Of all the causes of War, every day, it is true, sees those disappear which appertain to the existence of kings, priests and all that accompany them. But, nevertheless, republics will not be free of these lamentable properties so long as they do not free themselves from the erroneous systems of exclusive commerce and distant possessions. It is therefore a reason for every man who loves his fellows to endeavor to destroy these errors. Even ambition cannot seek a greater glory than in pointing out to men the path of truth and removing obstacles that impede nations from arriving at a durable peace. What glory can stand against time if it does not receive the approval of philosophy? In order to free nations, Citizen Bounaparte, you have executed vast enterprises and the glory with which you are covered should be as permanent as time itself. Who then can support with more efficacious approbation, projects which contribute to the general welfare? It is with this idea that I submit to you my work, hoping that if you find therein any useable truths that you will deign to support them with an influence as powerful as your own, and in effect to patronize projects the execution of which should render millions of men happy. Can there be for virtuous genius a more delicious reward? It is from this point of view that interior improvements and freedom of commerce are of the highest importance.
Should success crown the efforts of France against England, there will remain but gloriously to terminate this long war, to give freedom to commerce and make other powers adopt the system. Political liberty will then acquire that degree of perfection and breadth of which it is susceptible and philosophy will see with joy the olive branch of an eternal peace shade the course of science and industry.
This letter possesses two great points of interest. One that it marks the first approach of Fulton to Napoleon, leading as will be seen below to a far more important suggestion than that of building small canals; and the other that it is animated by an intense desire for French success over England. That this was in the beginning Fulton’s hope is to be borne in mind when, as will be shown, having developed in 1804 the opposite or pro-British sympathy, he lived and worked during two years in England for the destruction of Napoleon’s power though perhaps not of French ascendancy. The letter speaks of a “lasting peace.” That is something that the same nations a century and a quarter later are still seeking.
How delightfully charming and naïve is Fulton’s confidence that his picture of an altruistic ambition would excite a sympathetic emotion in Bonaparte. If Napoleon read the letter he must have smiled at Fulton’s enthusiastic simplicity.
Fulton’s leaning to French views at this time is explained by the fact that in politics he was intensely republican, in fact, somewhat extreme, a position that was undoubtedly encouraged and strengthened by his mentor, Barlow, who we have seen was a candidate for the celebrated Convention of 1793. This same leaning very likely influenced his remaining in France, rather than undertaking his contemplated return to his native land, because at this period his political ideals seemed more probable of realization in the former than in the latter country.
Chapter II
EARLY ATTEMPTS AT SUB-SURFACE NAVIGATION
Fulton’s first efforts for mechanical navigation. Some early submarines: Bourne, Van Drebbel, Mercenne, de Son, Wilkins, Bushnell.
While Fulton was taking out patents for his little canals—patents that never had either practical or profitable application—and endeavoring to earn a livelihood through the introduction of some of his methods of canal construction, there was germinating in his mind the great principle of mechanical propulsion on water that was eventually to win for him both fame and a competence.
The seeds had found lodgment some years previously. Dickenson shows that in 1793, or about the time when he retired from his art career, Fulton wrote a letter to the Earl of Stanhope stating that he had a project for moving boats by steam. This was a subject in which Stanhope took particular interest, being an inventor and a great student of applied science, and especially as he at that same time was working on a design of his own for a steamboat. Lord Stanhope requested Fulton to present his plan in detail. The original letter and accompanying sketches, dated November 4th, 1793, are still in the possession of the Stanhope family.
The idea of propelling boats by steam was not new. Jonathan Hulls had published a pamphlet in 1737 entitled, “A Description and Draught of a New Invented Machine for Carrying Vessels Out of or Into Any Harbour, Port or River, Against Wind or Tide or in a Calm.” This pamphlet is of great rarity, and the plate it contains, being the first pictorial representation of a boat propelled by the force of steam, merits reproduction. But in Fulton’s own country practical results had already been achieved. James Rumsey had actually moved a vessel by steam on the Potomac in 1785–88, and in 1788 and 1790 took out British patents. In February, 1793, Rumsey ran a steamboat on the Thames. Equally important was the work of John Fitch, who also constructed a boat operated by a steam engine and actually conveyed passengers on a regular schedule on the Delaware River in 1790. Fitch, like his rival inventor Rumsey, went to Europe further to develop his ideas and, in 1791, took out a French patent. All these experiments were, of course, known to Fulton and it is not impossible that they gave him his first suggestion.