FOOTNOTES:
[1] To avoid confusion, Sir Isambard Brunel has been called throughout by that designation, the one by which he is generally known: he was knighted on March 24, 1841.
His Life has been written by Mr. Richard Beamish, F.R.S. (London, 1862.)
[2] Lady Brunel survived her husband five years. Of their children, three lived to maturity, one son, Isambard Kingdom, and two daughters, Sophia, wife of the late Sir Benjamin Hawes, K.C.B., Under Secretary of State for War, and Emma, wife of the Rev. George Harrison, Rector of Sutcombe.
[3] He was sent to Paris to recover his knowledge of French, which had got rather rusty at school, and also to study mathematics. He retained through life a great admiration of the method of teaching this subject which was adopted in France.
In addition to the time spent in the study of mathematics and languages, Mr. Brunel occupied himself on his holidays in examining the various engineering works going on in Paris, and he used to send his father drawings and descriptions of them.
[4] Sir Isambard was also consulted upon a proposed suspension bridge over the Tamar at Saltash, where Mr. Brunel subsequently built the Royal Albert Bridge.
[5] This history has been written by Mr. Beamish in his Life of Sir Isambard Brunel, pp. 202-304, and also, up to the year 1828, in the very valuable work by Mr. Henry Law, C.E., entitled ‘A Memoir of the several Operations, and the Construction, of the Thames Tunnel,’ and published by the late Mr. Weale in his Quarterly Papers on Engineering.
[6] For an account of these earlier attempts see Law, pp. 3-7.
[7] This expectation does not seem to have been realised, as there was never any considerable traffic through the Thames Tunnel. Perhaps, however, it would have been otherwise had the large descents for carriages and horses been constructed.