One of the first actual steamboats of which there is authentic record sailed down the River Fulda, in Prussia, in the year 1707. It was built, engined and navigated by a clever Frenchman, Denis Papin,[3] who was born in 1647, was educated as a physician, and became assistant to the celebrated philosopher, Huygens, in Paris, where he published a small volume on the mechanical effects to be obtained by means of a vacuum. While this attracted the attention of savants, it had little or no interest for practical men, and yet in it lay the germ of the power that was to revolutionize the world. He went to London with letters to the Royal Society, and was employed by that society several years, during which he continued his experiments on atmospheric pressure and the vacuum, and the power of steam. He was next appointed Professor of Mathematics in the University of Marburg, from which he removed to Cassel. He had seen the horse-boat in England, and the idea of employing steam to turn the paddles took strong hold of him. He had a boat built and fitted with a steam-engine, in which he embarked with his family and all his belongings, with a view to making his experiment known in Britain and exhibiting his steamboat. All went well until he reached the junction of the rivers Fulda and Weser, where the boatmen got up a hue-and-cry that their craft was endangered by this innovation. In vain Papin protested that he merely wanted to leave the country. On the plea that their rights of navigating these waters had been infringed upon, they rose up en masse, seized the steamboat, dragged out the machinery and smashed it to atoms. Poor Papin found his way back to London a broken-hearted man, never to see the day when his great discovery was to enrich the world.
MILLER’S TWIN BOAT ON LOCH DALSWINTON, 1788.
From “Chambers’ Book of Days.”
Fifty years later another experiment was made by Patrick Miller, a banker in Edinburgh, aided by Mr. Taylor, tutor in his family, and Alexander Symington, a practical engineer. Mr. Miller had a boat built and fitted with a small steam-engine, for his amusement, on Dalswinton Loch, Dumfriesshire. It was a twin-boat, the engine being placed on one side, the boiler on the other, and the paddle-wheel in the centre. It was launched in October, 1788, and attained a speed of five miles an hour. The engine, of one horse-power, is still to be seen in the Andersonian Museum, in Glasgow. Encouraged by his experiment, Mr. Miller bought one of the boats used on the Forth and Clyde Canal, and had a steam-engine constructed for it by the Carron Ironworks Company, under Symington’s superintendence. On December 26th, 1789, this steamboat towed a heavy load on the canal, at a speed of seven miles an hour; but, strange to say, the experiment was dropped as soon as it was tried.
SYMINGTON’S “CHARLOTTE DUNDAS,” 1802.
From “Our Ocean Railways.”
In 1801 the London newspapers contained the announcement that an experiment had taken place on the Thames, on July 1st, for the purpose of propelling a laden barge, or other craft, against the tide, by means of a steam-engine of a very simple construction. “The moment the engine was set to work the barge was brought about, answering her helm quickly, and she made way against a strong current, at the rate of two and a half miles an hour.” In 1802 a new vessel was built expressly for steam navigation, on the Forth and Clyde Canal, under Symington’s supervision, the Charlotte Dundas, which was minutely inspected on the same day by Robert Fulton, of New York, and Henry Bell, of Glasgow, both of whom took sketches of the machinery to good purpose.[4] This boat drew a load of seventy tons, at a speed of three and a half miles an hour, against a strong gale of wind. Under ordinary conditions she made six miles an hour, but her admitted success was cut short by the Canal Trust, who alleged that the wash of the steamer would destroy the embankment.