“Killingworth Colliery,
June 28, 1821.“Robert Stevenson, Esq.
“Sir,—With this you will receive three copies of a specification of a patent malleable iron rail invented by John Birkinshaw of Bedlington, near Morpeth. The hints were got from your Report on Railways, which you were so kind as to send me by favour of Mr. Cookson some time ago. Your reference to Tindal Fell Railway led the inventor to make some experiments on malleable iron bars, the result of which convinced him of the superiority of the malleable over the cast iron—so much so, that he took out a patent. Those rails are so much liked in this neighbourhood, that I think in a short time they will do away the cast iron railways. They make a fine line for our engines, as there are so few joints compared with the other. I have lately started a new locomotive engine, with some improvements on the others which you saw. It has far surpassed my expectations. I am confident a railway on which my engines can work is far superior to a canal. On a long and favourable railway I would stent my engines to travel 60 miles per day with from 40 to 60 tons of goods. They would work nearly fourfold cheaper than horses where coals are not very costly. I merely make these observations, as I know you have been at more trouble than any man I know of in searching into the utility of railways, and I return you my sincere thanks for your favour by Mr. Cookson.
“If you should be in this neighbourhood, I hope you would not pass Killingworth Colliery, as I should be extremely glad if you could spend a day or two with me.—I am, Sir, yours most respectfully,
“G. Stephenson.”
CHAPTER VIII.
HARBOURS AND RIVERS.
1811–1843.
There is scarcely a harbour or river in Scotland about which, at some time, Mr. Stevenson was not asked to give his advice. His opinion was also sought in England and Ireland, and he executed works of greater or less extent in many of the cases in which he was consulted.
We may select from his reports the names of Dundee, Aberdeen, Peterhead, Stonehaven, Granton, Fraserburgh, Ardrossan, Port-Patrick; the rivers Forth, Tay, Severn, Mersey, Dee, Ribble, Wear, Tees, and Erne, as among some of the many places in the United Kingdom where he was employed.
In a subsequent chapter extracts will be found illustrating Mr. Stevenson’s views on various professional subjects, and from these it will be seen that he brought his large experience and study of the waves to bear advantageously and practically on his harbour engineering. He was, as will be gathered from the extracts, at an early period fully alive to the value of spending basins for tranquillising a harbour, and of the proper disposition of the covering piers, in reference to the line of exposure, so as to avoid throwing sea into the harbour’s mouth, or causing it to heap up on coming in contact with the piers; while, as regards rivers, he was no less alive to the value of backwater in keeping open estuaries, and to the necessity of removing all obstructions to the free flow of the tide in river-navigation.
At an early date, for example, Mr. Stevenson and Mr. Price were jointly consulted as to the navigation of the Tees, and I am indebted to Mr. John Fowler of Stockton, the engineer to the Tees Navigation, for the following statement as to the result of that joint reference:—
“The Navigation Company consulted Mr. Stevenson and Mr. H. Price, who differed in opinion as to the general treatment of the river. Mr. Price recommended that it should be contracted by jetties, and Mr. Stevenson that the banks should be faced with continuous walls, stating as his reason for this recommendation, that ‘to project numerous jetties into the river, I regard as inexpedient, being a dangerous encumbrance to navigation, and tending to disturb the currents and destroy the uniformity of the bottom.’ The plan adopted by the Navigation Company was, however, that of Mr. Price; and jetties were constructed on the river to a large extent,” and Mr. Fowler adds, that “after a trial of twenty-seven years it was found that they were liable to all the objections that had been urged against them by Mr. Stevenson.”
Accordingly, under Mr. Fowler’s direction, the whole of the jetties have been removed.
One of the early harbour schemes in which my father was engaged in England, was a harbour at Wallasey Pool, on the Mersey, in which he acted in conjunction with Telford and Nimmo. The following reports will show the nature and extent of work then contemplated as a commencement of the Birkenhead Docks, now so valuable an adjunct to the port of Liverpool. But at the early period of 1828, when the reports were written, the public were not prepared to entertain a scheme of improvement based on so great a scale. It included, as will be seen, not only the formation of a floating harbour at Wallasey on the Mersey, but the construction of a harbour at Helbre on the Dee, with a connecting ship canal between the two estuaries.