Men of Invention and Industry

S >> Samuel Smiles >> Men of Invention and Industry

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MEN OF INVENTION AND INDUSTRY

by Samuel Smiles

"Men there have been, ignorant of letters; without art, without
eloquence; who yet had the wisdom to devise and the courage to
perform that which they lacked language to explain. Such men
have worked the deliverance of nations and their own greatness.
Their hearts are their books; events are their tutors; great
actions are their eloquence."--MACAULAY.

Contents.

Preface

CHAPTER I Phineas Pett:
Beginings of English Shipbuilding

CHAPTER II Francis Pettit Smith:
Practical introducer of the Screw Propeller

CHAPTER III John Harrison:
Inventor of the Marine Chronometer

CHAPTER IV John Lombe:
Introducer of the Silk Industry into England

CHAPTER V William Murdock:
His Life and Inventions

CHAPTER VI Frederick Koenig:
Inventor of the Steam-printing Machine

CHAPTER VII The Walters of 'The Times':
Inventor of the Walter Press

CHAPTER VIII William Clowes:
Book-printing by Steam

CHAPTER IX Charles Bianconi:
A lession of Self-Help in Ireland

CHAPTER X Industry in Ireland:
Through Connaught and Ulster to Belfast

CHAPTER XI Shipbuilding in Belfast:
By Sir E. J. Harland, Engineer and Shipbuilder

CHAPTER XII Astronomers and students in humble life:
A new Chapter in the 'Pursuit of Knowledge under Difficulties'

PREFACE

I offer this book as a continuation of the memoirs of men of
invention and industry published some years ago in the 'Lives of
Engineers,' 'Industrial Biography,' and 'Self-Help.'

The early chapters relate to the history of a very important
branch of British industry--that of Shipbuilding. A later
chapter, kindly prepared by Sir Edward J. Harland, of Belfast,
relates to the origin and progress of shipbuilding in Ireland.

Many of the facts set forth in the Life and Inventions of William
Murdock have already been published in my 'Lives of Boulton and
Watt;" but these are now placed in a continuous narrative, and
supplemented by other information, more particularly the
correspondence between Watt and Murdock, communicated to me by
the present representative of the family, Mr. Murdock, C.E, of
Gilwern, near Abergavenny.

I have also endeavoured to give as accurate an account as
possible of the Invention of the Steam-printing Press, and its
application to the production of Newspapers and Books,--an
invention certainly of great importance to the spread of
knowledge, science, and literature, throughout the world.

The chapter on the "Industry of Ireland" will speak for itself.
It occurred to me, on passing through Ireland last year, that
much remained to be said on that subject; and, looking to the
increasing means of the country, and the well-known industry of
its people, it seems reasonable to expect, that with peace,
security, energy, and diligent labour of head and hand, there is
really a great future before Ireland.

The last chapter, on "Astronomers in Humble Life," consists for
the most part of a series of Autobiographies. It may seem, at
first sight, to have little to do with the leading object of the
book; but it serves to show what a number of active, earnest, and
able men are comparatively hidden throughout society, ready to
turn their hands and heads to the improvement of their own
characters, if not to the advancement of the general community
of which they form a part.

In conclusion, I say to the reader, as Quarles said in the
preface to his 'Emblems,' "I wish thee as much pleasure in the
reading as I had in the writing." In fact, the last three
chapters were in some measure the cause of the book being
published in its present form.

London, November, 1884.

CHAPTER I.

PHINEAS PETT: BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH SHIP-BUILDING.

"A speck in the Northern Ocean, with a rocky coast, an ungenial
climate, and a soil scarcely fruitful,--this was the material
patrimony which descended to the English race--an inheritance
that would have been little worth but for the inestimable moral
gift that accompanied it. Yes; from Celts, Saxons, Danes,
Normans--from some or all of them--have come down with English
nationality a talisman that could command sunshine, and plenty,
and empire, and fame. The 'go' which they transmitted to us--the
national vis--this it is which made the old Angle-land a glorious
heritage. Of this we have had a portion above our brethren--good
measure, running over. Through this our island-mother has
stretched out her arms till they enriched the globe of the
earth....Britain, without her energy and enterprise, what would
she be in Europe?"--Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine (1870).

In one of the few records of Sir Isaac Newton's life which he
left for the benefit of others, the following comprehensive
thought occurs:

"It is certainly apparent that the inhabitants of this world are
of a short date, seeing that all arts, as letters, ships,
printing, the needle, &c., were discovered within the memory of
history."

If this were true in Newton's time, how much truer is it now.
Most of the inventions which are so greatly influencing, as well
as advancing, the civilization of the world at the present time,
have been discovered within the last hundred or hundred and fifty
years. We do not say that man has become so much wiser during
that period; for, though he has grown in Knowledge, the most
fruitful of all things were said by "the heirs of all the ages"
thousands of years ago.

But as regards Physical Science, the progress made during the
last hundred years has been very great. Its most recent triumphs
have been in connection with the discovery of electric power and
electric light. Perhaps the most important invention, however,
was that of the working steam engine, made by Watt only about a
hundred years ago. The most recent application of this form of
energy has been in the propulsion of ships, which has already
produced so great an effect upon commerce, navigation, and the
spread of population over the world.

Equally important has been the influence of the Railway--now the
principal means of communication in all civilized countries.
This invention has started into full life within our own time.
The locomotive engine had for some years been employed in the
haulage of coals; but it was not until the opening of the
Liverpool and Manchester Railway in 1830, that the importance of
the invention came to be acknowledged. The locomotive railway
has since been everywhere adopted throughout Europe. In America,
Canada, and the Colonies, it has opened up the boundless
resources of the soil, bringing the country nearer to the towns,
and the towns to the country. It has enhanced the celerity of
time, and imparted a new series of conditions to every rank of
life.

The importance of steam navigation has been still more recently
ascertained. When it was first proposed, Sir Joseph Banks,
President of the Royal Society, said: "It is a pretty plan, but
there is just one point overlooked: that the steam-engine
requires a firm basis on which to work." Symington, the
practical mechanic, put this theory to the test by his successful
experiments, first on Dalswinton Lake, and then on the Forth and
Clyde Canal. Fulton and Bell afterwards showed the power of
steamboats in navigating the rivers of America and Britain.

After various experiments, it was proposed to unite England and
America by steam. Dr. Lardner, however, delivered a lecture
before the Royal Institution in 1838, "proving" that steamers
could never cross the Atlantic, because they could not carry
sufficient coal to raise steam enough during the voyage. But
this theory was also tested by experience in the same year, when
the Sirius, of London, left Cork for New York, and made the
passage in nineteen days. Four days after the departure of the
Sirius, the Great Western left Bristol for New York, and made the
passage in thirteen days five hours.[1] The problem was solved;
and great ocean steamers have ever since passed in continuous
streams between the shores of England and America.

In an age of progress, one invention merely paves the way for
another. The first steamers were impelled by means of paddle
wheels; but these are now almost entirely superseded by the
screw. And this, too, is an invention almost of yesterday. It
was only in 1840 that the Archimedes was fitted as a screw yacht.

A few years later, in 1845, the Great Britain, propelled by the
screw, left Liverpool for New York, and made the voyage in
fourteen days. The screw is now invariably adopted in all long
ocean voyages.

It is curious to look back, and observe the small beginnings of
maritime navigation. As regards this country, though its
institutions are old, modern England is still young. As respects
its mechanical and scientific achievements, it is the youngest of
all countries. Watt's steam engine was the beginning of our
manufacturing supremacy; and since its adoption, inventions and
discoveries in Art and Science, within the last hundred years,
have succeeded each other with extraordinary rapidity. In 1814
there was only one steam vessel in Scotland; while England
possessed none at all. Now, the British mercantile steam-ships
number about 5000, with about 4 millions of aggregate tonnage.[2]

In olden times this country possessed the materials for great
things, as well as the men fitted to develope them into great
results. But the nation was slow to awake and take advantage of
its opportunities. There was no enterprise, no commerce--no "go"
in the people. The roads were frightfully bad; and there was
little communication between one part of the country and another.

If anything important had to be done, we used to send for
foreigners to come and teach us how to do it. We sent for them
to drain our fens, to build our piers and harbours, and even to
pump our water at London Bridge. Though a seafaring population
lived round our coasts, we did not fish our own seas, but left it
to the industrious Dutchmen to catch the fish, and supply our
markets. It was not until the year 1787 that the Yarmouth people
began the deep-sea herring fishery; and yet these were the most
enterprising amongst the English fishermen.

English commerce also had very slender beginnings. At the
commencement of the fifteenth century, England was of very little
account in the affairs of Europe. Indeed, the history of modern
England is nearly coincident with the accession of the Tudors to
the throne. With the exception of Calais and Dunkirk, her
dominions on the Continent had been wrested from her by the
French. The country at home had been made desolate by the Wars
of the Roses. The population was very small, and had been kept
down by war, pestilence, and famine.[3] The chief staple was
wool, which was exported to Flanders in foreign ships, there to
be manufactured into cloth. Nearly every article of importance
was brought from abroad; and the little commerce which existed
was in the hands of foreigners. The seas were swept by
privateers, little better than pirates, who plundered without
scruple every vessel, whether friend or foe, which fell in their
way.

The British navy has risen from very low beginnings. The English
fleet had fallen from its high estate since the reign of Edward
III., who won a battle from the French and Flemings in 1340, with
260 ships; but his vessels were all of moderate size, being
boats, yachts, and caravels, of very small tonnage. According to
the contemporary chronicles, Weymouth, Fowey, Sandwich, and
Bristol, were then of nearly almost as much importance as
London;[4] which latter city only furnished twenty-five vessels,
with 662 mariners.

The Royal Fleet began in the reign of Henry VII. Only six or
seven vessels then belonged to the King, the largest being the
Grace de Dieu, of comparatively small tonnage. The custom then
was, to hire ships from the Venetians, the Genoese, the Hanse
towns, and other trading people; and as soon as the service for
which the vessels so hired was performed, they were dismissed.

When Henry VIII. ascended the throne in 1509, he directed his
attention to the state of the navy. Although the insular
position of England was calculated to stimulate the art of
shipbuilding more than in most continental countries, our best
ships long continued to be built by foreigners. Henry invited
from abroad, especially from Italy, where the art of shipbuilding
had made the greatest progress, as many skilful artists and
workmen as he could procure, either by the hope of gain, or the
high honours and distinguished countenance which he paid them.
"By incorporating," says Charnock, "these useful persons among
his own subjects, he soon formed a corps sufficient to rival
those states which had rendered themselves most distinguished by
their knowledge in this art; so that the fame of Genoa and
Venice, which had long excited the envy of the greater part of
Europe, became suddenly transferred to the shores of Britain."[5]

In fitting out his fleet, we find Henry disbursing large sums to
foreigners for shipbuilding, for "harness" or armour, and for
munitions of all sorts. The State Papers[6] particularize the
amounts paid to Lewez de la Fava for "harness;" to William Gurre,
"bregandy-maker;" and to Leonard Friscobald for "almayn ryvetts."

Francis de Errona, a Spaniard, supplied the gunpowder. Among the
foreign mechanics and artizans employed were Hans Popenruyter,
gunfounder of Mechlin; Robert Sakfeld, Robert Skorer, Fortuno de
Catalenago, and John Cavelcant. On one occasion 2,797L. 19s. 4
1/2d. was disbursed for guns and grindstones. This sum must be
multiplied by about four, to give the proper present value.
Popenruyter seems to have been the great gunfounder of the age;
he supplied the principal guns and gun stores for the English
navy, and his name occurs in every Ordnance account of the
series, generally for sums of the largest amounts.

Henry VIII. was the first to establish Royal dockyards, first at
Woolwich, then at Portsmouth, and thirdly at Deptford, for the
erection and repair of ships. Before then, England had been
principally dependent upon Dutchmen and Venetians, both for ships
of war and merchantmen. The sovereign had neither naval arsenals
nor dockyards, nor any regular establishment of civil or naval
affairs to provide ships of war. Sir Edward Howard, Lord High
Admiral of England, at the accession of Henry VIII., actually
entered into a "contract" with that monarch to fight his enemies.

This singular document is still preserved in the State Paper
office. Even after the establishment of royal dockyards, the
sovereign--as late as the reign of Elizabeth--entered into formal
contracts with shipwrights for the repair and maintenance of
ships, as well as for additions to the fleet.

The King, having made his first effort at establishing a royal
navy, sent the fleet to sea against the ships of France. The
Regent was the ship royal, with Sir Thomas Knivet, Master of the
Horse, and Sir John Crew of Devonshire, as Captains. The fleet
amounted to twenty-five well furnished ships. The French fleet
were thirty-nine in number. They met in Brittany Bay, and had a
fierce fight. The Regent grappled with a great carack of Brest;
the French, on the English boarding their ship, set fire to the
gunpowder, and both ships were blown up, with all their men. The
French fleet fled, and the English kept the seas. The King,
hearing of the loss of the Regent, caused a great ship to be
built, the like of which had never before been seen in England,
and called it Harry Grace de Dieu.

This ship was constructed by foreign artizans, principally by
Italians, and was launched in 1515. She was said to be of a
thousand tons portage --the largest ship in England. The vessel
was four-masted, with two round tops on each mast, except the
shortest mizen. She had a high forecastle and poop, from which
the crew could shoot down upon the deck or waist of another
vessel. The object was to have a sort of castle at each end of
the ship. This style of shipbuilding was doubtless borrowed from
the Venetians, then the greatest naval power in Europe. The
length of the masts, the height of the ship above the water's
edge, and the ornaments and decorations, were better adapted for
the stillness of the Adriatic and Mediterranean Seas, than for
the boisterous ocean of the northern parts of Europe.[7] The
story long prevailed that "the Great Harry swept a dozen flocks
of sheep off the Isle of Man with her bob-stay." An American
gentleman (N.B. Anderson, LL.D., Boston) informed the present
author that this saying is still proverbial amongst the United
States sailors.

The same features were reproduced in merchant ships. Most of
them were suited for defence, to prevent the attacks of pirates,
which swarmed the seas round the coast at that time.
Shipbuilding by the natives in private shipyards was in a
miserable condition. Mr. Willet, in his memoir relative to the
navy, observes: "It is said, and I believe with truth, that at
this time (the middle of the sixteenth century) there was not a
private builder between London Bridge and Gravesend, who could
lay down a ship in the mould left from a Navy Board's draught,
without applying to a tinker who lived in Knave's Acre."[8]

Another ship of some note built at the instance of Henry VIII.
was the Mary Rose, of the portage of 500 tons. We find her in
the "pond at Deptford" in 1515. Seven years later, in the
thirtieth year of Henry VIII.'s reign, she was sent to sea, with
five other English ships of war, to protect such commerce as then
existed from the depredations of the French and Scotch pirates.
The Mary Rose was sent many years later (in 1544) with the
English fleet to the coast of France, but returned with the rest
of the fleet to Portsmouth without entering into any engagement.
While laid at anchor, not far from the place where the Royal
George afterwards went down, and the ship was under repair, her
gun-ports being very low when she was laid over, "the shipp
turned, the water entered, and sodainly she sanke."

What was to be done? There were no English engineers or workmen
who could raise the ship. Accordingly, Henry VIII. sent to
Venice for assistance, and when the men arrived, Pietro de
Andreas was dispatched with the Venetian marines and carpenters
to raise the Mary Rose. Sixty English mariners were appointed to
attend upon them. The Venetians were then the skilled "heads,"
the English were only the "hands." Nevertheless they failed with
all their efforts; and it was not until the year 1836 that Mr.
Dean, the engineer, succeeded in raising not only the Royal
George, but the Mary Rose, and cleared the roadstead at
Portsmouth of the remains of the sunken ships.

When Elizabeth ascended the throne in 1558, the commerce and
navigation of England were still of very small amount. The
population of the kingdom amounted to only about five
millions--not much more than the population of London is now.
The country had little commerce, and what it had was still mostly
in the hands of foreigners. The Hanse towns had their large
entrepot for merchandise in Cannon Street, on the site of the
present Cannon Street Station. The wool was still sent abroad to
Flanders to be fashioned into cloth, and even garden produce was
principally imported from Holland. Dutch, Germans, Flemings,
French, and Venetians continued to be our principal workmen. Our
iron was mostly obtained from Spain and Germany. The best arms
and armour came from France and Italy. Linen was imported from
Flanders and Holland, though the best came from Rheims. Even the
coarsest dowlas, or sailcloth, was imported from the Low
Countries.

The royal ships continued to be of very small burthen, and the
mercantile ships were still smaller. The Queen, however, did
what she could to improve the number and burthen of our ships.
"Foreigners," says Camden, "stiled her the restorer of naval
glory and Queen of the Northern Seas." In imitation of the
Queen, opulent subjects built ships of force; and in course of
time England no longer depended upon Hamburg, Dantzic, Genoa, and
Venice, for her fleet in time of war.

Spain was then the most potent power in Europe, and the
Netherlands, which formed part of the dominions of Spain, was the
centre of commercial prosperity. Holland possessed above 800
good ships, of from 200 to 700 tons burthen, and above 600 busses
for fishing, of from 100 to 200 tons. Amsterdam and Antwerp were
in the heyday of their prosperity. Sometimes 500 great ships
were to be seen lying together before Amsterdam;[9] whereas
England at that time had not four merchant ships of 400 tons
each! Antwerp, however, was the most important city in the Low
Countries. It was no uncommon thing to see as many as 2500 ships
in the Scheldt, laden with merchandize. Sometimes 500 ships
would come and go from Antwerp in one day, bound to or returning
from the distant parts of the world. The place was immensely
rich, and was frequented by Spaniards, Germans, Danes, English,
Italians, and Portuguese the Spaniards being the most numerous.
Camden, in his history of Queen Elizabeth, relates that our
general trade with the Netherlands in 1564 amounted to twelve
millions of ducats, five millions of which was for English cloth
alone.

The religious persecutions of Philip II. of Spain and of Charles
IX. of France shortly supplied England with the population of
which she stood in need--active, industrious, intelligent
artizans. Philip set up the Inquisition in Flanders, and in a
few years more than 50,000 persons were deliberately murdered.
The Duchess of Parma, writing to Philip II. in 1567, informed him
that in a few days above 100,000 men had already left the country
with their money and goods, and that more were following every
day. They fled to Germany, to Holland, and above all to England,
which they hailed as Asylum Christi. The emigrants settled in
the decayed cities and towns of Canterbury, Norwich, Sandwich,
Colchester, Maidstone, Southampton, and many other places, where
they carried on their manufactures of woollen, linen, and silk,
and established many new branches of industry.[10]

Five years later, in 1572, the massacre of St. Bartholomew took
place in France, during which the Roman Catholic Bishop Perefixe
alleges that 100,000 persons were put to death because of their
religions opinions. All this persecution, carried on so near the
English shores, rapidly increased the number of foreign fugitives
into England, which was followed by the rapid advancement of the
industrial arts in this country.

The asylum which Queen Elizabeth gave to the persecuted
foreigners brought down upon her the hatred of Philip II. and
Charles IX. When they found that they could not prevent her
furnishing them with an asylum, they proceeded to compass her
death. She was excommunicated by the Pope, and Vitelli was hired
to assassinate her. Philip also proceeded to prepare the Sacred
Armada for the subjugation of the English nation, and he was
master of the most powerful army and navy in the world.

Modern England was then in the throes of her birth. She had not
yet reached the vigour of her youth, though she was full of life
and energy. She was about to become the England of free thought,
commerce, and manufactures; to plough the ocean with her navies,
and to plant her colonies over the earth. Up to the accession of
Elizabeth, she had done little, but now she was about to do much.

It was a period of sudden emancipation of thought, and of immense
fertility and originality. The poets and prose writers of the
time united the freshness of youth with the vigour of manhood.
Among these were Spenser, Shakespeare, Sir Philip Sidney, the
Fletchers, Marlowe, and Ben Jonson. Among the statesmen of
Elizabeth were Burleigh, Leicester, Walsingham, Howard, and Sir
Nicholas Bacon. But perhaps greatest of all were the sailors,
who, as Clarendon said, "were a nation by themselves;" and their
leaders--Drake, Frobisher, Cavendish, Hawkins, Howard, Raleigh,
Davis, and many more distinguished seamen.

They were the representative men of their time, the creation in a
great measure of the national spirit. They were the offspring of
long generations of seamen and lovers of the sea. They could not
have been great but for the nation which gave them birth, and
imbued them with their worth and spirit. The great sailors, for
instance, could not have originated in a nation of mere landsmen.

They simply took the lead in a country whose coasts were fringed
with sailors. Their greatness was but the result of an
excellence in seamanship which prevailed widely around them.

The age of English maritime adventure only began in the reign of
Elizabeth. England had then no colonies--no foreign possessions
whatever. The first of her extensive colonial possessions was
established in this reign. "Ships, colonies, and commerce "began
to be the national motto--not that colonies make ships and
commerce, but that ships and commerce make colonies. Yet what
cockle-shells of ships our pioneer navigators first sailed in!

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