History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce, Volume 4 (of 4)

Chapter IV (2)

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These propositions have been evident to all practical men in America, as they must be to those on this side of the Atlantic. In the construction of the hull, greatly increased strength is obviously requisite. The resistance to a vessel, or its concussion against the water at a low rate of speed, will not be sensibly felt, but if that speed be considerably increased, and the concussion made quicker without a corresponding increase in the strength of the frame and hull of the ship generally, the ship will creak, strain, and yield to the pressure until she finally works herself to pieces, at the same time disarranging the engines, whose stability, bracing, and keeping proper place and order depend first and essentially on the stability of the hull. If the resistance to a vessel in passing through the water increases as the square of the velocity, and if, in addition to this outward thrust against the vessel, she has to support the greater engine power within the hull, which has increased as the cube of the velocity, then her strength must be made adequate to resist without injury these two combined forces against which she has to contend.

The same increased strength is also necessary in the engines and boilers. It is evident that if the boilers have to generate and the engines to employ twice the power and exert twice the force, they must also have twice the strength, and there is no working arrangement in any way connected with the propulsion of the ship that does not partake of this increase: every pump, every valve, every bolt is connected, directly or indirectly, with the engine economy of the ship. All this is equally applicable to the ship’s hull, though in a less degree in the case of iron vessels than in those of wood. It is unnecessary to dwell upon the cost of repairs: indeed, the rapid motion of heavy parts of machinery and the necessarily severe concussions and jarrings cannot fail to destroy the costly working parts of the engine, entailing heavy and expensive repairs and substitutions.

But first cost and current expenses do not for the moment appear to have been considered by any person interested in the Collins line. One thought, and one only, prevailed, and that thought was embodied in the resolution to run the Cunarders off the Atlantic, or at least to “neutralize,” as was expressed in the discussions of the period, “an existing foreign monopoly.” The enterprise they proposed “was one of a national character, and the semblance or reality of monopoly on their side was lost,” they alleged, in the stipulation of the contractors themselves to transfer their ships at cost price with their contracts, and all the additional facilities that might be extended to them by Congress “to any person who might be acceptable to the United States’ Government, and capable of carrying out an enterprise of such vital importance to the nation.”

By this plausible but transparent mode of reasoning Congress attempted to disguise the real features of an undertaking which eventually became a great failure. From the spirit, however, which then prevailed, cost was not considered either by the projectors or by the majority of the members of Congress in their determination to surpass in speed and in splendour of equipment, any steamers which Great Britain could send afloat. “We must have speed,” exclaimed Mr. Bayard, “extraordinary speed, a speed with which they (Collins steamers) can overtake any vessel which they pursue, and escape from any vessel they wish to avoid; they must be fit for the purpose of a cruiser with armaments to attack your enemy (if that enemy were Great Britain) in her most vital part, her commerce.”

Happily, the Collins steamers were never required for any such purposes, and, in 1850, just ten years after the Cunard vessels commenced to run, they started against them in their great contest for the commercial maritime supremacy of the Atlantic Ocean, a much more sensible struggle than that which Mr. Bayard so glowingly pictured when he spoke about their “sweeping the seas.”

[Sidenote: Further details of competing lines.]

Before the Collins line was established, the Cunard steamers were receiving 7_l._ 10_s._ sterling per ton, freight, which was so much of a monopoly rate, that in two years after the Collins line had commenced, the rate of freight fell to 4_l._ sterling per ton. Arguing from this fact the Americans held that the excessive freights charged for transport by the Cunard Company were paid by the United States’ consumer, in most instances, on articles of British manufacture carried to America by British vessels. But now the American consumer paid only 4_l._ per ton, and this sum for the most part was paid to their own people, thus increasing their national wealth. Their acute political economists discovered “that formerly the American consumer paid _very nearly twice as much for the service_, and enriched the British capitalists: whereas, subsequently to 1850, he not only saved one-half of the former cost of freight to himself, but in paying the remaining half, benefited his fellow-citizens who, in return, aided in consuming perhaps the very merchandise which he had imported.”[201]

[Sidenote: Speed obtained and cost.]

Arguments such as these, too frequently honoured with the title of political economy, are often employed to hide direct taxation; so, instead of attempting to refute them, I prefer inviting my readers to inquire with me into the practical results.

Now, there can be no doubt that the Collins line of steamers did honour to the naval architecture of the time, and in their performances equalled the expectations of their most sanguine friends. Mr. C. B. Stuart, with feelings of national pride, places upon record that, in May 1851, the _Pacific_ accomplished the passage from New York to Liverpool in nine days, twenty hours, and sixteen minutes, and that, in July 1852, the _Arctic_ made the same passage in nine days, seventeen hours, and twelve minutes, which considerably exceeded in swiftness any voyages hitherto made across the ocean by the vessels of any nation. But while this determination to surpass every other vessel afloat is one which commends itself to our admiration, if not to our better judgment (as speed unless it is combined with safety should always be condemned), it was attended with enormous extra outlay, for, by a statement afterwards laid before Congress, it appeared “that to effect a saving of a day or a day and a half in the run between New York and Liverpool costs the company nearly a million of dollars annually.”[202] So eager, however, are the public to make rapid passages (and this applies to railways as well as ships) that the Collins line for the time had a decided preference with passengers.[203] Nor was there any lack of valuable goods; the gross earnings of the company by freights and passage money alone amounting in the two first years to $1,979,760. But while the Government during these two years paid the Collins line for mail service $770,000, they only recovered $513,546, showing a pecuniary loss of $256,453, so that, so far as the public was concerned, the establishment of the Collins line of steamers can only be regarded as a costly and doubtful experiment; and, as will hereafter be shown, the establishment and maintenance of a costly Transatlantic line was not merely an equivocal success on the whole, but to the shareholders resulted in a vast loss of capital.

[Sidenote: Great competition, 1850-1852.]

The owners of the Cunard steamers were, however, not listless spectators of the great preparations which the Americans were making to run them off their ocean lines, and, in 1850, they added two new vessels to their fleet, the _Asia_ and _Africa_; they were sister ships[204] but, though magnificent vessels, they were not equal in speed to those which the Collins Company had sent forth.

The competition between these two great lines of steam-ships excited extraordinary public interest at the time on both sides of the Atlantic, and indeed in all parts of the world; numerous records were kept for twelve months of the length of the respective voyages of the ships of the contending companies, and large sums of money were expended in bets on the result of each passage. Dividing the year into two parts it appears that the average length of passage from Liverpool to New York of the Collins steamers during the last half of 1851 was eleven days eighteen hours, while the average time of the Cunard boats was eleven days, twenty-three hours, thirty minutes; but, in the last quarter of that year, they were respectively, on the return passages from New York to Liverpool, ten days, twenty-three hours, and ten days, thirteen hours, seventeen minutes.

[Sidenote: Results of it.]

During the first half of 1852, the Collins line made the passage from Liverpool to New York, on an average of eleven days, twenty-two hours, and the Cunard Company on an average of twelve days, thirteen hours, and fifty-two minutes, while the return passages to Liverpool were respectively eleven days, one hour, and ten days, twenty-one hours, forty-four minutes, showing, on the whole, an average gain each passage of fourteen hours, twenty-three minutes, in favour of the Collins line.[205]

It must, however, be mentioned that the Cunard line had only two of their new, or best boats engaged in the race, and that had their old boats, the _Canada_, _Niagara_, and _Europa_, been equal in speed to the _Asia_[206] and _Africa_, the gain of the Collins line would have been reduced to nine hours and ten minutes each passage. Still, in that great ocean race, the Americans were triumphant, and the rejoicings which spread throughout the United States, were, to our credit, re-echoed on the shores of Great Britain, for the struggle was one which, up to that time, had involved no loss of life, and the triumph honestly gladdened the hearts of every lover of progress on both sides of the Atlantic, encouraging as it did two great nations to extend the benign influence of art and science to their legitimate object—the advancement of the human race.

But though the Cunard Company were thus far behind in the contest, they were far from vanquished, and, with renewed exertions and indomitable energy, at the same time ever bearing in mind the value of human life and the stupendous responsibility they incurred in the continuation of this struggle, they, as will hereafter appear, produced steamers which surpassed their competitors in speed, and were unrivalled in the regularity and safety with which their passages were performed. It was far otherwise with the Collins Company, and the closing years of their brief career is a sad, sad story to tell.

FOOTNOTES:

[164] The Americans are now rapidly developing their large natural resources of iron. “The iron ores of the United States” (London _Times_, 28th of May, 1875), “are plentiful and various, though some kinds are wanting; thus the ‘spathose’ or spar-like iron ore, scarce even in Europe, is very rare; and the ironstone of the liassic and oolite seams, which furnishes about one-third of our British pig-iron, appears to be wholly absent. On the other hand, the specular iron ore, the brown and red hematites, the clay and blackband ironstones, are good and abundant; and some of the deposits of magnetic iron ore—as at Lake Champlain, and at Cornwall, in Pennsylvania—are very remarkable. At Cornwall the deposit consists of a solid hill of ore, measuring roughly 500 feet in diameter, rising from the ground level to a height of 350 feet, and proved by borings to a depth of 180 feet below ground level. The iron mine at Port Henry—at the south-west corner of Lake Champlain, in the State of New York—is worked in a huge prism of ore, about 200 feet square, and descending at an angle of 26 to 40 degrees, to an unknown depth, the superincumbent rock being supported by pillars of solid ore, 40 feet square at the base and about 20 feet at the top, with a height of considerably more than 100 feet.”

[165] _Ante_, p. 42.

[166] “Encyclopædia Britannica” (eighth edition), vol. xx. p. 639, “Steam Navigation.” The _Savannah_ was full rigged as a sailing-vessel with auxiliary steam power, and her paddles were removable.

[167] Dr. Lardner, in his “Encyclopædia” and elsewhere, had more than once expressed the opinion that no steam-ship would ever be able to make so distant a voyage as that of crossing the Atlantic, without recoaling. Having entered on details with regard to this important question in a lecture he delivered at Liverpool in December 1835, I consider it desirable to give the following extract from it, as reported in the _Liverpool Albion_ of the 14th of that month, the matter being one of considerable historical interest:

“STEAM COMMUNICATION WITH AMERICA.—Dr. Lardner then proceeded to observe that one of the grandest projects which had ever occupied the human mind was at present in the progress of actual accomplishment. He meant that of constructing a great highway for steam intercourse between New York and London. Part of the highway was in process of formation. It consisted of several stages—that of the railroad from London to Birmingham; that from Birmingham to Liverpool, and the steam intercourse with Dublin; but there was another stage—that from Dublin to Valentia—which had as yet hardly been thought of. Ireland was a country which, with all her political disadvantages, was blest by nature with a vast number of physical advantages, and among the rest he might reckon a vast number of excellent harbours. No country in the world could boast of so many fine and spacious ports, bays, and roadsteads. She had many harbours on her west coast, which would serve admirably as stations for steam conveyance across the Atlantic; but Valentia had been selected as the extreme westerly point suitable for that purpose. It was a fine anchoring ground by an island of that name on the coast of Munster. The distance from Dublin to this point was under 200 miles, which might be traversed in about eight hours. The nearest point of the Continent of North America to this point of Ireland was St. John’s in Newfoundland. The distance between the two was about 1900 miles, thence to Halifax in Nova Scotia there would be another run of 550 miles, and from that to New York would not exceed the admissible range; but touching at Halifax would be desirable for the sake of passengers. The only difficulty would be as to the run from Valentia to St. John’s; and the voyage from Dublin to Bordeaux and back, a distance of between 1600 and 1700 miles, with the same stock of coals, came very near this distance. It must be observed that westerly winds blew almost all the year round across the Atlantic. They were produced by the trade winds being the compensating cause that restored the balance which these served to destroy, according to that beautiful principle in nature which always provides a remedy for any derangement in the deranging cause itself. As a last resource, however, should the distance between Valentia and St. John’s prove too great, they might make the Azores a stage between, so that there remained no doubt of the practicability of establishing a steam intercourse with the United States. _As to the project, however, which was announced in the newspapers of making the voyage directly from New York to Liverpool, it was, he had no hesitation in saying, perfectly chimerical, and they might as well talk of making a voyage from New York or Liverpool to the moon._ The vessels which would ultimately be found the best adapted for the voyage between this country and the United States would be those of 800 tons, which would carry machines of 200 horse-power, and would be able to stow 400 tons of coal. To supply a 10 horse-power, daily required an expenditure of a ton of coals, and, consequently, 200 horse-power would require 20 tons of coal daily; but if the vessel carried 400 tons of coal only, it would not be practicable to undertake a voyage which would require the whole of that quantity. They must make an allowance of 100 tons for contingencies. Thus, in reckoning the average length of the voyage which might be undertaken by such a vessel, we might safely calculate upon 300 tons of coal, which would be sufficient for fifteen days, and it might fairly be concluded that any project which calculated upon making longer voyages than fifteen days without taking in a fresh supply of coals, in the present state of the steamboat, must be considered chimerical. Now, the average rate of speed of the Mediterranean packets was 170 miles per day, and the utmost limit of a steam voyage might be taken at 2550 miles; but even that could not be reckoned upon.”

It is, however, fair to the scientific memory of Dr. Lardner to state that, in the eighth and last edition of his “Steam-engine, Railways,” &c., 1851, pp. 294-309, he declares that he never stated that a “steam voyage across the Atlantic was _a physical impossibility_:” the more so, that he was of course well aware of the previous voyages of the _Savannah_ and _Curaçoa_; what he did say (especially at the meeting of the British Association at _Bristol in 1836_) was “that the long sea voyages which were contemplated could not be maintained with that regularity and certainty which are indispensable to commercial success by _any revenue which could be expected from traffic alone_, and _that, without a government subsidy of a considerable amount_, such lines of steamers, although they might be started, could not be permanently maintained.”

[168] The _Royal William_ was between 400 and 500 tons, built at Three Rivers, Canada, and her engines, constructed in England, were fitted into her at St. Mary’s Foundry, Montreal. She only made this one Atlantic passage and was subsequently sold to the Portuguese Government.

[169] It is only due to the memory of the late Mr. MacGregor Laird, who, with his brother, the late Mr. John Laird, M.P. for Birkenhead, did so much to encourage Ocean steam navigation in its infancy, to state that the _Sirius_ was placed on the Transatlantic service on his recommendation, and that, so early as 1836, he was chiefly instrumental in founding the British and American Steam Navigation Company which chartered this vessel from the St. George Company. See letter from Mr. A. Hamilton of St. Helen’s Place, London, “the friend and executor of the late Mr. MacGregor Laird,” which appeared in the _Shipping and Mercantile Gazette_ of the 15th May, 1873: in this paper, also, appears a copy of a letter which Mr. Laird, under the signature of “Chimera,” addressed to the _Liverpool Albion_ on the 28th December, 1835, in reply to Dr. Lardner’s fallacious prognostications that a steam voyage across the Atlantic was “perfectly chimerical,” from which I take the following extract:

“By what process of reasoning Dr. Lardner has fixed the ultimate size of steam-vessels for the Atlantic at 800 tons and 200 horse-power does not appear, which is the more to be regretted, as it must be a peculiar one, from the size of the vessels very little exceeding that of several in the coasting trade, and the power being much less; but I am not bound to take this for granted, particularly as all my experience has proved that we as yet have never had to complain of the size of the vessel if the power has been proportionately increased; on the contrary, the Dublin boats have crept up from 250 to 500 and 600, and the Clyde from 200 to 400 tons, and other lines in the same proportion. In reasoning, therefore, upon a line of steam communication between Great Britain and New York, I must reason from analogy, and fortunately Dr. Lardner gives me the data. The _Leeds_, it appears, makes the voyage to and from Bordeaux, a distance of 1600 miles, with one supply of coals. The _Leeds_ is, I believe, 420 tons and 140 horse power, and her displacement between her light and load marks will be about 80 tons to one foot, or perhaps only 70. Now, the distance from Liverpool or Portsmouth to New York is 3000 nautical miles or 3500 statute miles, a little less to Liverpool. Suppose the _Leeds_ be trebled in capacity, so that her displacement should exceed 200 tons per foot draught, it is not necessary to treble her power, as double power propels more than double bulk: but allow her 300 horse-power, her light draught of water would be about 11 feet with her machinery on board, and with 800 tons of dead weight on board, about 15. I take the consumption of coals at 30 tons per day, and a mean speed of 10 miles per hour, and at an expenditure of 525 tons of common coal, or 420 of Langennich, I land my passengers in New York, Portsmouth, or Liverpool in something less than fifteen days. I have not allowed anything in this calculation for the saving of fuel that would accrue in these large engines by working them expansively, but have taken the consumption at 9½ lbs. per horse per hour, and with common coal I would have a surplus of 275 tons dead weight for passengers and goods. One objection will, I am aware, be made, viz., that my average speed is too great, and if I admitted that the _beau idéal_ of a steam-vessel was embodied in one of His Majesty’s Mediterranean steam-packets the objection would be fatal; but what is the fact? (no less wonderful than true), the average speed of private vessels far exceeds them; and, to prove that the average speed of 10 miles per hour is not ‘chimerical,’ I may state that the average speed of the _Dundee_ and _Perth_, in all weathers, winter and summer, fair or foul, exceeds 11 miles per hour; that the average speed of the _Monarch_ is 10½ miles per hour; and that the _Medea_ steam-frigate averaged more than 10 miles per hour on her voyage to Malta. Now, I am of opinion that the _Dundee_, _Perth_, _Monarch_, and _Medea_ are to be, and will be, beat, but not by vessels of 800 tons and 200 horse-power. I hope, Mr. Editor, I have proved that it is easier to go from Portsmouth or Liverpool to New York than to the moon; that it is more convenient to go direct than through the first ‘gem of the sea;’ and the last, though not the least consideration, that if we wish to go at all by steam, we had better not wait for the Valentia Railway.”

[170] Builders’ measurement, or O.M., is the measurement of a vessel according to the old law of 1773 (13 George III., Chap. LXXIV.) which prescribed as follows: “The length shall be taken on a straight line along the rabbet of the keel of the ship, from the back of the main stern-post to a perpendicular line from the fore part of the main-stem under the bowsprit, from which substracting three-fifths of the breadth, the remainder shall be esteemed the just length of the keel to find the tonnage; and the breadth shall be taken from the outside of the outside plank in the broadest place in the ship, be it either above or below the main wales, exclusive of all manner of doubling planks that may be wrought on the sides of the ship; then multiplying the _length_ of the keel by the _breadth_ so taken, and the product by _half the breadth_ and dividing the whole by ninety-four, the quotient shall be deemed the true contents of the tonnage.”

Though another Act was passed in 1834 (Act 5th & 6th William IV. Chap. LVI.) which was again amended by the 6th & 7th Victoria, Chap. LXXXIV., and consolidated by 8th & 9th Victoria, Chap. LXXXIX., known as the “new measurement, or N.M.” the old law remained in use with all shipbuilders in their contracts until 1854, when the law (proposed and carried out by Moorsom) now in force, was passed. By this law, the internal cubic contents of a ship are ascertained, and the register tonnage (on which all fiscal dues are levied) ascertained by certain calculations which produce as nearly as possible the same results in the old measurement of all ships built since 1854 (see _ante_, vol. iii. note, p. 310), and thus the necessity is avoided of altering the rates charged upon shipping, for light, dock and other dues; under the present law, which is generally approved, an allowance is made for the space occupied by the engines in steam-vessels, so that the register tonnage on which all dues are levied is the gross admeasurement, less the space occupied by the propelling power. The mode of arriving at this, adopted by different nations, has of late been a question of much discussion with reference to the dues charged on vessels passing through the Suez Canal.

[171] The “Principle of Construction” of this vessel is clearly stated in the following note given in Mr. Brunel’s life at p. 234: “To enable the ship to resist the action of the heavy Atlantic waves, especial pains were taken to give her great longitudinal strength. The ribs were of oak, of scantling equal to that of line-of-battle ships. They were placed close together and caulked within and without before the planking was put on. They were dowelled and bolted in pairs; and there were also four rows of 1½ inch iron bolts, 24 feet long, and scarfing about 4 feet, which ran longitudinally through the whole length of the bottom frames of the ship. She was closely trussed with iron and wooden diagonals and shelf-pieces which, with the whole of her upper works, were fastened with bolts and nuts to a much greater extent than had hitherto been the practice.”

[172] “ARRIVAL OF THE ‘GREAT WESTERN’ AND ‘SIRIUS’ STEAMERS AT NEW YORK.—At three o’clock P.M., on Sunday, the 22nd of April, the _Sirius_ first descried the land, and, early on Monday morning, the 23rd, anchored in the North River immediately off the battery. The moment the intelligence was made known, hundreds and thousands rushed early in the morning to the battery. Nothing could exceed the excitement. The river was covered during the whole day with row-boats, skiffs, and yawls, carrying the wondering people out to get a close view of this extraordinary vessel. While people were yet wondering how the _Sirius_ so successfully made out to cross the rude Atlantic, it was announced about eleven A.M. on Monday, from the telegraph, that a huge steamship was in the offing. ‘The _Great Western!_—the _Great Western!_’ was on everybody’s tongue. About two o’clock P.M. the first curl of her ascending smoke fell on the eyes of the thousands of anxious spectators. A shout of enthusiasm rose on the air.... During the first part of the passage of the _Sirius_ she made slow progress, her speed varying from 4 knots 4 fathoms per hour to 7; the latter portion was at the rate of 8 to 11 knots. Thus the grand experiment has been fairly and fully tested, and has been completely successful. The only question now in the case is that of expense. Can steam-packets be made to pay?”

[173] Sixty knots are equal to sixty-nine geographical or statute miles.

[174] The _Great Western_ ran regularly between Bristol and New York till the end of 1846. In 1847 she was sold to the West India Royal Mail Steam Packet Company, and was long one of their best vessels. In 1857 she was broken up at Vauxhall, being no longer able to compete profitably with the new class of steamers which, by that time, had been placed on the different Transatlantic lines.

[175] “DEPARTURE OF THE FIRST STEAM-SHIP FROM LIVERPOOL TO NEW YORK.—On Thursday evening the _Royal William_, the property of the City of Dublin Steam Packet Company, set sail on her first voyage for New York. The _Royal William_ was announced to sail for New York at half-past six o’clock. At that time Prince’s Pier was lined towards the river with a dense crowd from top to bottom, and the rigging of the shipping in the Prince’s Dock was densely manned with sailors. Every conceivable standing place on George’s Pier was crowded to excess. The deck of the vessel was crowded with passengers and their friends, and those whom curiosity had taken there. Exactly at half-past six o’clock the anchor was weighed, and, immediately, as the noble vessel began to move she was greeted with the enthusiastic cheering of thousands of spectators, which were responded to by those on board, whilst from Woodside, Birkenhead, Rock Ferry, the Pier, and the steamboats in the river on all sides, scores of cannon thundered forth the rejoicings of their possessors.... She is built by Messrs. Wilson and her engines are from the manufactory of Messrs. Fawcett and Preston. The vessel is 817 tons burthen, and her engines are 276 horse-power, and work expansively at a 5 feet 6 inch stroke. The consumption of coal is 14 cwt. 2 lbs. per hour. She has furnaces which completely ignite the smoke, and are a saving of 33 per cent. in the consumption. The smoke from the chimney top is scarcely perceptible. She has fuel on board for 4500 miles; almost sufficient to take her out and bring her back again. Her length is 175 feet; breadth of beam 27 feet; and depth of hold 17 feet 6 inches. She is also fitted with four water-tight wrought-iron bulk-heads for safety from foundering and fire. She is fitted up with floats, which neutralize the vibration. Her paddle-wheels are 24 feet in diameter, and, owing to the great depth of the vessel in the water from the large quantity of coal on board, the paddles are 6 feet in the water. In smooth water the vessel sails 11½ knots an hour. Her cabins, which are exceedingly neatly fitted up, contain accommodation for eighty passengers. There are two principal cabins and several private cabins. Thirty-two passengers went out in her.”

[176] The _Royal William_ made her first passage from Liverpool to New York in nineteen days and the passage home in fourteen and a half days.

[177] Mr. George Burns, whose family had for many years held a highly respectable position in the city of Glasgow (his father having been for the very long period of seventy-two years the minister of the Barony parish of that city), entered into partnership with his elder brother, James, in 1818, and in that year founded the great business firm still carried on in Glasgow. In 1824 they became owners, along with the late Hugh Matthie of Liverpool, of six sailing-vessels trading between that port and Glasgow, and in the same year they engaged in steam navigation between Glasgow and Belfast. They next substituted steam for sailing-vessels in the Glasgow and Liverpool trade and, in 1830, amalgamated this business with that of the Messrs. MacIver of Liverpool, with whom they afterwards made arrangements to establish the line of steamers with the United States of America from Liverpool, suggested by Mr. Cunard. The business thus created was, in its various branches, carried on by Messrs. G. and J. Burns in Glasgow, by Messrs. D. and C. MacIver in Liverpool, and by Messrs. S. Cunard and Co., in Halifax, N.S., under the superintendence of Mr. Cunard at Boston, and, subsequently, when New York was embraced in the line, under the management of his son Mr., afterwards Sir Edward, Cunard, Bart. Mr. David MacIver died a few years after the formation of the Cunard line. Mr., afterwards Sir Samuel, Cunard, Bart., and his son, Sir Edward, who died more recently, have been succeeded by Mr. William Cunard, now managing the affairs of the company in London and Mr. George Burns, alone, survives of the Glasgow firm, the business of which is now carried on by his two sons, Mr. John Burns (whose abilities and philanthropy are alike conspicuous), and his brother, Mr. James Cleland Burns, and that in Liverpool by Mr. Charles MacIver (a gentleman of remarkable energy and ability) and his sons.

[178] Mr. Cunard in his evidence before the Select Committee “On Halifax and Boston Mails” (Parl. Paper, 1846, No. 563), stated that 3,295_l._ per voyage was paid for the service. And, in 1874, Mr. John Burns, in his examination before the Royal Commission “On Unseaworthy Ships,” said, in reply to question 16,982: “The original contract of the Cunard Company which was made by my late partner, Sir Samuel Cunard, was made with the Admiralty, and under the Admiralty all the ships were inspected by Admiralty officers, and there were certain restrictions in the contract as to allowing them to be used in time of war. These ships were all wooden ships and they had to carry naval officers on board, and to do other things which caused a good deal of trouble and expense to us. In the last contract which we negotiated we said that we would take less money, if certain of these restrictions were taken away from us. Therefore, we are now under a contract of 70,000_l._ a year, and carry no naval officers on board.”

[179]

-----------+---------------+---------+----------+------------+---------
Name. |Length between | Extreme | Depth of | Nominal | Burden
|Perpendiculars.| Breadth.| Hold. |Horse-Power.| in Tons.
-----------+---------------+---------+----------+------------+---------
| Feet. | Ft. In. | Ft. In. | |
_Britannia_| 207 | 34 4 | 22 6 | 423 | 1,156
_Acadia_ | 206 | 34 6 | 22 6 | 425 | 1,136
_Caledonia_| 206 | 34 6 | 22 6 | 425 | 1,139
_Columbia_ | 207 | 34 2 | 22 4 | 425 | 1,138
-----------+---------------+---------+----------+------------+---------

[180] Built on the Clyde by Mr. R. Duncan, in 1840. Left Liverpool on her first voyage, July 4th, 1840.

Material of vessel Wood
Length, keel and forerake 207 feet
Breadth of beam 34 feet 4 inches
Breadth over paddle boxes 54 feet 8 inches
Depth of hold 22 feet 6 inches
Depth over planking 24 feet 8 inches
Tonnage, builders’ measurement 1,156-45/94
Tonnage, new measurement 1,155-13/100
Tonnage, of engine-room 535-70/100
Tonnage, register 619-43/100
Length on deck 203 feet 7 inches
Breadth of deck 31 feet 9 inches
Depth of hold 22 feet 2 inches
Length allowed for engine space 70 feet 7 inches
Draught, mean, one-half of coals consumed 16 feet 10 inches
Area of midship section at mean draught 520
Displacement at mean draught 2,050 tons
Kind of engines Side-lever
Collective H.P., nominal, per Admiralty 403
Cylinders, diameter 72½ inches
Stroke of piston 6 feet 10 inches
Diameter of paddle-wheel over floats 27 feet 9 inches
Number of floats on one wheel 21
Dimensions of floats 8 ft. ⨉ 2ft. 10 in.
Kind of boilers Flue (4)
Number of furnaces 12
Grate, 6 ft. 2 in. ⨉ 3 ft. 222 square feet
Total heating surface in boilers 2,698 square feet
Coals consumed outwards to Boston viâ Halifax 440 tons
Coals consumed homeward from Boston viâ Halifax 450 tons
Mean draught of water, ship leaving Liverpool 17 feet 2 inches

[181] Report of Committee of House of Commons, August 1846.

[182]

---------------------+--------+------------+----------------------+--------------------
Vessel’s Name. |Tonnage.|Horse-Power.| Proportion of Tonnage| Remarks.
| | | to Power. |
---------------------+--------+------------+----------------------+--------------------
_Acadia_ (Cunard }| 1,136 | 400 | 1 h.p. = 2¾ tons | Exceedingly fast.
Company) }| | | |
| | | |{ 10¼ knots when
_Oriental_ | 1,670 | 440 | 1 h.p. = 4 tons |{ deep on trial
| | | |{ trip.
| | | |
_Great Western_ | 1,340 | 450 | 1 h.p. = 3 tons |
| | | |
_Great Liverpool_ | 1,543 | 464 | 1 h.p. = 3⅓ tons |
| | | |
| | | |{ Fast when light,
_British Queen_ | 2,016 | 500 | 1 h.p. = 4 tons |{ and light stern
| | | |{ breeze.
| | | |
_President_ | 2,366 | 540 | 1 h.p. = 4½ tons |{ Slow under any
| | | |{ circumstances.
| | | |
_Liverpool_ (before }| 1,150 | 404 | 1 h.p. = 2½ tons | Slow and crank.
alterations) }| | | |

See Fincham’s “Naval Architecture.”

[183] Letter from E—— in the _Civil Engineer and Architects’ Journal_, January 1841.

[184] She was constructed of iron, and expressly for the Transatlantic trade. Her dimensions were, length of keel, 289 feet; 296 feet between the perpendiculars; and 322 feet over all. Her extreme breadth, 51 feet, with 32 feet 6 inches depth of hold, her main load draught of water being 16 feet; and her measurement 2984 tons, with engines of 1000 horse-power.

[185] The _Great Britain_ was launched on the 19th of July 1843. The machinery was constructed in the works of the company, as no engineers could be found willing to undertake the task by contract. But, by putting the engines into the vessel at the works, it was found that she was so deeply immersed as to be unable to pass out of the dock, and she was, consequently, detained for some months until the requisite alterations could be made for her release. Soon after her experimental trip, made on the 12th December, 1844, she was placed on the American station. Her career, however, was prematurely brought to a close by an accident (stranded on the coast of Ireland) which, though occasioning a serious loss to her enterprising owners, proved at this early stage the great strength and value of iron ships. During the whole winter that she lay on the beach at Dundrum Bay, coast of Ireland, she sustained very little injury, and though frequently altered and under repair since then, the _Great Britain_ is still successfully employed in the trade between Liverpool and Australia, and to all appearance is as sound a vessel as she was when launched thirty-one years ago.

[186] Mr. R. B. Forbes, of Milton, Massachusetts, in forwarding to the author the lithograph of his ship, remarks: “The lower yards and the topgallant yard are in the same position as in the ordinary rig; but the topsail and topgallant sail are so divided as to make three sails instead of two. The topsail being exactly of the size of an ordinary double reefed topsail, the yard being parrelled to the heel of the topmast, where the topmasts are fidded forward of the lower mast-head; and to the head of the lower mast where the topmasts are (as they ought to be) fidded abaft the mast-head; this renders it necessary to have the lower mast-heads longer, by several feet, than in the old rig. The next sail above the topsail, representing the upper half of the topsail of the old rig and a fraction of the old topgallant sail, is called the topgallant sail, and the old rig topgallant sail is in the new rig called the royal, while the royal of the old rig becomes the skysail of the new rig. As I consider it important to have the sail as much in the body of the ship as possible, and at the same time to dispose of the canvas and spars that the sails can be used in different places, I make the foreyard of the same length (excepting a slight difference in the yardarms) as the main topsail yard; the fore topsail yard the same as the main topgallant yard, the fore topgallant yard the same as the main royal yard, and so on with the mizen, so that the yards and sails on the fore fit on the main one stage higher up, those on the mizen fit on the fore one stage higher and on the main two higher.”

[187] In a letter which I had the pleasure of receiving from Mr. Forbes (November 1874) that gentleman further remarks: “On the 15th September, 1845, I sailed for Liverpool in the steam-propeller ship _Massachusetts_: she made one other voyage to that port and, in June 1846, she was chartered to carry troops to the Gulf of Mexico. She was afterwards bought by our government and bore the flag of General Scott to the siege of Vera Cruz. She long continued in the navy department, and was known as the _Farralones_. Three or four years ago our government sold her when her machinery was removed, and she is now running and is called the _Alaska_.”

[188]

[189] Mr. Forbes, one of the owners of this ship, is a remarkable man, and has, during the long period of sixty years, taken so useful and active a part in the development of the maritime resources of his country, that a brief note of his career, for which he has furnished the materials, cannot fail to interest my readers. In 1811, when a boy of only seven years of age, he and his mother were captured at sea on their passage to France, and, again, in 1813, on his return passage. In 1817 he adopted the sea as a profession; and by his genius and industry he obtained the charge of an Indiaman, before he had reached the age of twenty years, and by 1830 he was in command of a ship of his own engaged in the trade with the East. He retired from the sea in 1832, and, in 1839, he became the principal partner in one of the largest mercantile establishments in China—the still well-known house of Russell and Co. In November 1844 his _Midas_ (propeller schooner) left New York for China: she was the first American steam-vessel that went beyond the Cape of Good Hope, and the first to ply on the waters of China. He was also interested in the propeller barque _Edith_, which left New York for Bombay and China, on January 18th, 1845. She was the first American steamer despatched to British India, and the first square-rigged propeller to China under that flag. In April 1845 he, with others, built an _iron_ paddle-wheel steamer, nearly 300 feet in length, which they named the _Iron Witch_: she was designed by Ericsson for great speed, to ply on the River Hudson, but as she did not prove fast enough to compete with the regular Albany boats, her engines were transferred to a wooden vessel named the _Falcon_; the _Falcon_ was the first American steamer that plied to Chagres in connection with the California route, as the _Iron Witch_ had been the first iron passenger steamer that plied on the North River. In 1845 Mr. Forbes launched the first iron steam-tug, built for mercantile purposes in New England, designed so far back as 1838. In 1847 he loaded the ship _Bombay_ with a full cargo of ice for Bombay, the first cargo taken there, a small quantity having previously gone in the _Paul Jones_ in 1843. At that period it used to be a joke that the Americans had nothing to offer in return for the produce of India except _ice_, apples, and bills! On the 28th of March, 1847, he sailed from Boston to Cork in the sloop of war _Jamestown_ with 800 tons of provisions, nobly contributed by citizens of Boston and other inhabitants of New England for the famine-stricken Irish—an act in itself which constituted a grand and imperishable monument of their goodness. In 1847 he sent to China on the deck of a ship, a small iron propeller called the _Firefly_, the first vessel of the kind to ply on the Canton river. He states that when in China in 1839-40, he sent the first cargo of tea to England in an American ship, the _Oriental_. In 1857-8 he built and despatched from Boston, an iron paddle-wheel steamer, called the _Argentina_, of 100 tons for the survey of the La Plata, which ascended the Parana beyond where any steamer had previously navigated. In 1861 he despatched the iron propeller _Pembroke_ for China, where she was sold. She held the only “letter of marque” issued by the United States’ Government during the great civil war. Such are a few of the leading points in the active life of Mr. R. B. Forbes, of whom his country may be proud, who still in his fresh old age continues his career of usefulness. He now builds boats for the “good boys” of his native town, and I had great pleasure in executing for him the other day an order for no end of miniature blocks, dead-eyes, anchors, and cables.

[190] “We have to say that, if the _Britannia_ beats the _Washington_ over (and they both, we understand, start the same day), she will have to run by the deep mines, and put in more coal. We shall have, in two years’ time, a system of Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific steamers in operation that will tell a brilliant story for the enterprise of Brother Jonathan. We are bound to go ahead, and steam is the agent of the age. We expect yet to see the day when a traveller will be able to leave New York, and going eastward all the time, will be enabled to make the circuit of the earth, coming in by Huascualco, in the summer interval between two sessions of Congress, spending a month or two in the Mediterranean on the way.”

[191] “The _Washington_ is stated to be of 2000 horses’ indicated power, and is 1750 tons Government measure, or 2000 tons carpenters’ measure; so her steam power is to her tonnage as one to one, while the _Britannia_ has only one horse-power to 2¾ tons.[193] To go a little, however, more into detail: both vessels have two cylinders, I believe, of the same diameter, viz., 72 inches, and both have side beam engines; the stroke of the _Washington_ is 10 feet; her boilers are able to carry (they say) 30 lbs. of steam; but, if we allow her only 23 lbs. ⨉ 13 vacuum, she will be still double the power of the _Britannia_ with 5 lbs. ⨉ 13 lbs. i.e., = 900 horses’ power (450 ⨉ 2). I am now speaking of full steam, or at least both cutting off at the same point. The _Herald_ (New York) says the _Washington’s_ wheels are 39 feet in diameter, and 7½ feet dip; but the latter is of course an error, and probably means 7½ feet face; she has two boilers 36 feet ⨉ 15 on the plan; there are three furnaces, each 7 feet ⨉ 4 feet 6 inches ⨉ 6 = 189 feet. Well then, there you have data from which you may calculate how many horses’ power can be got off that great surface with anthracite and blowers. Her recipient heating surface must be large; she has flues, perhaps 12 inches in diameter.”

[192] The proportion was actually one to two as against one to two and three-quarters.

[193] “In point of size she looked like an elongated three-decker, with only one streak round her; but about as ugly a specimen of steam-ship building as ever went through this anchorage. She did not appear to make much use of her 2000 horse-power either, but seemed rather to roll along than steam through the water. She excited considerable curiosity, although her performance, as compared with the _Britannia_, had evidently taken the edge off the feeling with which the vessel would have been viewed had a different result been obtained in her favour.” (Spithead correspondent of the _Times_.)

[194] In 1840 and 1841 the British Government entered into contracts, to which I shall hereafter refer, for the conveyance of the mails with the West Indies and also with the Pacific Steam Navigation Companies; and, early in 1850, they concluded a contract with the Cunard Company for the conveyance of the mails between Halifax, New York, and Bermuda in small vessels of 350 tons and 80 horse-power, fitted with a proper space for mounting an 18-pounder pivot gun. One of these vessels left Halifax for Bermuda and another left for St. John’s within twenty-four hours after the arrival of the packet from Liverpool; a third conveyed the mails monthly between Bermuda and New York, the subsidy being 10,600_l._ per annum, or at the rate of 3_s._ per mile; on the main line it was 11_s._ 4_d._ per mile.

In 1851, the British Government made another contract with the Cunard Company for a monthly conveyance of the mails between Bermuda and St. Thomas each way upon such days as might be fixed by the Admiralty, the provisions as regards the size, power, and armament of the vessels being the same in all respects as those in the other subsidiary service, only that the price was to be equal to 4_s._ per mile, or 4,100_l._ per annum. This service connected the West Indies with the United States and the North American provinces. The departure of the one vessel engaged in it took place immediately after the arrival of the homeward mail West India packet, so that she carried the correspondence of the West Indian Colonies and of Her Majesty’s officers on the station from that island to Bermuda.

[195] _Vide_ Official Reports from the Senate, 1850 and 1852, _passim_.

[196] The general dimensions of these celebrated steamers were: length of keel, 277 feet; length on main deck, 282 feet; depth from the maindeck, 24 feet; depth under the spar deck, 32 feet; breadth of beam, 45 feet. They had rounded sterns, three masts with suitable spars; a lower deck, main deck, and spar deck, as well as an orlop deck extending from the engine-room forward and aft. The area of transverse section of the _Arctic_, for instance, was 772 square feet. Launching draught aft, 10 feet; average displacement per inch, from launching to load line, 20½ tons; area of load line, 9369·10 square feet; whole displacement to its circumscribing parallelopipedon, 601 per cent.; weight of hull, 1525 tons; weight of spars and rigging, 34 tons; ordinary load line aft, 20 feet; ordinary load line forward, 19½ feet.

[197] I have not room for these very valuable historical documents, so much wanted in our own merchant navy, but the reader interested will find them _in extenso_ in note, Appendix O, in Mr. C. B. Stuart’s work, “On Naval and Mail Steamers;” U.S., published in New York, 1853.

[198] A description in detail of these boilers is given in the note, Appendix O, already mentioned.

[199] The respective diameters of wheels in these steamers from outside to outside of floats, were as follows, viz., _Arctic_, 35 feet 6 inches; _Baltic_, 36 feet; _Atlantic_, 35 feet; and _Pacific_, 35 feet. Those of the _Arctic_ and _Atlantic_ had thirty-six floats; the _Baltic_, thirty-two; and the _Pacific_, twenty-eight.

The average performances of the engines of the _Arctic_ were as follows: pressure, 16·9 pounds; revolutions, 15·8 per minute with an average consumption of 83 tons of anthracite coals per day of twenty-four hours, giving an average speed of 316·4 knots per day. Her maximum pressure was 17·5 pounds; revolutions, 16·7 per minute; consumption, 87 tons, and speed 320 knots per day. The consumption of coal per day in the _Asia_ (Cunard line) was, on an average, 76 tons, and her speed with this consumption 303 knots per day.

[200] The plates of this splendid engine will be found in the second volume of Tredgold’s “Steam-Engine,” and well deserve the attention of professional readers. Mr. Victor Beaumont’s account of the ship and engine will be found in the same volume.

[201] See Reports of Proceedings in Congress.

[202] The comparative cost of driving a steamer on the average of 7 knots up to an average of 9 knots is very small compared to what it would be to increase the speed from 9 to 11 knots an hour, and it becomes enormous when that rate is increased (as the resistance increases with the square of the velocity), but my readers must take the very large sum mentioned as the extra cost of one extra day’s saving of time with _very considerable qualifications_, as the statement was made in Congress with the object of obtaining for the Collins line further assistance either in the shape of a vote of money or an enhanced annual subsidy.

[203] From a return which appeared in the _New York Herald_ on the 1st of January, 1853, the number of persons carried in the course of eleven months, January to November inclusive, 1852, was:

By Collins line to Liverpool, 2,420, to New York, 1,886.
By Cunard line to Liverpool, 1,783, to New York, 1,186.

[204] The dimensions of the _Africa_, built of wood by Messrs. Steele and Company, of Greenock, were as follows:

_Builders’ Measurement._

Ft. In.
Length of keel and fore rake 267 0
Breadth of beam 40 6
Depth of hold 27 6
Tonnage 2128 78-94ths

_New Measurement._

Length on deck 265 0
Breadth on ditto at midships 37 2
Depth of hold at ditto 27 2
Tonnage 2226 24-100ths

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History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce, Volume 4 (of 4)Chapter IV (2)

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