Patrick Miller’s Triple Boat the “Edinburgh.”
“Joseph Stainton Esq., of Biggarshiels, manager for Carron Company at Carron, in the County of Stirling, in that part of the United Kingdom called Scotland, maketh oath, and sayeth: That he knows William Symington, engineer at Falkirk. That he has access to know that the said William Symington made certain experiments in the year one thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine, by applying a steam-engine to propel a boat along the Forth and Clyde Canal. That the machinery for said experiment was made at Carron, under the direction of the said William Symington, and the expense thereof, amounting to three hundred and sixty-three pounds, ten shillings and ten-pence, was paid to Carron Company by the now deceased Patrick Miller, Esq., of Dalswinton. That the deponent has seen the boat in which the said experiments were made, and has frequently heard of the experiments mentioned. That in the year one thousand eight hundred and one, or about that time, the said William Symington was employed by the now deceased Thomas Lord Dundas to erect a boat and construct a steam-engine to propel it along the said canal. That the deponent saw the said boat when completed, and had access to know that it was employed in the way of experiments to drag vessels along the canal. That it consists with the deponent’s knowledge, Robert Weir was employed by the said William Symington about the said boat. That he knew the said Robert Weir, who now resides at Kincardine, to be a man of respectable character and of veracity. That the said William Symington afterwards constructed a larger boat, and the deponent had access to see both the boats, and to know that they were propelled by steam.”
“Sworn at Carron, in the County of Stirling, upon the thirtieth day of November, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-four, before me, one of His Majesty’s Justices of the Peace for the County of Stirling.
“(Signed) John Callander, J.P.
“(Signed) J. Stainton.”[26]
[26] “A Century and a Half of Commercial Enterprise,” by the Carron Company.
Scotland owes her pre-eminence in shipbuilding and marine engineering to Patrick Miller, an Edinburgh banker who, having retired with a large fortune to Dalswinton, among other things set himself to ascertain whether some better means of propelling vessels than sails or oars could not be obtained. He had exhibited at Leith a triple vessel “having rotatory paddles in the two interspaces driven by a crank,” which was turned by four men. This he matched against a fast-sailing Customs wherry between Incholm and Leith Harbour over a distance of six or seven miles, and was very well satisfied with the victory he secured. But his sons’ tutor, James Taylor of Cumnock, having taken his turn at the crank, was so convinced by the violence of the exertion that some more reliable power was needed, that he urged on Mr. Miller the propriety of employing a steam-engine. Mr. Miller had placed a new double boat on his lake at Dalswinton, and Taylor, with his permission, arranged with his friend William Symington to fit it with a steam-engine. Symington, who was then engaged as a mining engineer, at Wanlockhead, had constructed a model of a steam carriage in which he had converted the reciprocating motion of the pistons into a rotatory motion. Miller and Taylor were shown this model in December 1787. The engine had only four-inch brass cylinders, made, curiously enough, by George Watt of Edinburgh. The trial trip of Miller’s boat took place on October 14, 1788, in the presence of several hundreds of people, and was so successful that Miller resolved to repeat the experiment on a larger scale. In the next year a twin vessel, 60 feet long and fitted with an engine with 18-inch cylinders, attained a speed of seven miles an hour on the Forth and Clyde Canal. For some reason Miller became dissatisfied with Symington, and abandoned his project of making a sea trip with a third vessel from Leith to London. The cost of fitting up a second vessel, for one thing, was greater than he had anticipated, and he was further discouraged by a miscalculation through which the machinery was made too heavy for the hull. Symington’s original engine of 1788 is now at South Kensington, and a [photograph] of it is here reproduced.
Model of Miller’s Double Boat.
Symington was the only one of the three who persevered.[27] He brought his design for a steam vessel under the notice of Lord Dundas, who was largely interested in the Forth and Clyde Canal, and suggested to him the advisability of towing barges by steam-power. The Charlotte Dundas was accordingly built in 1801 under the patronage of Lord Dundas, and made her appearance on the canal in 1802. The propelling machinery of the vessel was a long way in advance of the time, inasmuch as it consisted of a stern wheel driven by the first horizontal direct-acting engine that was ever constructed.[28] She was 56 feet in length by 18 feet beam and 8 feet depth, and towed two barges of 70 tons a distance of nineteen and a half miles in six hours against strong winds. But complaints were made that the swell she created damaged the canal banks, and her proprietors were forced to abandon the enterprise. Thus the Charlotte Dundas, though an unquestioned engineering success, was a commercial failure, and on being withdrawn from service was laid up in Lock No. 16 and allowed to rot, a monument to the genius of her constructor and the prejudice of those who were too ignorant to recognise the obvious. A photograph of the [model] at South Kensington Science Museum, and a [section] showing her machinery, are given here.