After the removal of the ‘Royal George’ had been effected, but while the search for the guns was going on, Major-General Pasley detached to the wreck of the ‘Edgar,’[[442]] the ‘Drake’ lighter, with thirteen petty officers and seamen of Her Majesty’s ship ‘Excellent,’ to learn the art of diving. Corporal Jones was attached to the party to instruct them. Violent gales prevailed at this period, “which repeatedly drove the ‘Drake’ from her moorings, not without damage, and at other times caused her to drift in such a manner that guns, discovered by a diver late in a slack, could not be found when the weather permitted his subsequent descent.” Hence only five iron guns of this wreck were got up during the season, with a piece of the keel and a floor timber. These were all recovered by corporal Jones, who had also been engaged one tide in finding an anchor that had been lost.[[443]] So anxious was he to add to the magnitude of his acquisition, that on one occasion he remained below as long as four hours, but his exertions were unattended with the hoped-for return.
An interesting fact with respect to the power of water to convey sound was ascertained on the 6th October. A small waterproof bursting charge containing 18 lbs. of gunpowder was fired at the bottom. Corporal Jones who happened at the time to be working at the ‘Edgar’—nearly half-a-mile distant—hearing a loud report like the explosion of a cannon, imagined that a large charge had been fired over the ‘Royal George.’ To those on deck immediately over the place, the report was scarcely perceptible.
Private Girvan relieved corporal Jones at the ‘Edgar’ on the 16th October, and got up the breech part of an iron 32-pounder, which had been cut in two a little in front of the trunnions.[[444]]
The only mishap this summer occurred to private Girvan. Just as he appeared above the water the explosion of a charge took place, from which he sustained a slight shock and a wrench in the back producing a sensation of pain. Though eager to go down again his wish was overruled, and he remained on board for the day. Sergeant Lindsay fired the charge, and the accident was attributed to a nervous slip of his hand when ready to apply the wires to the battery.
On the 4th November the divers descended for the last time, as the water had become so cold that their hands—the only part exposed—were completely benumbed, so that they could no longer work to advantage; and then, the operations ceasing from necessity, the detachment of the corps rejoined their companies at Woolwich.
Major-General Pasley in according his praises to the various individuals and parties employed at Spithead, spoke highly of sergeant George Lindsay in subordinate charge, and the whole detachment; but more particularly of the intelligent and enterprising men to whom the important task of preparing all the charges fired by the voltaic battery was confided. The charges were numerous and of various quantities, amounting in all to 19,193 lbs. of powder, or nearly 214 barrels. The soldiers alluded to were lance-corporal John Rae and private Alexander Cleghorn who were promoted for their services. The still more arduous duty of diving gave the General every satisfaction. Frequently the duty was embarrassing and dangerous, and carried on under circumstances calculated to test most severely their courage and resources; and so indefatigable were their exertions, and so successful their services, that the military divers gained the character of being “second to none in the world.”[[445]] Most of the party this season attempted to dive, but, from the oppression felt under water by some, only two or three beyond the regular divers could persevere in the duty.
Upon the report made by Major-General Pasley of the conduct of the detachment engaged in the operations, Sir George Murray, the Master-General, was pleased thus to remark: “It has given me no less pleasure to be made acquainted with the very commendable conduct of the non-commissioned officers and privates of the sappers and miners who have been employed under Major-General Pasley, and have rendered so much useful service in the important undertaking conducted under his management.”
From June to September about eight men under Lieutenant Gosset, R.E., assisted in the undertaking for determining the longitude of Valentia by the transmission of chronometers. Thirty chronometers were conveyed in every transmission; and to privates Robert Penton and John M‘Fadden was entrusted the service of bearing the chronometers, and winding them up at stated times and places. On receiving the chronometers from Liverpool the reciprocations took place repeatedly between Kingston and Valentia Island; one private being responsible for their safe transit a portion of the route, and the other for the remaining distance to and from the station at Feagh Main. Professor Sheepshanks and Lieutenant Gosset carried out the scientific purposes of the service, while the sappers not engaged with the chronometers attended to the duties of the camp and observatory at Feagh Main, under the subordinate superintendence of corporal B. Keen Spencer. The professor instructed this non-commissioned officer in the mode of taking observations with the transit instrument; and further, in testimony of his satisfaction, gave generous gratuities to privates Penton and M‘Fadden. Professor Airy, in speaking of the former, alludes to the perfect reliance he placed on his care, “and in winding the chronometers,” adds, “he has no doubt the service was most correctly performed.”[[446]] The duty was one in which extreme caution and care were required, to prevent accident or derangement to the instruments.
Agitation for a repeal of the union, headed by O’Connell, was now the great excitement of Ireland, and a rising of the masses to enforce it was daily expected. With the reinforcement of troops sent there to preserve order was the first company of sappers, which was despatched by rapid conveyances, viâ Liverpool to Dublin, where it arrived on the 26th July. The company consisted of ninety men of all ranks, and their duties embraced repairs to the barracks and the planting of stockades in the rear of the castle, to prevent the ingress, in case of revolt, of the rebels.[[447]] They also prepared several thousands of sand-bags for breastworks. Detachments of one sergeant and twenty rank and file were sent to Limerick and Athlone in November, where they strengthened the barracks and loopholed the outside walls for musketry. The store-rooms of the artillery barracks were also loopholed. Effectually, however, was the anticipated outbreak suppressed, and, under the authority of Sir James Graham, the Home Secretary, the company was recalled to England and arrived at Woolwich on the 22nd August, 1844.
The yellow fever broke out at Bermuda in August, and continued with unabated virulence and fatality until the middle of September. In that brief period, out of a strength of 165 men, it carried off no less than thirty-three men of the eighth company and four men of the fourth, besides Captain Robert Fenwick, R.E., in command of the latter, and Lieutenant James Jenkin, the Adjutant.[[448]] The two companies were distributed to St. George’s and Ireland Island; at the former, where the fever chiefly raged, was the eighth company, about ninety strong, and at the latter the fourth. Eighty-eight men had been seized with the malady, of whom twenty-four were admitted with relapses, and four had suffered three seizures, none of whom died. Dr. Hunter, a civil physician, attended the cases in the absence of a military medical officer. With the civil population his practice was remarkably successful; for out of 101 natives who took the fever only one died. He therefore concluded that the artillery, who lost nine men, and the sappers thirty-seven, fell easy victims to the epidemic from their intemperate habits. No comparison, however, was justifiable between coloured people, upon whom the fever had but little effect, and Europeans; but an analysis of the cases, as far as the sappers were concerned, confirmed the doctor’s views to the extent of sixteen men. The remainder, twenty-one, were men of sobriety and general good conduct.