THE CLERMONT: THE FIRST STEAMBOAT.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
APPLICATION OF STEAM TO NAVIGATION—ROBERT FULTON-CHANCELLOR LIVINGSTON—LAUNCH OF THE CLERMONT—SHE CROSSES THE HUDSON RIVER—HER VOYAGE TO ALBANY—DESCRIPTION OF THE SCENE—FULTON'S OWN ACCOUNT—LEGISLATIVE PROTECTION GRANTED TO FULTON—THE PENDULUM-ENGINE—CONSTRUCTION OF OTHER STEAMBOATS—THE STEAM-FRIGATE FULTON THE FIRST—THE FIRST OCEAN-STEAMER, THE SAVANNAH—ACCOUNT OF HER VOYAGE—MISAPPREHENSIONS UPON THE SUBJECT.
In the year 1807, a new agent was introduced into the science of navigation,—one which was destined to effect as great a change in the duration of a voyage at sea as the compass had effected in its practicability. Steam was applied to a boat upon the Hudson, and the Clermont, propelled by wheels, steamed from Jersey City to Albany. Though this was an event that immediately concerned river-navigation, and though twelve years were to elapse before the accomplishment of the first ocean steam-voyage, we cannot with propriety omit an account of the conception, construction, and success of the first river-steamboat.
Robert Fulton was born in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, in the year 1765. He manifested a genius for mechanics at an early age, though portrait-painting was his first profession. He spent many years in England and France, and conceived the idea of a vessel propelled by steam in 1793. He received no countenance from Napoleon, and returned to the United States in December, 1806. His mind was now occupied with two projects,—the invention of submarine explosives and the construction of a steamboat. He published a work entitled "Torpedo War," with the motto, "The liberty of the seas will be the happiness of the earth." He renewed his acquaintance with Chancellor Livingston, whom he had known when ambassador to Paris. This gentleman had long had entire faith in the practicability of steam-navigation, and as early as 1798 had obtained from the Legislature of New York a monopoly of all such navigation upon the waters of the State, provided he would within twelve months build a boat which should go four miles an hour by steam. When they met in America, in 1806, the two entered into a partnership and commenced the construction of a boat. Finding the expenses unexpectedly heavy, they offered to sell one-third of their patent; but no one would invest in an enterprise universally deemed hopeless. The boat was nevertheless launched, in the spring of 1807, from the ship-yard of Charles Brown, on the East River. She was supplied with an engine built in England, and was driven by steam, in August, from the New York side to the Jersey shore. The incredulous crowd who had assembled to laugh stayed to wonder and applaud.
The Clermont soon after sailed for Albany, her departure having been announced in the newspapers as a grand and unequalled curiosity. "She excited," says Colden, in his Life of Fulton, "the astonishment of the inhabitants of the shores of the Hudson, many of whom had not heard even of an engine, much less of a steamboat. There were many descriptions of the effects of her first appearance upon the people of the bank of the river: some of these were ridiculous, but some of them were of such a character as nothing but an object of real grandeur could have excited. She was described, by some who had indistinctly seen her passing in the night, as a monster moving on the waters, defying the winds and tide, and breathing flames and smoke. She had the most terrific appearance from other vessels which were navigating the river when she was making her passage. The first steamboat—as others yet do—used dry pine wood for fuel, which sends forth a column of ignited vapor many feet above the flue, and whenever the fire is stirred a galaxy of sparks fly off, and in the night have a very brilliant and beautiful appearance. This uncommon light first attracted the attention of the crews of other vessels. Notwithstanding the wind and tide, which were adverse to its approach, they saw with astonishment that it was rapidly coming toward them; and when it came so near that the noise of the machinery and paddles was heard, the crews—if what was said in the newspapers of the time be true—in some instances shrunk beneath their decks from the terrific sight and left their vessels to go on shore, whilst others prostrated themselves and besought Providence to protect them from the approaches of the horrible monster which was marching on the tide and lighting its path by the fires which it vomited."
Fulton himself wrote the following account of the trip up the river and back, and published it in the American Citizen:—"I left New York on Monday at one o'clock, and arrived at Clermont, the seat of Chancellor Livingston, at one o'clock on Tuesday: time, twenty-four hours; distance, one hundred and ten miles. On Wednesday, I departed from the chancellor's at nine in the morning, and arrived at Albany at five in the afternoon: time, eight hours; distance, forty miles. The sum is one hundred and fifty miles in thirty-two hours,—equal to near five miles an hour.