CHAPTER IV.
THE OCEAN RACE.
“Thisis the very opportunity I have been wanting!”
The speaker was looking at a paper setting forth that the British Government were open to consider contracts for the carrying of the letters by steamships between Great Britain and America. Encouraged, no doubt, by the success attending the conveyance of the mails by similar means to the Peninsula, the Government were now going farther afield.
The practicability of ocean steam traffic had been amply demonstrated; but some of those early steamships did not “pay,” and to that test, after all, such undertakings must come. Now, the man into whose hands the circular had fallen was of great intelligence and remarkable energy. He was a merchant and owner of ships, and agent for the East India Company at Halifax, Nova Scotia. His name has since become known the wide world over. It was Samuel Cunard.
Apparently he had cherished the idea of establishing transatlantic steam traffic for some years—since 1830 it is said—and now, here was the opportunity. The British Government would, of course, give a handsome sum for carrying the mails, and that sum would form a backbone to the enterprise.
Over came Cunard to London in 1838. Mr. Melvill, the secretary of the East India Company, gave him a letter of introduction to Mr. Robert Napier, the eminent engineer at Glasgow. Thither then went the indomitable merchant, and was heartily welcomed. Napier knew Mr. George Burns, who was partner with Mr. David MacIver in a coasting trade, and the upshot of the matter was that capital of considerably overa quarter of a million (£270,000) was subscribed through Mr. Burns’s influence.
The first great step thus taken, Mr. Cunard made a good offer to the Government, and although another offer was made by the owners of theGreat Western, Cunard got the contract, the tender being regarded as much more favourable. The subsidy was eventually £81,000 per annum. The contract was for seven years, and was signed by the three gentlemen mentioned—Cunard, Burns, and MacIver.
These three divided the labour. Cunard ruled at London, MacIver at Liverpool, and Burns at Glasgow. Napier was to engine the new vessels. It was decided that their names were all to end in “ia,” and nearly every one of the now historic fleet has rejoiced in a title of that ending. There is a sailor’s superstition that it is unlucky if the vessels of a fleet are not named with some uniformity; but we doubt if the superstition influenced the Cunard Company. In any case, they broke another superstition by starting their first ship on a Friday! She was a mail ship, and she had to go. The Cunard Company meant business.
But about their fleet. Their first order was for four vessels, all of about the same size and power. TheBritanniawas the first, and her sisters were theCaledonia, theColumbia, and theAcadia. They were paddle steamers, the value of the screw not having then been clearly and widely demonstrated, all of them about 207 feet long, 35⅓ feet broad, 22½ feet deep, and 1154 tons burthen. The engines—side-lever, of course, in those days—were of 740 horse-power. The boilers had return-flues, and were heated by a dozen furnaces.
They would look now quite out of fashion, like a lady’s dress of a past age. They appeared something like sailing ships, with the straight funnels added.
TheBritanniabegan the service by starting from Liverpool on the 4th of July, 1840, and, attaining a speed of about 8½ knots per hour, she made the passageto Halifax in 12 days, 10 hours, and returned in 10 days. Her average consumption of fuel was about thirty-eight tons daily.
The Bostonians gave theBritanniaquite an ovation. A grand banquet, followed by speeches, celebrated the great occasion. But they gave even more practical appreciation of their favour subsequently, for when, in the winter season, the vessel became ice-bound in the harbour, they cut a seven-mile passage for her through the ice, at their own cost.
The Cunarders were successful, and the conveyance of the mails by steamship became quite established. The white-winged clipper ships fought hard against the Cunarders, but they had to yield. Three years later the Company put another vessel on the route—theHibernia—and in 1845 theCambria. These were of greater size and developed a little better speed than their forerunners. It has always been the policy of the owners to improve their ships as they went on building, and even thus early that policy ruled.
The establishment of the Cunard Company marks a most important step in ocean steam navigation. Further, in the same year, 1840, in which the Cunarders began to run, the Pacific Steam Navigation Company was established. Ten years later saw the foundation of the Collins and the Inman Lines. The Collins, an American Line, boasted that they would run “the Cunarders off the Atlantic.” They were very fine vessels, and they were the first fleet to fully adopt the upright stem and discard the bowsprit. But the Cunarders were ready for the fierce competition. They had actually put on six new vessels, and their new postal contract of 1847 had stipulated for a weekly, instead of a fortnightly service; while the subsidy was much increased. It was to be £173,340 annually instead of £81,000.
THE ICE-BOUND “BRITANNIA” AT BOSTON.By permission of The Cunard Steamship Co.
THE ICE-BOUND “BRITANNIA” AT BOSTON.
By permission of The Cunard Steamship Co.
The echoes of that fierce struggle between the Cunarders’ and the Collins’ boats have now died away, or have been quite lost in the other clamorous cries ofthat wonder of the world, the development of the transatlantic steamship traffic; but apparently partisanship ran very high. The Collins’ seem to have been slightly the faster vessels, coming from America in 9 days 17 hours, but occupying nearly two more days to return. Alas, disaster overtook them. TheArcticperished by collision; thePacificwas lost at sea, and no one knows the story of her death, for she was never heard of more. Bad management, and extravagance surged over the remaining vessels, and the fine ships went as old iron!
But the Inman line had also begun to run, about 1850. These ships, like theGreat Britain, were built of iron and propelled by a screw. The first was theCity of Glasgow, and several famous “Cities” followed; though years afterwards the Inman line became the “American,” and the appellation “City” was dropped, the ships being simply known asParis,New York,Berlin, etc. The Inman line had the distinction of being the first, apart from theGreat Britain, to use iron screw steamers regularly on the Atlantic. Other lines soon followed, the Anchor, the Allan, and the Guion, while the Cunarders, not to be beaten, came along in due course with iron and screw steamers.
But great changes were at hand. To mark these changes let us look at what may be called the culminating ship of the old type of steamers—theGreat Eastern.
This historical vessel was the largest ever built. She was 680 feet long, by 83 feet broad, and her hull was 60 feet high, 70 feet including bulwarks. But the steam pressure of her engines was only from 15 to 25 lbs. She was fitted with both screw-propeller and paddle wheels. Her screw-propeller engines were of 4000 indicated horse-power, and paddle of 2600, but they could together work up to 11,000 horse-power.
Commenced at Millwall early in 1854, she was not launched until near upon four years later. The launching itself was a difficult and expensive business, costing£60,000, and only effected after various attempts extending over nearly three months. The total cost of the vessel has been estimated at £732,000.
ISAMBARD KINGDOM BRUNEL.By permission of Messrs. Graves & Co.
ISAMBARD KINGDOM BRUNEL.
By permission of Messrs. Graves & Co.
It will be seen at once that so large an outlay required an immense business to yield a satisfactory return, and indeed, financial difficulties hampered hersuccess almost from the very commencement, even before she was launched.
She was planned, in 1852, by the great engineer, I. K. Brunel, and by Scott Russell. In the life of Brunel by his son, it is stated:—“It was, no doubt, his connection with the Australian Mail Company that led Mr. Brunel to work out into practical shape the idea of a great ship for the Indian or Australian service.”
The Eastern Steam Navigation Company desired a vessel to trade to Australia and back, large enough to carry a sufficiency of coal for the outward and homeward journey, and yet to have space for a goodly number of passengers and a bulky amount of cargo.
That was the idea, and we perhaps can hardly realise what a difficulty this question of coal carrying capacity was in those days, before the problem had been solved by high-pressure steam boilers, triple expansion engines, improved condensation, and quick passages. Even so great a philosopher as Dr. Lardner could not believe in 1835 that a steamship could voyage from Liverpool to New York without stopping—we presume for fresh fuel.
TheGreat Eastern, therefore, was planned to carry 15,000 tons of coal; whereas now the large Atlantic linerParisneeds only 2700 tons for her Atlantic trip. The difference is most striking, for theParisis one of the largest steamships afloat, but her working steam pressure is 150 lbs. instead of the 15 or 25 lbs. of theGreat Eastern.
This immense vessel was also planned to carry some 5000 persons, or about 500 less if any large number were to require state-rooms, and finally she was to convey 5000 tons of cargo. The idea of water-tight compartments was anticipated in her case, even to the extent of longitudinal ones, and she had half-a-dozen masts of which five were of iron.
When at length she was launched, the directors’ minds misgave them as to an Australian trip, and they determined to cross the Atlantic instead, for a trialvoyage. She started on the 8th of September, 1859, but alas! when off Hastings some steam pipes burst. Several persons were killed and wounded, and the voyage ended at Portland.
Next year she tried again and crossed in eleven days, after which she made several voyages with success—on one occasion conveying soldiers to Canada. Unfortunately for the owners, however, she did not pay.
Then in 1865 she began to be engaged in submarine telegraph work, by which she will most likely be best remembered, and two years later she was chartered to convey passengers from America to Havre for the French Exhibition, but this scheme failed.
Then for some years from 1869 she was successfully engaged in cable-laying, in the Red Sea, the Atlantic, and the Mediterranean, etc., after which she came down to be a coal hulk in 1884, stationed at Gibraltar.
At length she was sold for £26,200 at London, by auction, and was on view in the Thames, and also in the Mersey. At this latter river her huge sides were used as an advertising “board” for a Liverpool business house. Again in November, 1888, she was sold by auction, this time for breaking up, and it is said that the total proceeds of the sale which lasted five days was £58,000, more than double what she had previously brought!
“A ship before her time,” says some one, thinking of the huge vessels of the last decade of the nineteenth century. That is true, but the immense space required for coal, and her low-pressure engines, had also something to do with her comparative failure. The problem which theGreat Easternfailed to solve has been met in other ways—viz., by the use of high-pressure steam and compound, triple-expansion and even quadruple-expansion engines. That is, the steam, working at 150 or 160 lbs. pressure, instead of the 25 lbs. of theGreat Eastern, is passed through two, three, and even four cylinders respectively, and the economy in coal consumption is astounding. Thus the use of tripleexpansion engines has brought the saving in coal down from 4 lbs. per indicated horse-power to less than 1½ lbs.
There have been many other improvements also, such as the use of steel instead of iron, the parts being thus stronger and yet lighter; the circular tubular boiler enabling high-pressure steam to be economically produced and maintained; the use of surface condensers, by which the exhaust steam is quickly reduced to water and returned to a “hot well” ready for the boilers, to be speedily again raised to high pressure steam; and a forced draught by which the furnaces are made to roar furiously and heat the water in the boilers speedily.
THE “GREAT EASTERN.”
THE “GREAT EASTERN.”
But these things were not all attained in a day. The introduction of the compound marine engines in 1854-56 by John Elder, marks the first great step of the new departure. In 1856 he engined vessels for thePacific Steam Navigation Company, on the compound principle, which proved very satisfactory.
Again in 1870, the appearance of the White Star linerOceanic, marked a new development. Her yacht-like shape, great length, and general symmetry of form commenced a marked change in Atlantic liners.
It was in 1867 that Mr. T. H. Ismay bought the interest of the managing owner of the White Star line—a set of sailing clippers, dating from the rush to the Australian gold diggings—and began to introduce iron vessels instead of wooden clipper ships. In 1869 he established the Oceanic Steam Navigation Company—popularly known as the White Star—and was later on joined by Mr. William Imrie. The Company was started with so much wisdom and boldness that the £1000 shares were privately taken up at once. The order for the new steamers was given to Harland & Wolff, of Belfast, because, it is said, an influential share-holder had had satisfactory dealings with them before.
TheOceanicwas of 3600 tons burthen, and with engines of 3000 horse-power. The accommodation for first-class passengers was placed amidships, where the motion of the vessel is said to be felt the least, and altogether she embodied improvements which made her the type of many of the Atlantic passenger ships since. The earlier White Stars were fitted with compound engines, and reduced the passage to about 8½ days.
But when the White StarsGermanicandBritannicappeared in 1877, then a marked advance indeed was made in the Atlantic record. TheBritannicastonished the world by speeding from Queenstown to New York in 7 days, 10 hours, and 50 minutes, and since then she has beaten her own record. Her sister shipGermanicalso did as well, and the fierce race for the blue ribbon of the Atlantic may be said to have begun.
It was even prophesied that the time across the water might be reduced to six days. How has that been fulfilled?