Chapter 11

JAMES B. EADS.

Birth--Childhood--Fondness for machinery--Early mechanical skill--Constructs a steam engine at the age of nine years--His work-shop--Death of his father--Works his way to St. Louis--Sells apples on the streets--Finds employment and a friend--Efforts to improve--Becomes a clerk on a Mississippi steamer--Undertakes the recovery of wrecked steamboats--Success of his undertaking--Offers to remove the obstacles to the navigation of the Mississippi--Failure of his health--Retires from business--Breaking out of the war--Summoned to Washington--His plan for the defense of the western rivers--Associated with Captain Rodgers in the purchase of gunboats--His first contract with the Government--Undertakes to build seven ironclads in sixty-five days--Magnitude of the undertaking--His promptness--Builds other gunboats during the war--The gunboat fleet at Forts Henry and Donelson the private property of Mr. Eads--Excellence of the vessels built by him--A model contractor--Residence in St. Louis.