CHAPTER IX

THE BEGINNINGS OF STEAM NAVIGATION

It will help us to appreciate the work of the men who first experimented with steam-driven ships if we recall the fact that James Watt, working at Soho, near Birmingham, England, invented the engine which used steam on both sides of the piston in 1782, and that it was for many years after that date an enormously heavy and cumbersome machine. From this fact we see the state of the mechanic arts in England at the end of the eighteenth century, when practical experiments in steam navigation were first begun. That the state of those arts was still lower in the United States would be naturally inferred from the story of Bond's efforts to restrain progress by reëxporting the machinery that had been imported at Philadelphia. As a matter of fact, when one American inventor began to make experiments in steam navigation, he was obliged first of all to train men in the work of building engines; he was unable to find, anywhere in the country, men with the necessary skill.

One of the most curious of the early experiments was that made by James Rumsey, who was a bath tender at a pleasure resort in Virginia. He first planned to mount an old-style, single-acting engine in a boat, connect it with a pump, draw in water through a pipe at the bow, and then force it out astern. When this plan was explained to Washington, he wrote a testimonial, saying, "the discovery is of great importance." A boat built on this plan was eventually driven at a speed of four miles an hour. Rumsey also experimented with a screw propeller, but he was poor, and could not carry the experiment to a conclusion. Finally he went to England to get capital (a fact to be remembered), and there he died before he could accomplish anything of real moment.

Another interesting experimenter was John Fitch, of Pennsylvania, a man who was handy in the use of tools, and who was also a surveyor and map-maker. On December 2, 1785, he presented to the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia a model, with drawings, of a steamboat. The New Jersey legislature then gave him the exclusive right to navigate the waters of the State with steamboats, and a company was organized to develop the invention. The first engine built had a 3-inch cylinder. It was mounted in a skiff and was connected at one time with a screw propeller, at another with an endless chain dragging alongside, and with a "screw and paddles," but neither device would drive the boat at a practical speed. Then Fitch conceived the idea of driving with paddles somewhat after the fashion of canoe men. This plan worked so well that a boat forty feet long was built and furnished with an engine having a 12-inch cylinder. In spite of the fact that the cylinder of this engine had wooden ends that leaked, and a piston that did not fit the bore, the boat was driven at a speed of four knots an hour.

In 1788 Fitch built a boat sixty feet long with a larger engine, and in October she carried thirty passengers to Burlington, New Jersey, a distance of twenty miles, in three hours and ten minutes. The speed of this boat being unsatisfactory, still another was built, and in May, 1790, she covered a measured mile in seven and a half minutes, or at the rate of eight miles an hour. She was then put on the river as a packet plying between Philadelphia and Trenton, and made more than thirty trips of which records remain. She was operated by paddles at the stern.

Though Fitch's plan was not the best conceivable, it is now admitted that his boat was a mechanical success. He built a workable boat, but, unhappily, he was far ahead of his day in his hopes and work. The people were not yet ready for steam navigation, and the company failed to pay dividends. Meantime another boat that he had built to run on the Mississippi was wrecked, and that loss ended the enterprise. Fitch finally went to the banks of the Ohio, where he continued his efforts without success.

"The day will come," he wrote, "when some more powerful man will get fame and fortune from _my_ invention, but nobody will believe that poor John Fitch can do anything worthy of attention." Then he killed himself.

In 1786, Oliver Evans, a Philadelphia millwright, asked the legislature of the State to give him the exclusive right to build steam gristmills and road-wagons,--automobiles, in other words,--but his plans were not treated seriously. In 1801, however, he built a steam plaster mill, and in 1804 he demonstrated, in a way that yet astonishes the reader, the entire feasibility of steam navigation.

Having obtained a contract for dredging some of the slips along the Philadelphia water front, he built a scow, 30 × 12 feet large, to carry the dredge. The scow was put together at his shop, which was located a mile from the Schuylkill. When done, he mounted a steam engine, (5 × 19 inches large), on its deck, placed temporary wooden axles with temporary wooden wheels underneath, connected the axles and engine shaft, and then steamed away to the river. There he removed the wheels and put a paddle wheel at the stern for use afloat. Then he launched his scow, steamed down the Schuylkill and up to the slips he was to dredge. The engine was thereafter used in the work of dredging. Although that was in 1804, the people were not yet ready for steam navigation. The only practical result of the work of Evans was the adoption of the high-pressure engine, so called. His engine had no condenser. It exhausted its steam into the open air, and this style of engine was found to be best adapted for use on the steamboats of the Western rivers, later on.

In the meantime Robert Fulton, who was to succeed, had been at work. Fulton was a Pennsylvania artist who had shown so much talent that he went to England to study under Benjamin West. In the meantime, however, he had been greatly interested in mechanics, and had dreamed of steamboats. In London his thoughts turned more and more to mechanics, and in 1793 he abandoned art to take up his life-work.

In the popular view the most interesting chapter in Fulton's life is that relating the story of the first voyage of his first steamship; but for the encouragement of struggling inventors the most important facts in his life are those showing how he went about his task. For Fulton made a thorough study of his subject; while experimenting for himself he took care to learn as much as possible about what others had already done in the same line. In modern days, when every important invention is known to be a development from crude ideas and appliances into a perfect design, it seems not a little curious to read that in Fulton's time his method of work--his determination to learn his subject thoroughly before building--was considered not quite creditable. Invention, it was thought, consisted in working out an inspiration in the dark!

Fulton's first effort to build a steamship was made in 1794, when he went to Paris and tried to induce the National Convention to take up the invention, and thus "deliver France and the whole world from British oppression." Of course the chaotic conditions in Paris prevented the realization of his hopes.

Returning to England, Fulton published a pamphlet on steam navigation (1796), but failed to interest the people. Then he became interested in marine torpedoes and submarine navigation. With these ideas he went again to Paris (1802), where he made experiments in working a boat under water, but failed to convince Napoleon, who was then the despotic ruler of France. While thus engaged, however, he met Robert R. Livingston, the American minister to France. In connection with John Stevens and Nicholas J. Roosevelt, of New Jersey, Livingston had already made experiments looking toward steam navigation on the Hudson, and in aid of his enterprise had secured from the legislature of New York the exclusive privilege of navigating New York waters with steamboats. This privilege had expired by limitation, and the experiments had come to an end, so far as he was concerned, but on meeting the enthusiastic Fulton he at once became interested again, and furnished money for further experiments. Thereupon Fulton built a steamboat that, when launched upon the Seine, in 1803, instantly broke in two and sank. The frames were not strong enough. Fishing up the engine, Fulton built a stronger hull, and this time the engine worked, though the speed was so slow that only Fulton and Livingston believed the experiment to be a success.

With the optimism that breeds success, Fulton, backed by Livingston, now made drawings of an engine to be used in a boat which he purposed building upon the Hudson, and these plans he carried to England, where he ordered his engine of Watt, who was building the most efficient engines in use.

In the meantime, William Symington, a Scotch engine builder, had been experimenting with steamboats. In 1789 he had installed an engine upon a double-hulled yacht, with which one Patrick Millar navigated Lake Dalwinston, in Scotland. Although Millar spent $150,000 in experiments with steam, nothing came of them. In 1801 Symington induced Lord Dundas, president of the Forth & Clyde Canal Company, to build a steam-tug for towing barges.

This tug, named the _Charlotte Dundas_, had an engine with a 22-inch cylinder (stroke four feet), and the piston was connected directly with the shaft of a stern paddle-wheel by means of a piston rod and a connecting rod--a plan of such simplicity that it came into universal use later on. The rudder of the boat was handled by means of a wheel placed near the bow, and this plan, too, received universal approval. In March, 1802, this tug towed two 70-ton barges nineteen miles and a half, against a strong wind, in six hours. As a demonstration of the feasibility of steam navigation on smooth water, that passage should have been entirely convincing, but the fear that the wash from the wheel, or wheels (for Symington thought to try side-wheels), would injure the banks of the canal, prevented the adoption of the tug.

Fulton had learned about the experiments with this tug, and while in England contracting for the engine mentioned, he went to Scotland and visited Symington, who fired up the boat and showed Fulton how it worked.

In December, 1806, Fulton came to New York, where he contracted with Charles Brown, who had a shipyard on East River, between Stanton and Third streets, for the hull of a new boat. The model of this hull is memorable. In planning ships in those days it was customary to make them approximately three and a half times as long as they were broad, and at least half as deep as they were broad. But Fulton's plans called for a keelless hull 140 feet long over all, by 13 feet wide, and only 7 feet deep. One feels a certain sympathy, even now, for the sailors of that day who, on learning the facts about this ship, named it _Fulton's Folly_.

The boiler for supplying the engine with steam was 20 feet long, 8 wide, and 7 feet deep. It was set in masonry. The fuel used was dry pine. The engine had a cylinder 24 inches in diameter with a 4-foot stroke. It was not a typical Watt engine, however, for Watt's piston rods were kept in line by a combination of levers and rods known as a "parallel motion," while Fulton had called for a cross-head on the end of the piston rod, and the cross-head worked in guides in an A-frame. From each end of the cross-head hung a connecting rod. These connecting rods were joined to a "bell-crank," which was not unlike a "walking beam" in the modern river-boat, but it was located down in the hull. Connecting rods led from the bell-crank to cog-wheels on the inner ends of the two main shafts. The cog-wheels served as cranks which turned with the vibrations of the bell-crank. The paddle-wheels were on the outboard ends of the main shafts, of course. Then cog-wheels on the inner ends of these shafts geared into pinions on a smaller shaft which carried two fly-wheels, placed outside the hull, which were provided to carry the engine over the "dead centre" at each end of the stroke. The paddle-wheels were 14 feet in diameter. The main shafts were each of cast iron, and 4½ inches in diameter. The A-frame and guides, the cross-head, the bell-crank and connecting rods to the cross-head, and crank cog-wheels, the crank-wheels, paddle-wheels, and shafts, and the fly-wheels and their driving gear were all of Fulton's design.

According to Fulton's diary, he paid Watt £548 for the engine. The boiler, built by Cave & Son, of London, cost "at 2_s_ 2_d_ the pound, £476 11_s_ 2_d_." This was the first engine of the kind that Watt was allowed to build for export, and Fulton writes on March 22, 1805:--

"Fee at the treasury on receiving permission to ship the engine to America, £2 14_s_ 6_d_."

Fulton had no little trouble in raising the money for his boat. Livingston contributed the larger share, while Joel Barlow and David Dunham gave the next larger shares. The remainder of the sum was collected among personal friends by personal solicitation, and that was work that tried the soul of the man. The fact that the engine lay on the pier where it was landed for a period of six months because Fulton could not raise the money to pay the freight is significant.

The new ship was named _Clermont_, the name of Livingston's home on the Hudson. At noon on Monday, August 17, 1807, she was lying near the old State prison which stood on land now bounded by Washington, West Tenth, West and Charles streets, and thousands of people gathered to gaze at the remarkable vessel because it had been announced that she was to make a trial trip some time during the day. They observed that Brown, the builder, was working at some sails stretched to a mast standing at each end of the hull, although the sails were not set. A man named Maxwell (he had been brought from the shop of the London makers) was tinkering around the boiler--stopping leaks with melted lead, very likely, as he did, at any rate, later. Another man, Van Lea, was adjusting what is called a harpoon gun in the records. Harpoon guns, as the American whalers know them, were not yet invented, but swivels had previously been used for throwing harpoons, and this was, perhaps, such a gun. What it was to be used for is not recorded. The spectators were naturally cynical, and the humorists of the class that in modern days write the jokes for newspapers, shouted to Fulton: "God help you, Bobby!" "Bring us back a chip of the north pole!" "A fool and his money are soon parted!" The small boys whistled, and also yowled like cats. Fulton's correspondence shows that his sensitive soul was cut to the quick.

At 1 o'clock, as the start was described by the _Evening Post_, everything seemed ready, and Fulton told Captain Moses Rogers[6] to cast off the lines. The order was given to the engineer, Stevens Rogers, a relative of the captain, to start the machinery. A long blast was blown on a big tin horn as a warning to near-by boats, and then there was a "strange creaking, whirring, churning sound, a hiss of the escaping steam; the awkward-looking wheels, towering full seven feet above the deck on either side, began to turn, and we were really started on the first steamboat voyage on the Hudson." The next moment, however, the spectators saw the machine come to a sudden stop, and, supposing it had failed, they gave a derisive shout. The captain of a passing river-sailing packet sheered his boat close in to the pier line, and "made a sarcastic offer" to "throw us a line and tow us to Albany."

Perhaps the jeering at this time did not hurt Fulton so much as that previously mentioned, for he had ordered the engine stopped in order to readjust the boards or floats on the paddle-wheels. He had noted that they dipped too far into the water. An hour or more passed while the crew did this work. When it was done and the throttle was again opened, there was less strain on the machinery, and the _Clermont_ moved smoothly away from the landing.

"The jeers of the ignorant, who had neither sense nor feeling enough to suppress their contemptuous ridicule and rude jokes, were silenced for a moment by a vulgar astonishment which deprived them of the power of utterance till the triumph of genius extorted from the incredulous multitude which crowded the shores shouts and acclamations of congratulation and applause." (Colden's _Life of Robert Fulton_.)

Heading across to the west side of the river to escape the main current of the tide, the _Clermont_ passed the sloop whose captain had jeered her (the passengers on the _Clermont_ yelled ecstatically at him when they saw his look of wonder), and then steamed along under the shadows of the Palisades. Night came on as she entered the Tappan Zee, and because it was a dark night the crews of a number of river-sloops saw a vision that they remembered vividly the remainder of their lives. For while they gazed down the river, knowing nothing of an experiment in steam navigation, they saw far away through the darkness the flame and sparks that poured from the smokestack of the _Clermont_--a cloud of fire moving along between heaven and earth like that which had guided the Children of Israel in the desert. Then, as it drew near, a hoarse growling was heard and a frightful form was seen coming up the river directly against the tide. In abject terror many crews jumped into small boats and fled ashore. Others sought shelter in the holds of their boats and drew the hatches tight, while others still fell upon their knees "and besought Providence to protect them from the horrible monster."

In the meantime the guests on the _Clermont_ (she carried invited guests only on this trip), finding the river air somewhat chilly, gathered in the cabin, where, by the flickering light of a "candle in its high protecting glass," they discussed "the popular Salmagundi papers," speculated "on Mr. Irving's forthcoming Knickerbocker's _History of New York_," and finally "began to ply Mr. Fulton with questions about the steamboat and what had led up to it." They also sang "Ye Banks and Braes o' Bonny Doon," a favorite song with Fulton.

Twice on the way up the river the _Clermont_ stopped for fuel, one of the deck hands awakening the echoes with the big tin horn on each occasion to let the wood-yard men know that she was about to land. Then, just twenty-four hours after leaving New York, she cast anchor before the home of Livingston. The distance she had covered was 110 miles. She remained here until the next day, and it is noted in the histories that during the evening Livingston and a party of friends boarded the _Clermont_, where, in a congratulatory speech, he announced the engagement of his niece, Miss Harriet Livingston, to Robert Fulton.

Leaving the next morning at 9 o'clock, the _Clermont_ reached Albany at five in the afternoon. In her run to that city the _Clermont_ had averaged just under five miles an hour, regardless of wind and tide.

While neither freight nor paying passengers had been carried on the trip up, the boat was now advertised as a packet. Thereupon a number of men came on board for a passage to New York, and when one of these tendered the money for the trip, tears came into Fulton's eyes. For more than twenty years he had hoped against hope, and now he saw the fruition of his work.

"Although the prospect of personal emolument has been some inducement to me," he wrote to an intimate friend, "yet I feel infinitely more pleasure in reflecting on the immense advantages my country will derive from the invention."

On her return to New York the _Clermont_ began her career as an Albany packet, with regular dates for leaving each end of the route. She was advertised in the _Evening Post_, of New York, on September 2, 1807, as follows:--

"The North River steamboat will leave Paulus Hook Ferry on Friday the fourth of September, at six in the morning, and arrive at Albany on Saturday at six in the afternoon.

"Provisions, good berths, and accommodations are provided.

"The charge to each passenger is as follows:--

Time To Newburgh $3 14 hours To Poughkeepsie 4 17 " To Esopus 4½ 20 " To Hudson 5 30 " To Albany 7 36 "

"For places, apply to Wm. Vandervoort, No. 48 Cortlandt Street, on the corner of Greenwich Street.

"Way passengers to Tarry Town, etc., will apply to the captain on board.

"The steamboat will leave Albany on Monday the seventh of September at six in the morning, and arrive at New York on Tuesday at six in the evening."

Meals were served without extra charge, and baggage weighing sixty pounds was carried free with each adult passenger. The freight rate to Albany was three cents a pound. The _Clermont_ left New York on her first trip as packet at 6 o'clock in the morning on September 4, 1807, carrying twelve through and three way passengers. It was noted in the papers of the period that people were very much incensed because the steamer left her pier promptly at the hour advertised. They had been accustomed to having the river-sloops wait for them.

Morrison points out, in his _American Steam Navigation_, that no single detail of the _Clermont_ was invented by Fulton. As the _North American Review_ of July, 1838, says, the "great and surpassing merit of Fulton consisted not so much in absolute originality as in the skill with which he availed himself of all the theoretic knowledge of the day, and applied it to practical purposes." His choice of location for the inauguration of steam navigation is to be noted, for New York and the Hudson afforded an amount of traffic perhaps more valuable than could have been found elsewhere for such a vessel. Moreover, he was fortunate in making the trial at a time when the public were sufficiently enlightened to appreciate the value of steam.

The number of passengers and the amount of freight carried by the _Clermont_ in the fall of 1807 led Fulton to rebuild her during the winter, in order to give her greater capacity. Having a monopoly of the waters by act of the legislature (the monopoly was contrary to the Constitution of the United States, but the courts did not decide the matter until 1824), Fulton had no trouble in raising capital, and with the growth of traffic a new steamer, the _Car of Neptune_, was placed on the river in 1808. The _Paragon_ was built in 1811, and in 1812 the _Fire Fly_ was built for way traffic. On the whole, however, the evolution of steam navigation on the Hudson was slow, at least so far as improvement in the vessels employed was concerned, until the monopoly was broken. For Fulton died in 1815, and his associates were not progressive. In 1825 an opposition line put on two steamers that were much superior to those of the old line, and in 1827 they added a third. In this year Robert L. Stevens, a son of John Stevens, put a third line of steamers on the river, and in 1828 some Albany capitalists sought a share of the traffic with a steamer called the _De Witt Clinton_ that made a record of more than fourteen miles an hour between Albany and New York.

In 1832 the companies on the river consolidated, and used the superfluous boats in a night line that was successful from the first.

Two notable improvements were made in the engines in the meantime. Robert L. Stevens designed a light wrought-iron "walking beam" to replace the heavy cast-iron beam that was previously used. Then in 1824 James P. Allaire, who had made a reputation as an engine builder, brought out a "compound" engine. A compound engine has two or more cylinders of different diameters coupled to the one shaft. In the Watt engines the steam was conducted from the boiler to one end of the cylinder and allowed to flow in until the piston was driven almost to the opposite end. Then it was shut off and the way to the condenser was opened. Later it was found that if the flow of steam was cut off at half the length of stroke and the steam already in the cylinder was allowed to work by expansion, the total power of the engine was reduced only a little, while the saving of coal was very great. While thinking of this fact, it occurred to Allaire that the principle involved might be used to better advantage if the steam was taken at full pressure into a small cylinder and exhausted thence into a second and larger one to work by its expansive power. The _Henry Eckford_, the _Sun_, and a number of others were supplied with engines on this principle. The _Eckford_ had a small cylinder 12 inches in diameter and a large one of 24. Both had the same stroke, of course. But, curiously enough, it was not until about 1870 that compound engines became the fashion.

The racing era, as one may call it, began on the Hudson about 1835, the year that Daniel Drew became interested in the Hudson River steamers. Racing had been done before the consolidation of 1832, but it was mild in comparison with that under Drew's initiation. An unreasoning mania for speed took possession of the public as well as of the owners of steamers. Though no practical end was to be served by the saving of an hour in the time required in the trip from New York to Albany, every sacrifice was made and every risk was taken to secure it. Instead of going to a pier or dock to land way-passengers at the towns along the river, the unfortunates were dumped into a small skiff that was towed at the end of a long rope. Then, as the steamer ran in close, but not too close, to the landing, the man in charge of the skiff, using a steering oar, sheered it within a few feet of the landing, and the passengers were told to jump. And jump they did. Of course a few fell into the water at every trip; perhaps some were drowned thereby. But the steamer's reputation for making quick passages was maintained, and for a long time the public protested in vain. When legislation was invoked (1842) the act was opposed as an unwarranted attempt to interfere with private business which could much better regulate itself!

It is an interesting fact that while the racing on the Mississippi resulted in the explosion of many boilers and the consequent loss of hundreds of lives, no such disasters occurred on the Hudson. The Hudson immunity was due to a difference in machinery. On the Mississippi "high-pressure" engines were used--there was no condenser, and the steam, which was sometimes carried at a pressure of 150 pounds to the square inch, was exhausted, after use, into the open air. When the safety-valve on such a boiler was tied down and the fire was urged until an explosion followed, the whole boat was ripped to pieces. On the Hudson condensers were used because the water was deeper and the extra weight was not of quite so much importance. Moreover, fuel was more expensive, and the low-pressure engine was more economical. Hudson River boats often reached the end of the run with boiler-plates bulging and ruined, but the heartrending disasters of the Mississippi were unknown in the East.

From the Hudson the use of steam spread first to the Delaware. John Stevens, who had been associated with Livingston and Roosevelt at the end of the eighteenth century, continued his experiments after Livingston went to France as American minister. He could not find any mechanics fit to help him carry out his ideas, but he built a machine shop and trained young men for the work. In 1804 he made a number of trips on the Hudson with a 25-foot boat that was propelled by screws. He also invented the tubular boiler "which at least has been the means of working wonders, for in a boiler six feet long, four feet wide and two feet deep he exposed four hundred feet of surface, in the most advantageous manner, to the action of fire." (Macfarlane, _History of Propellers_.)

In 1807, while Fulton was bringing out the _Clermont_, Stevens had a smaller, but none the less practical, boat, almost ready. He missed the honor of leading by no more than two weeks. Being unable to use her on the Hudson, Stevens, in June, 1808, sent her to the Delaware, under the command of Captain Moses Rogers, who had commanded the _Clermont_ on her first voyages, and his son, Robert L., served as engineer. Thus this vessel--she was named the _Phœnix_--was the first steamer that ever went to sea. On the Delaware the _Phœnix_ proved a commercial success.

The next step in the expansion of steam navigation was taken when Nicholas J. Roosevelt built the steamer _New Orleans_ at Pittsburg (1811), and demonstrated to the incredulous frontiersmen of the region--especially to the "half horse, half alligator" keel boatmen--that a steam-driven boat could overcome the current of the swiftest part of the Mississippi.

In 1813 Fulton and his associates reached out for alongshore trade by building the _Fulton_ for use between New York and New Haven, but because of the activity of the British war-ships on the blockade, she did not make her first trip until March 21, 1815, when she carried thirty passengers to New Haven in eleven hours.

The _Massachusetts_ was the first steamer in use at Boston. She began plying to Salem in 1817. In the same year the _Fire Fly_ was sent from New York to Rhode Island, where she was used between Providence and Newport. Rounding Point Judith in this vessel was considered a feat showing extraordinary courage, and this, too, among sailors who thought nothing of a voyage around the world in a ship less than a hundred feet long.

In 1818 the _Walk-in-the-water_ was built at Black Rock, (now a part of Buffalo), on the Niagara River, for use on the Great Lakes. When ready for her trial trip, she was unable to stem the river current until eight yoke of oxen were brought to her assistance, but once on the lake she did well. She made her first trip to Detroit, starting on August 20, 1818, and covered the distance in about forty hours, using a cord of wood an hour.

By the annual report of the Commissioner of Navigation it appears that four steamboats, aggregation 457 tons, were built in the United States in 1812, the first year for which there is a record. In 1813 seven of an aggregate tonnage of 1430 were built, and in 1819 the number was twenty-eight, with a tonnage of 7291. More than a hundred had been built in all. This expansion was almost but not quite all made upon inland or sheltered waters. Fulton had looked toward the high seas. He had built a steamship, which he named the _Emperor Alexander_, to sell to the Russian government, but the War of 1812 prevented his trying to navigate her across the ocean, and she was eventually worn out at home. During the war he built the huge war steamer _Demologos_, a vessel fit to go along the coast, and crude as she was, she would have changed the manner of war at sea had she been set afloat a year sooner.

The year 1819 is especially memorable because a transatlantic steam passage was then made. It appears that Captain Moses Rogers was the originator of the venture. In 1818 Francis Fickett built a common sailing ship at New York that was 100 feet long by 28 broad and 14 deep. Rogers had had the honor of first navigating the sea with a steamer, and he had been selected in 1816, because of his reputation for courage and skill, to take the steamer _New Jersey_ from New York to the Chesapeake, a voyage thought to be full of danger for such a vessel. He was now inspired with the ambition to be the first to drive a steamship across the Atlantic, and after a look at the ship that Fickett was building, he persuaded Scarborough & Isaacs, ship merchants of Savannah, to buy and fit her with a steam engine for use between Savannah and Liverpool.

The engine for this ship was built by Stephen Vail, of Speedwell, New Jersey, and the boiler by David Dod, of Elizabethtown, New Jersey. It is worth while to interrupt the narrative to consider these two facts. At the beginning of the century mechanics had been so scarce in the nation that Stevens had to train men for his work. But in 1819 mechanics and shops fitted for engine building were found not only in the larger cities but in some of the smaller towns close to navigable waters. That these shops had been brought into existence through the mechanical progress--perhaps it may be called the mechanical awakening--that was due to the success of steam navigation is beyond question. Many machine shops had been built, and were profitably employed. They not only built engines, but other tools for many kinds of work. The day when a British consul like Bond could hamper the progress of American manufactures by reëxporting tools made in England was passing.

The paddle-wheels fitted to the new ship for use on the Atlantic were made of iron. They had eight radial arms, each so arranged (according to Preble) that they could be folded up like a fan and laid inboard when the ship was under sail; for her sailing rig was retained.

Leaving New York on March 28, 1819, under Captain Rogers, this ship (she was named _Savannah_) ran to her home port in eight days and fifteen hours, during which she used steam for forty-one and a half hours. On May 24 she sailed for Liverpool, and made the passage in twenty-seven days, during which she used steam for eighty hours. While off the coast of Ireland the crew of a revenue cutter that saw her supposed she was on fire, and made haste to go to her assistance. In a trip from Liverpool to St. Petersburg, Russia, occupying, with stops at ports on the way, thirty-three days, she was under steam ten days. She finally arrived back at Savannah on November 30, and then went to New York, where her machinery was removed and sold.

The Savannah was what would now be called an auxiliary steamer; steam was used when the wind did not serve. She failed to inaugurate steam traffic across the Atlantic chiefly because of the space occupied by fuel--wood.

Although Captain R. B. Forbes, one of the ablest seamen the nation ever produced, built an auxiliary steamer (the _Massachusetts_) in 1845, that made profitable voyages, and there were features of the system that make it seem very attractive for certain trades, few vessels of the class have ever been used.

The year 1819 is also memorable because of an effort to establish a line of steamers running from New York to New Orleans, with stops at Charleston, South Carolina, and Havana, Cuba, on the way. The line was maintained for five years, and then withdrawn because it could not be made to pay.

In 1819, too, a ship was put on the route between Mobile and New Orleans, but this was also a failure.

In 1822 the steamer _New York_ began to ply between New York and Norfolk, but she was unable to compete with the sailing packets. The steamer _Patent_, that began making regular voyages between Boston and Maine ports in 1823, also failed to pay dividends.

Not to add details of this kind, it may be said that while fortunes were made in steamboats plying on inland waters of the United States, almost every venture made with American steamers upon the ocean during the thirty years following the _Clermont's_ first trip on the Hudson proved unprofitable. In connection with this dismal record the story of the steamer _Home_, built for the trade between New York and Charleston, South Carolina, is instructive. Keeping in mind the fact that this steamer was designed to round Cape Hatteras, where the worst storms on the coast were known to rage, consider these facts: the _Home_ was 212 feet long by 22 wide and 12 deep. She was nearly 18 times as long as she was deep, and she was built of wood, at that. The engine, which was placed near the centre, as usual, had a cylinder 56 inches in diameter, with a stroke of 9 feet, and that is to say it was enormously heavy for a hull of such proportions. A set of iron braces was provided on each side to strengthen the hull, but on the first trip they "broke loose from their sockets on deck at their forward ends, by the elastic movement of the vessel in a heavy sea," as W. C. Redfield, a New York engineer, said in describing the vessel.

Two voyages were made with no greater visible injury than the breaking, on each voyage, of the worthless braces. On November 9, 1837, as the _Home_ was bound on her third voyage, she was overtaken by a northeast gale, and shortly after passing the Hatteras shoals, it was found that the "elastic movement" of the hull, which, according to Engineer Redfield, was "necessarily and properly manifested," had opened an uncontrollable leak. The _Home_ was then driven on the beach, where she at once went to pieces. About a hundred lives were lost.

It is important to note here that Engineer Redfield, in writing his defence of the _Home_ (1842), was entirely sincere. Further than that, the owners of the vessel were so confident that she was of a proper model in all respects that the only insurance they carried upon her was for a small sum to secure a creditor.

From this story, and others of the kind to be found in the records, it appears that, while American designers were then building sailing ships and inland-water steamers that were highly profitable, they were astonishingly ignorant of the requirements of a steamship for deep-sea navigation.

In a search for the reasons for this curious condition of affairs it is found that the success of the inland-water steamers was the primary cause of the American failure at sea. The men who designed the sea-going steamers had been trained in their art by designing, first of all, steamers for inland waters. Because these inland-water steamers succeeded so well, it was entirely natural that similar proportions should be given to the engines that were to be used upon deep water. It was also natural to model the hulls as nearly as possible like the hulls on smooth waters. At the same time it was believed, incredible as the statement may seem now, that an "elastic" hull--one that bends to the lift of the waves as a rope does--was not only swifter but safer than a stiff one.

A paragraph as to the durability of the inland-water steamers will now prove instructive. In the report of Israel D. Andrews on "Colonial and Lake Trade" (Sen. Ex. Doc. 112, 32 Cong. 1 Sess.), it is said (p. 665) that "the period of the natural life of a steamboat" in use on the inland waters of the United States at that time (1851) was only "three and a half to four years." This statement included the steamers in use on the Great Lakes, which had much longer lives than those on the rivers.

With all these facts in mind, one sees why the deep-water American steamers failed. Led on by the success of the river steamers, the designers turned out engines of the lightest possible weight consistent with the greatest power, and then bolted them fast to the frames of hulls that were "elastic"--would yield to the waves like a rope. Not many of these steamers went to pieces as the _Home_ did; good seamanship saved them from that fate; but neither good seamanship nor any economy practised afloat or ashore could make them pay dividends in the face of the enormous expense due to the wear and tear of machinery. Machinery built for speed could pay dividends on the inland waters because the steamers had no competition except that which they created among themselves, and that lasted for short periods only. The only competitors on the river-banks were stage-coaches and big wagons that were driven over the worst roads in the civilized world. The inland-water steamers charged what prices they pleased. At sea the steamers with their unfit machinery had to compete with the swiftest, most comfortable, and in every way the most economical sailing packets in the world. And until the designers had learned the requirements of a sea-going steamship, the sailing packets won.