is clear that Mr. Symington is entitled to the credit of the
application of steam-power to propel the paddles. Mr. Miller stuck to
the capstan and manual labour, but, on one occasion, having been to
see Symington’s locomotive, he told him of his own invention, and of
the difficulty he had with his paddles for lack of power. “Why don’t
you use the steam-engine?” was Symington’s immediate remark. Miller
at once assented, but first constructed a double vessel, with the
paddle-wheels worked by five men at the capstan amidships, and, in June
1787, the first experiment with her was deemed successful. A short time
subsequently steam was directly applied, but, whether in consequence
of Symington’s remark, is not certain. Mr. Taylor, who is said to have
suggested it, was an intimate friend and fellow-pupil with Symington at
Edinburgh 1786-7. (Smiles’ “Lives of Boulton and Watt,” p. 438.)
[56] Dumfries paper; _Edinburgh Advertiser_, and the _Scot’s Magazine_,
vol. 1. p. 566, November, 1788.
[57] _Caledonian Mercury_, _Evening Courant_, and _Advertiser_.
[58] In the Patent Office Museum, London, there may still be seen, “the
parent engine of steam navigation, made for Patrick Miller, Esq., and
used by him on the lake at Dalswinton, 1788.” It consists of two small
paddles, working one behind the other, to be fitted on the same side
apparently of a small boat.
[59] From the narrative given by Mr. Smiles in his “Lives of Boulton
and Watt,” it is certain that they discouraged what they considered
“speculative” adventures. Both were written to, with requests that
they would make engines for Mr. Miller, those constructed by Symington
not having answered as well as was expected, and both declined to have
anything to do with the scheme. (Smiles, p. 445.)
[60] “Woodcroft on Steam Navigation,” p. 54.
[61] “Encyclopædia Britannica” (eighth edition), vol. xx. p. 637.
[62] Mr. Smiles, in his interesting “Lives of the Engineers” (i.)
states that, in 1790, Lord Stanhope had proposed a mode of propelling
vessels by steam, and had been in communication with Mr. Rennie on
this subject, who, on the 26th April of that year, sent his Lordship
such information as he could obtain about Boulton and Watt’s improved
steam-engine. Lord Stanhope objected to the space occupied by the
condensing apparatus, to which Mr. Rennie replied that _high pressure_
could be applied, on which his Lordship constructed a vessel on that
plan which obtained a speed of 3 miles an hour (vol. ii. p. 237).
[63] Mr. Woodcroft observes that “this vessel might, from the
simplicity of its machinery, have been at work to this day with such
ordinary repairs as are now occasionally required for all steamboats,”
p. 53; and, again, “thus had Symington the undoubted merit of having
combined for the first time those improvements which constitute _the
present system of steam navigation_.”
[64] Patented 23rd August, 1780. An invention in which the
reciprocating motion of a beam acting on a connecting rod turns a
wheel. Woodcroft, “Marine Propulsion,” Part I. p. 32.
[65] It seems important to record that the success of Mr. Symington’s
engine consisted mainly in this: that, after placing in a boat a
double acting reciprocating engine, he _attached his crank to the
axis of the paddle-wheel_, a combination on which, as Mr. Woodcroft
justly observes, “there has been no improvement even to the present
time, either in this or in any other country.” The power thus applied
secured rotary motion without the interposition of a lever or beam. Mr.
Symington might fairly claim, as he does in his patent of October 14th,
1801, that “the principle of this invention comprehends any species of
machinery thus put in rotatory motion by a steam engine which may be
made use of to navigate boats, vessels, or rafts.”
[66] “Encyclopédie Moderne,” Paris, 1855, art. “Vapeur,” p. 171.
[67] See “Des Bateaux à Vapeur,” par Jouffroy (the son of the Marquis),
pp. 13 and 17; and “L’Universel Dictionnaire Encyclopédique de la
France,” Paris, 1845, vol. ix. p. 737.
[68] Ibid., p. 737.
[69] Stuart’s “Anecdotes of Steam Engines,” vol. ii. pp. 450 and 483.
[70] “Elements of Experimental Physics,” Florence, 1796, quoted by J.
Scott Russell on “Steam and Steam Navigation,” p. 238; also referred to
nine years previously in “Lettere di Fisica Sperimentale,” di Seraffino
Serrati; Firenze, 1787, 12mo., and quoted in “Biographie Universelle,”
Paris, 1856, art. “Fulton.”
[71] “Steam Navigation,” pp. 48-51.
[72] 6th Report, p. 179.
[73] See Brewster’s “Encyclopædia,” extracted from the _Columbian
Magazine_, Philadelphia, vol. i., December 1786.
[74] John Fitch, who was a remarkable genius, was born in Connecticut,
U.S., on the 21st January, 1743. His father, a small farmer, who
could not afford to give him more than a limited education, bound
him apprentice to a watch and clock maker. Afterwards he became a
silversmith at Trenton, New Jersey, and, during the early part of
the Revolutionary War, he was appointed by the “Committee of Safety”
armourer to that State. Dislodged by the approach of the British,
he fled to Bucks County, Pennsylvania; subsequently, he became a
sutler, and supplied the American camp at Valley Forge with goods and
provisions: he was also a land surveyor, and, in that capacity, the
idea first suggested itself to him (as, curiously enough, it had done
to Symington, in Scotland, about the same time) of propelling carriages
by steam, but he soon abandoned it on account of the roughness of the
roads in America, and turned his attention to propelling vessels by
that power on the rivers.
In a sketch of his life, which appeared in the “Philadelphia Dispatch”
of the 9th February, 1873, the writer, in describing the difficulties
Fitch had to encounter in raising money to finish his second
steam-boat, remarks: “In a letter to David Rettenhouse, when asking
an advance of fifty pounds to finish the boat, he says, ‘This, sir,
whether I bring it to perfection or not, will be the mode of crossing
the Atlantic in time for packets and armed vessels.’ But everything
failed, and the poor projector loitered about the city for some months,
a despised, unfortunate, heart-broken man. ‘Often have I seen him,’
said Thomas P. Cope, many years afterward, ‘stalking about like a
troubled spectre, with downcast eyes and lowering countenance, his
coarse soiled linen peeping through the elbows of a tattered garment.’
Speaking of a visit he once paid to John Wilson, his boat builder, and
Peter Brown, his blacksmith, in which, as usual, he held forth upon
his hobby, Mr. Cope says: ‘After indulging himself for some time in
this never-failing topic of deep excitement, he concluded with these
memorable words, “Well, gentlemen, although I shall not live to see
the time, you will, when steam-boats will be preferred to all other
means of conveyance, and especially for passengers; and they will be
particularly useful in the navigation of the river Mississippi.” He
then retired, on which Brown, turning to Wilson, exclaimed, in a tone
of deep sympathy, ‘Poor fellow! What a pity he is crazy!’”
The same writer states that Fitch, in 1796, after his return from
France, built, under the patronage of Chancellor Livingston, at New
York, “a yawl, which he moved by steam with a _screw-propeller_, on the
Collect Pond.” Poor Fitch died by his own hands in 1798. See also “Life
of John Fitch,” by Thompson Westcott, published by J. B. Lippincott,
Philadelphia, 1857.
[75] “New York Magazine” for 1790, p. 493.
[76] “History of Philadelphia,” by Thompson Westcott.
[77] Fitch himself thus describes the engines of his first boat in a
letter which appeared in the Philadelphia newspaper of the period:
“_Philadelphia, Dec. 8, 1786._
“SIR,—The reason of my so long deferring to give you a description
of the steam-boat, has been in some measure owing to the complication
of the works, and an apprehension that a number of drafts would be
necessary in order to show the powers of the machine as clearly as
you could wish. But as I have not been able to hand you herewith such
drafts, I can only give you the general principles. It is in several
parts similar to the late improved steam-engines in Europe, though
there are some alterations. Our cylinder is to be horizontal, and the
steam to work with equal force at each end. The mode by which we obtain
(what I take the liberty of terming) a vacuum is, we believe, entirely
new; as is also the method of letting the water into it, and throwing
it off against the atmosphere without any friction. It is expected
that the engine, which is a 12-inch cylinder, will move with a clear
force of 11 or 12 cwt., after the frictions are deducted; this force
is to act against a wheel of eighteen-inch diameter. The piston is to
move about 3 feet, and each vibration of the piston gives the axis
about forty evolutions. Each evolution of the axis moves twelve oars or
paddles 5½ feet (which work perpendicularly, and are represented by the
stroke of the paddle of a canoe). As six of the paddles are raised from
the water six more are entered, and the two sets of paddles make their
stroke of about 11 feet in each evolution. The cranks of the axis act
upon the paddles about one-third of their length from the lower end,
on which part of the oar the whole force of the axis is applied. Our
engine is placed in the boat about one-third from the stern, and with
the action and reaction turn the wheel in the same way.
“With the most perfect respect, sir, I beg leave to subscribe myself
“Your very humble servant,
“JOHN FITCH.”
[78] In a letter I received (May 2nd, 1875) from Commodore G. H.
Preble, Commandant U.S. Navy Yard, Philadelphia, to whom I am indebted
for much valuable information, he says, “John Stevens invented the
twin screw-steamer in 1804, which is still preserved in the Stevens’
Institute, Hoboken, N.Y.”
[79] The patent bears date 21st May, 1805, and was granted to “John Cox
Stevens, of New York, but now residing in New Bond Street, Middlesex.”
[80] Gill’s “Technical Repository,” 1829, vol. iv. p. 251 (for 1823),
where a paper by Evans is given, but no further authority.
[81] Fulton invented the drop and the double-ended steam ferry-boats
now in use in all the principal cities of the U.S.
[82] Stuart’s “Anecdotes of Steam-engines,” vol. ii. p. 478.
[83] Letter from R. Fulton in a memoir by E. Cartwright, London, 1843,
p. 142.
[84] Robert Fulton is said to have been born in Little Britain,
Pennsylvania, in 1765. He was trained as an engineer, but having
acquired some knowledge of portrait and landscape painting he came to
England and studied under his distinguished countryman, West, with whom
he continued to reside for several years; and, after quitting him,
he made painting his chief employment for some time. He afterwards
formed an acquaintance with Rumsey, and followed the profession of an
engineer. He died 1815.—“Biographical Treasury,” Longmans, 1873.
The following notice appears in the obituary of an American newspaper
of the period:
“At New York, aged about 34 (50 years?) Robert Fulton, Esq., a great
mechanical genius. He had been ill ten days, arising principally from
exposure to the weather, in the pursuit of objects calculated, as our
authority says, to increase the national greatness. These objects
were steam-vessels of war, and a safe and certain method of submarine
explosion. The first is so far completed, that it may be finished by
other hands. Mr. Fulton was the inventor of steam-boats as they are now
in use.”
See note, Appendix No. 1. p. 587.
[85] Woodcroft, pp. 64-65, Bourne, on “Steam Navigation,” p. 14; and
“Encyclopædia Britannica” (eighth edition), vol. xx. p. 638.
[86] Woodcroft, on “Steam Navigation,” pp. 65-67.
[87] Woodcroft, on “Steam Navigation,” with drawing of the vessel in
question, p. 60.
[88] The term horse-power is employed to express the magnitude or
capacity and power of an engine. It originated with James Watt from
the actual measure of the work which a horse could perform, in raising
33,000 lbs. one foot high per minute; but as any such measure must,
in the nature of things, be vague and fluctuating, it was replaced
by what is now known as “nominal horse-power,” a mode of measurement
based mainly upon the area of the cylinder, the number of strokes per
minute and the pressure. But this method is far from showing the actual
horse-power, as some modern engines will give an effective power three,
four, and even six times greater than the nominal; it serves, however,
as a commercial unit of capacity or power of performance and regulates
the price to be paid for an engine. But it is much to be regretted that
nominal power is not yet estimated by an uniform standard, as different
rules are still applied to condensing and non-condensing engines, and
these vary in different places.
[89] “Mr. Fulton’s ingenious steamboat, invented with a view to the
navigation of the Mississippi, from New Orleans and upwards, sails
to-day from the North Run, near States Prison and Albany, the velocity
of the steam-boat is calculated at 4 miles an hour. It is said that it
will make a progress of two against the current of the Mississippi and,
if so, it will certainly be a very valuable acquisition to the commerce
of the Western States.”—_American Citizen_, 17th August, 1807.
[90] “To the Editor of the _American Citizen_.
“New York, 21st August, 1807.
“SIR,—I arrived this afternoon at 4 o’clock in the steam-boat from
Albany. As the success of my experiment gives me great hope that
such boats may be rendered of much importance to my country, to
prevent erroneous opinions, and give satisfaction to the friends of
these useful improvements, you will have the goodness to publish the
following facts:
“I left New York on Monday, at 1 o’clock, and arrived in Clermont, the
seat of Chancellor Livingston, at 1 o’clock on Tuesday; time, 24 hours;
distance, 110 miles; on Wednesday I departed from the Chancellor’s at
8 o’clock in the morning, and arrived at Albany at 5 in the afternoon;
distance, 40 miles; time, 8 hours! The sum of this is 150 miles in 32
hours, equal near 5 miles an hour.
“On Thursday, at 9 o’clock in the morning, I left Albany, and arrived
at the Chancellor’s at 6 in the evening. I started from thence at
7, and arrived at New York on Friday, at 4 in the afternoon; time,
30 hours; space run through, 150 miles, equal to 5 miles an hour.
Throughout the whole way, going and returning, the wind was ahead; no
advantage could be drawn from my sails. The whole has therefore been
performed by the power of the steam-engine.
“I am, sir, your most obedient,
“ROBERT FULTON.”
[91] Stuart’s Anecdotes of “Steam-engines,” vol. ii. p. 488.
[92] Fulton’s second large boat on the Hudson was the _Car of Neptune_.
Besides these two vessels he constructed steam ferry-boats to run
between New York and New Jersey, also a boat for the navigation of Long
Island Sound, as well as others for the Hudson, and for the Ohio and
Mississippi.
[93] Mr. Woodcroft, in concluding his remarks about Fulton,
disparagingly says that, “If these inventions separately (those
borrowed from Watt, Pickard, and Symington) or, as a combination, were
removed out of Fulton’s boat, nothing would be left but the hull; and,
if the hull be then divested of that peculiarity of form admitted
to have been derived from Colonel Beaufoy’s experiments, all that
would remain would be the hull of a boat of ordinary construction....
Fulton’s patents and specifications must, therefore, be considered
either as mere importations, borrowed (in patent phraseology) from
‘foreigners residing abroad’ ‘or as barefaced plagiarisms.’”
[94] In this judgment Mr. Woodcroft is supported by Mr. Rennie,
who considered “Fulton a quack who traded upon the inventions of
others.”—Smiles’ “Lives,” vol. ii. p. 237.
[95] “On Saturday morning, at eight o’clock arrived here, from
Montreal, being her first trip, the steam-boat _Accommodation_,
with ten passengers. This is the first vessel of the kind that ever
appeared in this harbour. She is continually crowded with visitants.
She left Montreal on Wednesday, at two o’clock, so that her passage
was sixty-six hours, thirty of which she was at anchor. She arrived at
Three Rivers in twenty-four hours. She has at present berths for twenty
passengers, which next year will be considerably augmented. No wind or
tide can stop her. She has 75 feet keel, and 85 feet on deck. The price
for a passage up is nine dollars, and eight down—the vessel supplying
provisions. The great advantage attending a vessel so constructed is,
that a passage may be calculated on to a degree of certainty, in point
of time, which cannot be the case with any vessel propelled by sails
only. The steam-boat receives her impulse from an open, double-spoked,
perpendicular wheel, on each side, without any circular band or rim.
To the end of each double spoke is fixed a square board, which enters
the water, and, by the rotary motion of the wheel, acts like a paddle.
The wheels are put and kept in motion by steam, operating within the
vessel. A mast is to be fixed in her, for the purpose of using a sail
when the wind is favourable, which will occasionally accelerate her
headway.”
CHAPTER II.
Progress of steam navigation in Europe—Clyde mechanics take the
lead—James Watt, 1766—Henry Bell, 1800—Correspondence between
Bell and Fulton—Letter from Bell to Miller of Dalswinton—The
_Comet_ steamer, 1811, plies between Glasgow and Greenock, and
afterwards on the Forth—Extraordinary progress of ship-building
on the Clyde—Great value and importance of the private
building yards—J. Elder and Company; their extensive premises,
_note_—Steam between Norwich and Yarmouth, 1813; between London
and Margate, 1815—The _Glasgow_—Early opposition to the
employment of steam-vessels—Barges on the Thames—First steamer
between Liverpool and the Clyde—H. M. steam-ship _Comet_—The
_Rob Roy_ and other vessels, 1818—The _United Kingdom_,
1826—First idea of iron ships, 1830—Proposals of Trevethick
and Dickenson, 1809-1815—The _Vulcan_, 1818—The _Aaron Manby_,
1821—The Shannon Steam Packet Company, 1824—Mr. John Laird and
Sir William Fairbairn—The _Elburkah_, 1832, and _Garry Owen_,
1834—The _Rainbow_, 1837—Messrs. Tod and MacGregor—The _Great
Britain_, 1839-1843—Advantages of iron ships—Action of salt
water on iron inconsiderable—Durability, strength, and safety
of iron—Affords greater capacity for stowage—Admiralty slow to
adopt iron for ships of war—Mr. Galloway’s feathering paddles,
1829—Story of the screw-propeller—Joseph Bramah, 1785—Mr.
J. Stevens, 1804—Richard Trevethick, 1815—Robert Wilson,
1833—Captain Ericsson, 1836—The _Francis B. Ogden_, though
successful, fails to convince the Admiralty—Mr. T. P. Smith—The
_Archimedes_—Her trial with the _Widgeon_, Oct. 1839, and its
results—The _Rattler_ and the _Alecto_, 1843—The _Rattler_ not
as successful as expected—Captain Robert J. Stockton efficiently
supports Ericsson’s views—His vessel, a complete success, and the
first “screw” used for commerce in America—Superiority of Mr.
Woodcroft’s “varying” propeller, 1832—In building fit vessels,
the trade in which they are to be employed must be considered.
[Sidenote: Progress of steam navigation in Europe.]
During the progress in America of the art of practically applying
steam to marine propulsion the people of Europe were making slow but
important improvements in the models of their vessels, and in the
development of that art for the purposes of navigation.
[Sidenote: Clyde mechanics take the lead.]
[Sidenote: James Watt, 1766.]
In these improvements the mechanics on the Clyde took the lead,
establishing there a reputation for the construction of marine engines
and more especially of ships adapted to receive them, which they have
ever since maintained. In the early part of this century the river
Clyde in the vicinity of Glasgow was a scarcely navigable stream, with
few or no vessels at its chief port, and these, small craft of not
more than 40 tons, drawing, at most, only 5 feet of water when laden.
Indeed, my own recollection of that now important river goes back to
the time when one could wade across it among the stones at the foot
of the old Broomielaw Bridge, and when a small but lucrative salmon
fishery was carried on from the two “fishing huts,” then the site where
a dock now receives ships of the largest description, and where massive
quay walls and numerous warehousing sheds occupy the once verdant
grass banks of its southern shore. To the energy and intelligence of
the Corporation, and, in later years, through the laudable exertion
of a Trust, chosen from members of that body and other citizens of
Glasgow, may, in a great measure, be attributed the extraordinary rise
and prosperity of a city now possessing an inland navigation and a
stream harbour unsurpassed, perhaps, in Europe. Indeed, from the time
when James Watt, in 1766,[96] erected in Glasgow his first model of
a steam-engine and there laid the foundation of a power which has
since revolutionized the commerce of the world, its citizens seem to
have specially directed their genius to the development of this mighty
agency, their first and necessary step being the improvement of the
approaches to their city by the deepening of the Clyde.
[Sidenote: Henry Bell, 1800.]
But it was not till the beginning of the present century that any real
progress was made in the maritime pursuits of the people of Scotland.
In 1800, Henry Bell, then resident at Helensburgh, first laid before
the British Government his inventions for the improvement of steam
navigation. The Board of Admiralty, however, so far from expressing
any desire to promote his views, discouraged them, as they did
thirteen years afterwards, when the subject was again urged upon their
attention. Naturally anxious that his invention should be practically
tested on a scale sufficiently extended, Bell forwarded, in 1803, a
detailed account of his method of propelling vessels against wind and
tide by steam power, to most of the European Governments, and also to
the Government of the United States of America. He found, however, that
his plans were received no better abroad than at home: while it further
seems probable that the Government of the United States had either
given or shown them to Fulton, who was then engaged in endeavouring to
induce his countrymen to assist him in starting trading steamers on
their lakes and rivers, where such vessels were admirably fitted for
the profitable development of their vast natural inland resources.