proposed for making a railway on brick arches, to be known as the
Viaduct Railway. It was in the hands of men then in power in New York,
and soon after the organization of the company it was announced that a
large amount of stock had been taken. The route was surveyed, and maps
were published, showing the proposed line of travel. There were many
real estate speculations growing out of it, and the supposition is,
that the managers of the Viaduct Railway pocketed handsome amounts of
money out of these speculations; but somehow the public did not grasp
with any confidence the enterprise, which was in the hands of the
magnates of the Tammany Ring, and the Viaduct Railroad, at the time I
write, exists only on paper.
After this failure to meet the much felt want, the genius of
Vanderbilt was brought into action. The commodore, as he was called,
was able, by the influence he could bring to bear on the legislature,
to secure a charter for an underground railway from City Hall to the
upper end of the island. He went at it in a business-like way, and
promised that in a few years one could ride under ground from the City
Hall to Harlem in twenty minutes.
If Vanderbilt had lived to the age of Methuselah, and continued in
vigorous health, he would doubtless have done something for rapid
transit whenever he found that it would carry business to his railway.
But his grand scheme of several years ago amounted to nothing, and
shrewd people suspected that he was satisfied with the existing
surface roads.
[Sidenote: SPHERICAL TRANSPORTATION.]
Among the schemes that have been proposed for rapid travel and
transportation of freight, there is one which purposes to make use
of tubes, either under ground or on the surface, in which spheres or
globes shall be placed, and propelled by means of a rapid current
of air. The inventor claims that a sphere will move through a tube
with very little friction, and can be driven with great rapidity.
He would make a tube several feet in diameter, and have his spheres
so arranged that they could be opened and filled with freight, then
closed, properly fastened, placed in the tube, and started. I believe
that he proposes to propel them one or two hundred miles an hour, at
comparatively slight expense. For certain kinds of freight this mode
of transportation and propulsion might be well enough, but there are
things for which it would not answer. Imagine, for example, one of the
spheres filled with fresh strawberries in Virginia for transportation
to New York. The strawberries would be constantly rolled against each
other, so that by the time they reached New York they would be in a
condition of jelly.
As a passenger route this line would have great disadvantages. Imagine
a man enclosed in a sphere, either doubled or laid out horizontally,
to make a journey from New York to Washington. He would be standing
alternately on his head and on his feet about one hundred times a
minute, and if he went through alive it would be a wonder, and he
would be likely to be very much confused; especially if he were not
packed tightly in his travelling-box, he would have a rough time of
it. Every square inch of his body would be covered with bruises, and,
besides, he would have a hard time to breathe, as the supply of air
would be exceedingly limited.
[Illustration: THE BOMB FERRY—TRAVEL IN THE 30TH CENTURY.]
[Illustration: THE PUBLIC HIGHWAY—TRAVEL IN THE 30TH CENTURY.]
I believe the inventor proposes that all parcels going by his route
should be tightly packed; consequently, it would be necessary to wrap
the passengers and secure them somewhat after the style of an Egyptian
mummy, and stow them in their places by means of an hydraulic press.
None of this mode of travel for me, if you please.
[Sidenote: PROPULSION BY GUNPOWDER.]
I have heard of a scheme of locomotion in which the inventor proposed
to load his passengers into a large cannon, having a bore of three
or four yards, and then shoot them to their destination. The journey
could be made fast enough, but such a mode of travel is liable to
accidents, both on starting and stopping. If one could get off and
be well under way without being singed by the powder, he would run a
great risk of being somewhat injured when reaching his stopping-place.
“It was not the falling,” said a hod-carrier one day, speaking of a
tumble of twenty or thirty feet,—“it was not the falling that hurt me,
darling, but the stopping so quick at the end.”
XLV.
THE TUNNELS, AND THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD IN LONDON.
DESCRIPTION OF THE LONDON HARBORS—THE CATHARINE DOCK—ENORMOUS
STORE-HOUSES—HOW THE TUNNEL WAS BUILT—PLAN OF THE FRENCH ENGINEER,
ISAMBERT BRUNEL—HOW THE WORK WAS CHECKED BY A BREAK IN THE BED
OF THE THAMES—SIX LIVES LOST—REMARKABLE RESCUE OF THE SON OF MR.
BRUNEL—ENORMOUS LABOR AND STRUGGLE AGAINST THE ELEMENTS—TRIUMPH
AT LAST—THE MOST REMARKABLE RAILROAD IN THE WORLD—LONDON
CROSSED UNDERGROUND BY A SERIES OF TUNNELS—HOW LIGHT AND AIR IS
PRODUCED—THE NEWEST IMPROVEMENTS OF THE ROAD—THE CARS PASSING
UNDER THE DWELLING OF THE DEAD.
[Sidenote: THE DOCKS OF LONDON.]
The London harbor belongs to the grandest and most interesting ones in
the world. Here in vivid writing the history of the English commerce
is recorded; from this point, a gigantic net of navigation is spread
all over the globe. Voices from all parts of the world, of animals
and men; all human races, of every color, from the deepest black to
the palest white of the inhabitants on the shores of the White Sea,
are met with. Merchandise is taken in here, which has undergone an
uninterrupted travel of three-quarters of a year, until at last it
found here a preliminary object, and the statistics alone can give
an idea of the immense amount of products of all lands, which are
unloaded in this harbor, and stored in the enormous magazines. The
harbor-basins, where those store-houses are situated, are crowded
with boats for unloading the wares, give a refuge to colossi of
ships; here the steam-whistles resound; columns of smoke rise to the
sky; chains are rattling and cranes are creaking. In those long,
extended buildings, which are almost as large as a country town, the
merchandise is stored, free of duty until it is put in the market.
Oil, wine, tobacco, silk, wood, flour, etc., etc., are stored in
innumerable vaults, in the six stories of the monstrous buildings.
Steam is in operation to unload the ships, and small railroads
allow the wares to be easily transported. The principal of these
store-houses are the Catharine-docks, which are easily to be reached
from the Tower. It is only separated from this gloomy witness of the
reign of tyranny of the Middle Ages, by a street, and here one is
astonished at the hubbub which is going on. These docks were opened
to the traffic in 1828; in former times, one thousand two hundred and
fifty houses, with eleven thousand three hundred inhabitants were
found there. The flood-gates which lead to the basin are so deep that,
at the time of tide, ships of seven hundred tons (one ton equals
forty-two cubic feet) can easily enter and leave. The store-houses
have a capacity of one hundred and ten thousand tons. The Catharine
steamboat-wharf is especially used as pier for the steamers which
come from the continent. A whole series of docks is connected with
the Catharine-docks. Among them are the London-docks, with room for
two hundred and twenty thousand tons of goods, and a cellar with
a capacity of eight million two hundred and twenty-five thousand
gallons. The tunnel of the Thames leads from that part of the city
which is south of the London-docks, two miles below London Bridge, to
Rotherhithe, which lies on the right shore of the Thames.
[Sidenote: HOW THE EXCAVATIONS WERE MADE.]
The Thames flows through the city of London, and divides it into
two parts. Many bridges span the river, but they are insufficient
in number for the great traffic, and the idea was entertained of
constructing a new bridge. It must be so constructed, however, that
the largest vessels could pass under it. In order to avoid this,
Vesey commenced, at the beginning of this century, to build a tunnel
under the Thames, which plan, although it was nearly executed, had
to be relinquished in 1809, on account of too many obstacles. In
the year 1823, the idea was revived. The French engineer, Isambert
Brunel, looking at the keel of a ship, saw how the worms hollowed out
their single passages into the ship, by corridors closely adjoining
each other, and conceived the idea that a great tunnel might be
constructed by proceeding in the same way. He had twelve boxes made
without bottom, such as are used for a foundation for water-works.
These frames he placed perpendicularly, the one next to the other, and
divided each in three parts, by means of traverses, so that he had, in
all, thirty-six divisions, which served as points of commencement for
the excavations of so many single shafts.
Each one of these divisions was designed for one laborer; it was
open in the back and in front, supported by many planks, which were
movable. All the frames together were called the shield. This shield
was placed before the portions of ground to be excavated; the laborer
removed one of the planks, and commenced digging, placed the plank,
afterwards, against the sides of the shaft, which had been digged, and
supported it in this position by heavy poles; the work was continued
in the same way. As soon as the laborer had advanced to the same
length in all the three divisions of a frame, it was pushed forward by
two dummies, one of which worked at the top, the other at the bottom,
into the excavated space.
As soon as the frame had advanced, masons commenced vaulting
immediately behind the laborers; the shield, however, protected the
earth until the vaults were ready, and the rolls, which now had been
built, in their turn served as support for the dummies, by which
the single frames were pushed forward. To this so simple means of
excavating, London owes her underground railroad, which had long been
considered as a work impossible of achievement.
In the year 1824, an action-company was formed for the restoration
of the tunnel, and soon the only point where such a work could be
commenced, was found. It was between Rotherhithe and Wapping, between
London and Greenwich.
[Sidenote: SINKING THE CYLINDERS.]
At this point, the shores of the Thames are one thousand one hundred
and forty-four feet apart. The construction was commenced, in 1825,
by building a cylinder of brick on the side of Rotherhithe, at a
distance from the water of one hundred and fifty-five feet. This
cylinder was forty-three feet high, half a foot thick, and had a
diameter of fifty-three feet. Over the upper opening, Brunel placed
an engine of thirty horse-power, which took the earth and the water
from the interior, until, in that way, the cylinder had sunk sixty-six
feet deep into the earth. Now he placed a second cylinder within the
first, which had a diameter of only sixteen and one-half feet, and
sunk it, in the same manner, eighty-two and one-half feet deep. The
tunnel now commences from the first cylinder, at a depth of sixty-two
and one-half feet; its breadth is thirty-nine and one-half, and its
height twenty-three feet, the wall inclusive. The section is formed by
two ovals, which touch each other; in that way, two vaulted corridors
are made, each of which is almost sixteen and one-half feet high, and
has a road for carriages, and one for pedestrians, the one next to the
other. Both corridors are united by openings, in which are gas-lights,
which lighten them both.
At the beginning of 1826, they commenced the horizontal labor for
the tunnel proper, from the bottom of this shaft. They soon came,
from a firm, clay soil, to a loose, moist layer of sand, but, some
time afterwards, clay was met with again. The construction progressed
slowly but steadily; every day two feet were accomplished. On the 80th
of June, 1826, the construction reached the bed of the river, and on
the 2d of March of the following year, they had advanced four hundred
and seventy-five feet, or almost one-third of the length of the tunnel
had been completed.
Although the tunnel was constructed with such a decline that at every
three hundred and thirty feet, it inclined almost nine and one-half
feet, the top of the tunnel approached, at the middle of the river,
the bed, by three meters. Till now, every thing had gone on very
well, although the obstacles and dangers for the laborers increased
the more they approached the bed of the stream. Brunel did not lose
his courage, and the increasing danger more than once imperiled his
life. With the purpose of examining the bed of the Thames, himself,
he went down into the deep with a diving-bell, on the 22d of April,
1827, which bold undertaking he repeated for several days. He found,
at several points, the reason why the water trickled through, and,
consequently, he sunk there several baskets and bags with clay and
lime.
[Sidenote: A FATAL ACCIDENT.]
He purposely dropped several tools, shovels and a hammer, and when
the laborers, a few days afterwards, digged out in the tunnel some
watery substance, they found every one of the tools. So these tools
had worked through the sand and mud beds of twenty-nine feet of the
Thames, and to the depth of the tunnel; a very bad indication of
the loose substance of the soil. However, the labor was continually
pushed forward, when, unfortunately, several large vessels, which had
drifted down with the stream, threw their anchors exactly over the
tunnel. The consequence was such a violent rush of the water of the
Thames, that the engines could not master it longer. All efforts were
in vain. The laborers saved themselves, the tunnel was filled, within
a quarter of an hour, with water and some thousand tons of sand and
mud. This happened on the 18th of May, 1827. Brunel did not lose his
courage. Again he went down, in his diving-bell, to the hole which
had been made, and, to his great joy, he saw that the masonry had not
been harmed, and his shield stood on the same spot where the laborers
had left it. He commenced, at once, to repair the damage. With sixty
thousand hundredweights of clay, let down in baskets, he filled the
hole, and pumped the tunnel dry with several engines. A month after
the disaster, the work went on again. This accident, however, seemed
to be the beginning of a series of misfortunes, which threatened the
continuation of the tunnel. The laborers had lost their courage, by
the last disaster, which had almost proved fatal to them. One cry of
alarm followed another, when masses of combustible gas filled the
interior, and, at the least carelessness with the lamps, exploded, and
filled the whole empty space with flames and such a terrible stench
that the laborers swooned. However, up to the 12th of January, 1828,
they had advanced fifty-three feet farther, when the flood broke, for
a second time, through the ceiling. This unfortunate incident was
paid for by the lives of six laborers. The son of Brunel was, at
that time, in the tunnel; he crept forward, blindly, in the space,
which was blacker than night, then the current of water took him up,
but, happily, it forced him up into the shaft. This second hole was
at a distance of six hundred and twenty-seven feet from the entrance.
Again, Brunel went down to the bottom of the river; the tunnel was
pumped dry, and it was proved that the masonry had not been damaged.
[Sidenote: OPENING OF THE TUNNEL.]
Now the means for continuing the work commenced to give out, and it
was interrupted for seven years. At last, the government supplied the
means for its completion. The work commenced anew, but it proceeded
very slowly; the bed of the river proved to be so soaked through that
a new bed had to be formed; the shield, which, till now, had been
used, was damaged, and had to be replaced by another. Three times,
again, the water forced its way through the ceiling. However, the
work went on, amid the uninterrupted struggles with the obstacles of
the soil and the elements, and on the 13th of August, 1841, Isambert
Brunel had the satisfaction to walk through the whole length of the
tunnel, after continuous struggles and labor of sixteen years! After
the entrance and exit of the tunnel had been constructed, the tunnel
was opened, with great festivities, for the general traffic.
The gigantic labor took three million five hundred thousand dollars.
Everybody passing through it has to pay one penny.
Brunel, the able architect, was made a baronet, by the queen. He died
in 1849.
The tunnel, in the beginning, paid so little that those who held bonds
were obliged to pay for a part of the repairs, but, in 1865, the
tunnel was bought by the East London railroad company, for two hundred
thousand pounds, and at the present time, forty railroad-trains
are going up and down under the water of the Thames, and effect
the communication between Wapping and Rotherhithe, where the great
Commercial and West India-docks are found, which are the greatest
in the world, and which have room for four hundred and fifty West
Indiamen.
[Sidenote: UNDERGROUND RAILROAD.]
The underground railroad in London is the most remarkable one on the
globe, as its rails are laid almost entirely in tunnels. It was opened
in January, 1863, and was built by the civil engineers, J. Fowler and
Mason Johnson, with the purpose of connecting the four most important
railroad stations on the north side of the Thames. It commences at the
last station of the Great Western road, and terminates in the City.
The road has six or seven halts, and is laid above the ground only,
where the lots lying in the line of the road, and the buildings on
them, could be cheaply purchased; for the greatest part, however, the
road is underground, and leads through tunnels, which are lighted by
gas. The stations have platforms of a length of two hundred and five
feet, and a breadth of ten feet.
The road follows, with its double track, the direction of the streets;
it curves, however, considerably, to such an extent, even, that in
a distance of four English miles, mostly underground, it makes a
curve, the diameter of which is six hundred and twenty-seven feet. The
tunnels, constructed with an elliptic section, are about twenty-nine
and one-half feet wide, and sixteen feet high. The walls are all
twelve inches thick, and built of brick with hydraulic lime, on
account of the moisture. The greatest ascent of the road is one foot
per hundred, and the greatest depth under the surface of the earth,
fifty-six feet. Good light and sufficient ventilation is not wanting,
and the new locomotives, which consume their own steam and smoke,
prove to be a perfect success. The stations of Baker street and Gower
street, have a peculiar system of illumination. Fourteen enormous
windows open on both sides of the immense, dark vaults. The daylight,
which they allow to enter, falls on a perpendicular wall of white,
polished tiles, and is reflected through the windows proper, sidewise
in the halls. Nevertheless, the light is only feeble, gloomy, and
vague. The real sun of London underground is gas. Even the passenger
cars are provided with it. From six o’clock in the morning, till after
midnight, a train goes up and down every twenty minutes, and the
charges are less than those of the omnibuses. The road has cost
about one million one hundred and twenty-five thousand pounds, for the
construction proved to be a very difficult one, as well on account of
the water-works, gas-works, etc., which of course had to be avoided,
and which often suddenly presented themselves as obstacles, but also
on account of the unstable nature of the soil, which necessitated very
expensive constructions.
[Illustration: UNDERGROUND RAILROAD STATION, ALDGATE, LONDON.]
Lately, the underground railroad has been extended, and the new
Aldgate station has been opened to the public.
[Sidenote: REMARKABLE ENGINEERING WORKS.]
Although this extension amounts to only half a mile in length, it has
involved great expense, because of the remarkable engineering works
that were required; for example, the walls of some of the immense tea
warehouses of the St. Catharine Dock Company, eighty-six feet high,
and four feet thick, had to be “underpinned,” and deeper foundations
put in for them; but this work was successfully carried out without
the slightest injury to the buildings. In spite of all obstacles, the
diversion of nine great sewers, and the construction of a large sewer,
five feet by three feet, beneath the rails along the whole length of
the line, the works have been promptly completed. The excavations were
just outside where the old City walls stood, and a few Roman relics
were found. Outside the new station, twenty feet below the surface,
was discovered an immense deposit of bullocks’ horns, cartloads of
which were removed and sold. No other bones were with them, and how
they came there in such numbers is a mystery.
There are plenty of openings for ventilation along the new line.
Aldgate station is the lightest and airiest station along the line.
The glass roof extends half the length of the platform; the other
half length is covered by narrower roofs, supported on wooden pillars
rising from the platforms themselves. The front of the station is
in High street, Aldgate, a door or two from the old church of St.
Botolph, and opposite to the Minories.
Entering the station-building on High street, the visitor passes
by easy steps down the landing, thence by the stairs to whichever
platform he desires to reach. The situation of the terminus is most
convenient, and will bring the company a large amount of business.
Within a short distance, are the London and the St. Catharine’s docks,
Fenchurch and Leadenhall streets, the Commercial road, and the densely
populated neighborhoods of Whitechapel and Towerhill. Thus the eastern
extremity of the City, and the best business parts of the East End,
will be brought within a few minutes’ journey of Holborn and the West
End of London, the Great Northern, Great Western, Midland, and Chatham
& Dover Railways. The increase in the fares to Aldgate will be only a
penny per ticket. All the trains of the Metropolitan Railway Company
will run through to the new station, except the Great Western mainline
trains, which are few in number. A marble tablet in the Aldgate
station records the fact that this extension of the Metropolitan
Railway was commenced on March 1, 1876, and gives the names of Sir
Edward Watkin, chairman of the company, and his fellow-directors;
the general manager, Mr. Myles Fenton; Mr. Brady, the engineer; and
Messrs. Lucas and Aird, contractors.
[Sidenote: RAPID-TRANSIT RAILWAY SYSTEM.]
During Sir Edward Watkin’s visit to New York, a few months ago, he
gave some very interesting particulars concerning the operation of the
rapid-transit railway system of London.
The London underground railroad companies, he said, already had
about sixteen miles of road in operation, and in a few months they
would have twenty miles of completed road. They were negotiating
for a still further extension of their routes, and would in time
burrow under the whole city of London. These roads had proved to be
a greater convenience to the poorer classes than to wealthy persons.
The average fare collected was five cents, and the rate per mile was
reduced, by a system of commutation, to one penny. These roads carried
seventy million passengers a year. Heavy locomotives were used, and
one thousand trains per day, each having a carrying capacity for one
thousand persons, were run over them. The rate of speed was very
great. The cost was five million dollars per mile, of which about
four-fifths was due to damages to real estate caused by cutting
through blocks of buildings and tunneling under houses. In some places
the roads ran under graveyards without disturbing the graves and the
vaults above.