[5] Partington’s edition of the “Century of Inventions.”
About the same time, Sir S. Morland, another experimenter, estimated the expansive force of water at 2000 times, in which he was not far from the truth.
England, however, was not the only country to produce inventors. One Blasco de Garay, who flourished a hundred years before the Marquis of Worcester, is declared by his champions to have been the first to solve the problem of propelling a vessel by steam-power. But investigations as to the accuracy of the story tend to the belief that he did nothing of the kind, and that the beautifully circumstantial account of his experiment does greater credit to the imagination of the narrator than to his regard for accuracy.[6] De Garay’s experiment was made at Barcelona in the year 1543 in the presence of representatives of the Emperor Charles V. Ravago, the Treasurer, reported to the Emperor that the vessel would go two leagues in three hours, but that the machine was complex and expensive, and that the cauldron in which the steam was generated might burst. This is exactly the report which a cautious financier, presumably not an expert in mechanics, might be expected to make. Other reports were more favourable to the project, the commissioners appointed for the purpose ascribing to the vessel a speed of a league an hour. What has been established beyond question, however, is that De Garay made the experiment with a boat fitted with paddle-wheels, but that the wheels were turned by men and not by steam.
[6] Mr. John McGregor reported to the Society of Arts that the claim that De Garay used a steam-engine is unfounded, human power being used.
Salomon de Caus, a native of Normandy, is sometimes claimed by French writers to have first thought of using steam as a motive power in 1615, but his invention does not seem to have fructified. Half a century later the unlucky Doctor Denis Papin, a native of Blois, entered the field of invention. He came to this country from France in 1675, was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1681, and in 1690 described a steam cylinder fitted with a piston which descended by atmospheric pressure when the steam below it was condensed. He suggested that one of the uses to which his engine might be put was the revolution of paddle-wheels fitted to a ship, several cylinders being applied which worked alternately with the rackwork he designed. He may have been led to this by witnessing in 1681 the experiments on the Thames with a boat designed by Rupert, the Prince Palatine, with revolving fans, which easily left behind a boat manned by a number of oarsmen. It has been claimed for Papin that he was the inventor of the safety-valve, but this is disputed.[7] Prior, however, to his atmospheric engine he brought out in 1685 a machine for raising or pumping water, but the Royal Society treated it with contempt and referred to it as a “mere trick.” Neither of his machines received the recognition which historians have since decided was their due, and he went back disheartened to France, whence he was driven by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes to Marburg. He reappeared in England in 1707 and announced a project for moving ships by means of wheels and steam. Unfortunately for him, Thomas Savery, born in 1658, had already been at work on the problem, and had brought out his fire-engine, which among other things he thought might be used to propel ships. His machine lacked power, and was replaced by one made after the design of his partner Newcomen. Papin was also associated with Newcomen and Savery at one time. Savery says of his own machine that he would refer the question of its suitability for shipping to those more competent than himself to judge. Papin appealed to the Naval Department to consider his invention, but the Government of the day, after the manner of Governments when face to face with a new project, thought it useless, and made severe remarks on his presumption in continuing to invent for them. He exhibited his invention on the Thames, but no one took any interest in it. Thoroughly disheartened by the failures which attended all his efforts, Papin went to Germany, and is stated to have there built a steamer which was actually tried on the Fulda or the Weser, but the local watermen, fearing the rivalry of the new machine, smashed it, and that is the last which history has to record of Papin as a pioneer of steamboats. It is asserted that this boat was built for him by Newcomen and Savery in this country. As an experimenter he did valuable work, for he seems to have been the first to have grasped the importance of the vacuum under the piston.[8]
[7] Hy. Frith’s “Triumphs of Steam.”
[8] Lindsay’s “History of Merchant Shipping.”
In 1730 another remarkable proposition was made for marine propulsion. Doctor John Allen thought it possible to move a boat by pumping in water at the bows and pumping it out again at the stern, this scheme being probably the earliest attempt to secure motion by what has since become known as the jet-propeller system. Like almost all other inventions of his period it was crude in its details and does not seem to have been put to any practical use.
The next inventor who turned his attention to the question was Jonathan Hulls, for whom it has been claimed, with some show of justification, that he was the actual inventor of the steamboat. That he did invent a steamboat is beyond question, but whether his vessel was ever built, and if so whether it attained any measure of success, are points upon which historical evidence is not conclusive. But if it was constructed, and there is strong circumstantial evidence in support of this contention, then to the West of England, which has contributed so largely to the maritime glory of Britain, must be ascribed also the honour of being the birthplace of one of the two inventions which have done more than anything else to aid in the spread of civilisation and commerce. Hulls was born at Aston Magna in 1699. By occupation he was a clock repairer, a precarious trade at best. The difficulties he had to encounter through lack of means were very great, but he persevered, and a patron at last appeared in the person of a Mr. Freeman, of Batsford Park, near Chipping Campden, who supplied him with about £160 to develop and patent his invention. This enabled Hulls to proceed to London, and he petitioned Queen Caroline, as Guardian of the Realm in the absence of her Consort George II. at Hanover, for Letters Patent for the invention, which was accordingly granted to him December 21, 1736, provided he enrolled in Chancery within the following three months a specification describing his invention.[9] The patent read as follows:
“Whereas our Trusty and Well Beloved Jonathan Hulls hath by his petition humbly represented unto Our most dearly beloved Consort the Queen.... That he hath with much Labour and Study, and at Great Expense Invented and Formed a machine for carrying Ships and Vessels out of or into any Harbour, &c., which the Petitioner apprehends may be of great service to our Royal Navy and Merchant Ships, and to Boats and other Vessels, of which Machine the Petitioner hath made oath that he is the sole inventor, as by affidavit to his said petition annexed.