Fulton was busily engaged in constructing steam vessels until he died in 1815. One of his efforts was the building of a steam war vessel; and so greatly were his efforts esteemed that both Houses of the United States Legislature testified their respect for him by wearing mourning apparel on the occasion of his death.
His work was developed by Mr. R. L. Stevens, whose father, indeed, had a steamer ready, only a few weeks after the success of the Clermont. Mr. R. L. Stevens came to grasp the idea that the form of the hull of steamships could be much improved by giving them fine lines instead of full round bows. Stevens, it is said, was able to obtain a speed of thirteen miles an hour; and he also, it is stated, used a different form of engine from that adopted by Fulton.
The engines of those early steamboats were, as a rule, a sort of beam engine. The famous Comet was engined in that manner. John Robertson, who actually set up the Comet’s engines, lived to place them subsequently in South Kensington Museum. A beam, or lever, which worked on a pivot at its centre, was placed between the piston on one side, and the connecting rod—which was fastened to the crank—on the other. Thus, one end of the beam, or lever, was attached to the piston rod, and the other to the end of the connecting rod which drove the crank and the wheel.
A development apparently of this beam-engine arrangement was the side-lever engine—a form of which marine engineers were also fond. The side lever seems, in fact, to have been a sort of double beam engine. The cylinder was placed upright, and a cross-piece was fixed to the end of the piston rod. From either end of this cross-piece a rod was connected with a beam or lever on either side of the machinery below. These levers worked on pivots at their centres, and their other ends were joined by a cross-piece united by a rod to the crank-shaft above. The idea in the side-lever engines appears to have been to obtain equal strength on both sides for each paddle wheel. Marine engineers did not apparently at first grasp the idea of a direct-acting engine—that is, simply one connecting rod between the piston and the crank which pulled round the wheel; perhaps the sizes and arrangements of those early steamboats did not permit of this. But in the development of the locomotive, the direct-acting engine did not appear at once. In any case, even the first vessels of the celebrated Cunard Line were of the cumbrous side-lever type.
Now, when Fulton had made his Clermont in 1807, and Bell had put his Comet on the Clyde, some of the English speaking people on both sides of the Atlantic began, we say, to see that there was a future before the new invention. In 1809, the Accommodation ploughed the waters of the great St. Lawrence, and two years later a steamer startled the dwellers on the mighty Mississippi. The Elizabeth also followed the Comet on the Clyde in 1813.
She was bigger than her predecessor, but only of thirty-three tons; she was fifty-eight feet long, and her engine of ten horse-power. She was built by the constructors of the Comet, Wood & Company, of Port-Glasgow, under the direction of Mr. Thompson, who had been connected with some of Bell’s experiments.
The next step was the introduction of steamers on the Thames. All things gravitate to London, steamboats among the rest. Passing by some experiments, in which the names of a Mr. Dawson and a Mr. Lawrence appear, we find that George Dodd brought a steamboat from the Clyde to the Thames by sea, using both sails and steam, about the year 1813 or 1814. It is said that Dawson had a steamer plying between London and Gravesend in 1813, and that Lawrence, of Bristol, after using a steamer on the Severn brought her through the canals to the Thames, but was obliged to take her back because of the antagonism of the watermen. It is said also that the Marjorie, built by William Denny, of Dumbarton, was brought to the Thames about 1815 in six days from Grangemouth, having been purchased by some London merchants.
However this may be, the name of George Dodd should take a high place, perhaps next to that of Bell, for the enterprise and effort he showed in seeking to establish steam vessels. His sphere was chiefly the Thames, though he appears to have been also animated with the idea of using them upon the sea. The vessel he brought round from the Clyde was named first the Glasgow and afterwards the Thames, and was of about seventy-five tons, with nine feet paddle-wheels, and some fourteen or sixteen horse-power. He had some rough weather in the Irish Sea, and an account of the voyage is given in his book on steamboats. This, presumably in 1813, was the first steamship voyage at sea, as distinguished from steamers’ voyages on rivers.
Such great progress had the introduction of steamboats made in 1818, that according to Dodd there were in that year eighteen on the Clyde, two on the Tay, two at Dundee, two at Cork, two on the Tyne, two on the Trent, two on the Mersey, four on the Humber, three on the Yare, one on the Avon, the Severn, the Orwell, six on the Forth, and actually two intended to run from Dublin to Holyhead. There may have been more than these, but they seem at all events to be the chief. Apparently there were, or had been, several on the Thames. Two, the London and the Richmond, according to Dodd’s book, were plying between London and Twickenham, and had carried 10,000 persons in four months. No wonder the watermen were alarmed.
Other vessels also had appeared on the royal river. The Majestic even had got as far as Margate, and had ventured across to Calais. The Regent had been burned off Whitstable, and the Caledonia, which had actually two engines, had steamed across to Flushing. Dodd further designed a vessel which seems to have gone to Margate in about seven and a-half hours, speeding along at about ten or eleven miles an hour. No wonder that Bell could say—“I will venture to affirm that history does not afford an instance of such rapid improvement in commerce and civilisation as that which will be effected by steam vessels.” The Richmond was a little boat of 50 tons, and 17 indicated horse-power. She was engined by Messrs. Maudslay & Field, of London, and presumably was the first steamer engined on the Thames. She ran from London to Richmond. In the next year Messrs. Maudslay engined the Regent of 112 tons and 42 indicated horse-power, and intended to ply between London and Margate; while, in 1817, this famous firm engined three vessels, including the Quebec of 500 tons and 100 indicated horse-power, intended for Quebec and Montreal. Since then they have engined hundreds of vessels, including screw-propeller ironclads of 20,000 horse-power.