Beacon Lights of History Volume Xiv Part 6

Born of middle-cla.s.s parentage and with no apparent source of heredity from which to draw the stores of genius which he displayed throughout his life, and with surroundings in boyhood but little calculated to awaken and inspire the life-work which later made him famous, from this beginning and with these early surroundings John Ericsson became unquestionably the greatest of the engineers of the age in which he lived and of the century which witnessed such mighty advances along all engineering lines. The imprint left by Ericsson's life on the engineering practice of his age was deep and lasting, and if one may dare look into the future, the day is far removed when engineers will have pa.s.sed beyond their dependence on his life and labors.

It is perhaps not amiss that, before looking more closely at the achievements of Ericsson's life and activity, note should be taken of the large dependence of our present civilization and mode of life on the engineer and his work.

In different ages of the world's history each has received its name, appropriate or fanciful as the case may have been. For the modern age no name is perhaps more adequately descriptive than the "Age of Energy,"

the age in which our entire fabric of civilization rests upon the utilization of the energies of nature for the needs of humanity, and to an extent little appreciated by those who have not considered the matter from this point of view. If we consider the various elements which enter into our modern civilization,--the items which enter into the daily life of the average man or woman; the items which we have come to consider as necessities and those which we may consider as luxuries; the items which go to make up our needs as expressed in terms of shelter, food, intercommunication between man and his fellow, and pleasure,--the most casual consideration of such will serve to show distributed throughout almost the entire fabric of our civilization dependence at some point on the power of the steam-engine, the water-wheel, or windmill, the subtle electric current, or the heat-energy of coal, petroleum oil, or natural gas. The harnessing and efficient utilization of these great natural energies is the direct function of the engineer, or more especially of the dynamic engineer, and in this n.o.ble guild of workers, Ericsson carved for himself an enduring place and left behind a record which should serve as an inspiration to all who are following the same pathway in later years.

No one feature perhaps better differentiates our modern civilization from that of earlier times, four hundred years ago, or even one hundred, than that of intercommunication between man and his fellow. Compare the opportunities for such intercommunication in the present with those in the time of Queen Elizabeth, Sir Isaac Newton, George Was.h.i.+ngton, or Napoleon I. We now have our steams.h.i.+ps, steam and electric railroads, cable, telegraph, and telephone. A few years ago not a single one was known. The modern age is one which demands the utmost in the possibility of communication between man and his kind, and in this respect the wide world is now smaller than the confines of an English county a century ago.

In this field, as we shall see, Ericsson did some of his greatest work, and left perhaps his most permanent record for the future.

Ericsson's life falls most naturally into three periods chronologically or geographically, and likewise into three periods professionally, though the latter mode of subdivision has by no means the same boundaries as the former. The first mode of subdivision gives us the life in Sweden, the life in England, and the life in the United States.

The second mode gives us the life of struggle and obscurity, the life of struggle, achievement, and recognition, and the calmer and easier life of declining years with recognition, reward, and the a.s.surance of a life's work well done.

John Ericsson was born in the province of Vermland, Sweden, in 1803. His father was Olof Ericsson, a mine owner and inspector who was well educated after the standard of his times, having graduated at the college in Karlstad, the princ.i.p.al town of the province. His mother was Britta Sophia Yngstrom, a woman of Flemish-Scotch descent, and to whom Ericsson seems to have owed many of his stronger characteristics. Three children were born: Caroline in 1800, Nils in 1802, and John in 1803. Of John's earliest boyhood we have but slight record, but there seems to have been a clear foreshadowing of his future genius. He was considered the wonder of the neighborhood, and busied himself day after day with the machinery of the mines, drawing the form on paper with his rude tools or making models with bits of wood and cord, and endeavoring thus to trace the mystery of its operation.

In 1811 the Ericsson family fell upon evil times. Due to a war with Russia, business became disturbed and in the end Olof Ericsson became financially ruined. This brought the little family face to face with the realities of life, and we soon after find the father occupying a position as inspector on the Gota Ca.n.a.l, a project which was just then occupying serious attention after having been neglected for nearly one hundred years, and nearly three hundred years after it was first proposed in 1526. Through this connection, in 1815, John and Nils Ericsson were appointed as cadets in a corps of Mechanical Engineers to be employed in carrying out the Government's plans with reference to the ca.n.a.l. During the winter of 1816-17 and at the age of thirteen, John Ericsson received regular instruction from some of his officers in Algebra, Chemistry, Field Drawing, and Geometry, and the English language. Ericsson's education previous to this seems to have consisted chiefly in lessons at home or from tutors, after the manner of the time.

He had thus received instruction in the ordinary branches and in drawing and some chemistry. His training in drawing seems to have been unusually thorough and comprehensive, and with a natural genius for such work, his later remarkable skill at the drawing board is doubtless in no small measure due to the excellent instruction which he received in his early years. His progress in his duties as a young engineer was rapid, and he was soon given employment in connection with the ca.n.a.l-work, involving much responsibility and calling for experience and skill.

At length on reaching the age of seventeen he became stirred with military ambition, and, dissatisfied with his present prospects, he left his position with its opportunities for the future, and entered the Swedish army as ensign of a regiment of Field Cha.s.seurs. This regiment was famous for its rifle practice, and Ericsson was soon one of its most expert marksmen. The routine of army life was, however, far from being sufficient to satisfy the uneasy genius of John Ericsson, and we soon find him engaged in topographical surveying for the Government, and so rapid and industrious in his work that as the surveyors were paid in accordance with the amount accomplished, he was carried on the pay rolls as two men, and paid as such, in order that the amount which he received might not seem too excessive for one individual. Even this was not sufficient to exhaust his energy, and about this time he conceived the idea of publis.h.i.+ng a book of plates descriptive of the machinery commonly employed in the mining operations of his day. To this end he collected a large number of sketches which he had prepared in his earlier years, and made arrangements to take up the work of preparation for publication. The drawings selected were to be engraved for the book, and, nothing daunted by the undertaking, Ericsson proposed to do this work himself. After some discouragement the engraving was undertaken, and eighteen copper plates of the sixty-five selected, averaging in size fifteen by twenty inches, were completed within a year. In various ways the project met with delays, and it soon became apparent that the rapid advance in the applications of machinery to mining would render the work out of date, and it was at length abandoned.

At about this time Ericsson seems to have taken up seriously his work on his so-called "flame-engine," certain experiments made by his father having suggested to him the hope that a source of power might in this way be developed which would be more economical than the steam-engine.

At this point we see entering into Ericsson's life an idea which never left him, which controlled much of his work in mid-life, and which attracted no small part of his attention throughout his closing years.

This idea was the discovery of some form of heat-engine which should be more economical than the steam-engine, especially as it was in his day.

The flame-engine idea grew rapidly, and soon absorbed his chief attention. Military life now lost its attraction, and in 1826 obtaining leave of absence he left his native land and turned his face toward London, doubtless with the hope strong within him that a subst.i.tute for the steam-engine had been found, and that his future lay secure and easy before him.

The characteristic features of Ericsson's life up to this time, when he had reached his twenty-third year, are energy, industry, independence, all in most p.r.o.nounced degree, and combined with a most astonis.h.i.+ng insight into mechanical and scientific questions. It was not a period of achievement, but one of formation and of development in those qualities which were soon to make him famous in both worlds. Of his work during this period of life little or nothing outside the idea embodied in the flame-engine can be said to belong to the permanent record of his life's achievement. This appeared in the "Caloric" engine, and still later in the well-known Ericsson "Air" engine of the present day.

This era was one of development and promise, and richly were the promises fulfilled in the achievements of his later years. A careful study of his life to this point is sufficient to show that, with health and time, such a nature would certainly leave a mark wide and deep on the world in which it was placed. His characteristics were such that achievement was the very essence of life, and, with the promise and potency as revealed in this first twenty-three years of his life, we may be well prepared for the brilliant record of the remaining sixty-three.

With Ericsson's arrival in London began the second important period of his life. His first efforts were directed toward the introduction of the flame-engine, but he soon found unexpected difficulties in the use of coal as fuel instead of wood, and it became clear that in order to live he must turn his attention to other matters for a time. Then followed a series of remarkable pieces of work in which Ericsson's genius showed itself, either in original invention or in the adaptation and improvement of the existing facts and material of engineering practice.

While thus occupied, his leave from his regiment expired, and he seems to have overlooked taking proper steps to have it renewed. He was thus placed technically in the att.i.tude of a deserter. Through the intervention of a friend, however, he was soon afterward restored, and promoted to the rank of Captain in the Swedish Army. This commission he immediately resigned, and thus his record became technically cleared of all reproach.

To give a mere list of the work with which Ericsson was occupied during the years from 1827 to 1839, when he removed to the United States, would be no small task, and reference to the more important only can be here made. Compressed air for transmitting power, forced draft for boilers by means of centrifugal blowers, steam boilers of new and improved types, the surface condenser for marine engines, the location of the engines of a s.h.i.+p for war purposes below the water line, the steam fire-engine, the design and construction of the "Novelty" (a locomotive for the Rainhill contest in 1829, when Stephenson's "Rocket" was awarded the prize, though Ericsson, heavily handicapped in time and by lack of a track on which to adjust and perfect the "Novelty," achieved a result apparently in many ways superior to Stephenson's with the "Rocket"), various designs for rotary engines, an apparatus for making salt from brine, further experimental work with various forms of heat, or so-called "caloric" engines, and the final development, in 1833, of a type from which great results were for a time expected, superheated steam and engines for its use, a deep-sea-sounding apparatus embodying the same principle as that later developed by Lord Kelvin in the well-known apparatus of the present day, a machine for cutting files automatically, various types of steam-engines, and finally his work in connection with the introduction of the screw-propeller as a means of propulsion for steam vessels. These are some of the important lines of work on which Ericsson was engaged during the twelve years of his life in London. In connection with some he was undoubtedly a pioneer, and deserves credit as an original inventor; in connection with others, his work was that of improvement or adaptation; but in all his influence was profound, and the legacy which we have received from this period of engineering progress is due in no small degree to Ericsson, and to his work in London during these years. At a later point we shall refer in some further detail to these questions, but desire for the moment, rather, to gain a broad and comprehensive view of his life as a whole.

Ericsson has been by some called a spendthrift in invention, and the term is not without some justice in its application. His genius was uneasy, and his mind was oppressed by the wealth of his ideas. It was this very wealth which led him from one idea to another, without always taking sufficient time in which to develop and perfect his plans. Rich in invention, he cared but little for exploitation, and when the truth of his predictions was demonstrated, or the ground of his expectation justified, he was eager for new achievements and new combinations of the materials of engineering progress. In this spirit of struggle and unrest, he pa.s.sed the years in London, rapidly becoming known for his versatility in invention, and for his daring and originality in the details of his engineering work. From 1833 to 1839, or during the second half of this term of residence in London, he became in increasing measure absorbed in his work connected with the screw-propeller as a means of marine propulsion.

Ericsson's name in the popular mind has been most commonly a.s.sociated with the "Monitor" and her fight with the "Merrimac" in the Civil War, and next, probably, with the screw-propeller as a means of marine propulsion. It will, therefore, be proper at the present point to refer in some further detail to the circ.u.mstances connected with his relation to the introduction of the screw-propeller.

Regarding this question an entire volume might be written without doing more than justice to the subject, but only a brief statement of the chief facts can be here attempted.

As early as the Seventeenth Century the possibility of developing a propulsive thrust by the use of a submerged helicoidal, or screw, propeller, had been vaguely recognized, and during the following, or Eighteenth Century, the same idea had been brought forward. It had been viewed in this connection, however, merely as a curiosity, and led to no immediate results. Later, in 1804, Francis B. Stevens, of New Jersey, in an experimental boat on the Hudson, operated twin screws, and demonstrated their applicability to the requirements of marine practice.

These propellers, in fact, had a form far more nearly approaching the modern screw-propeller than did those which came somewhat later, and which marked the real entry of the screw-propeller into actual and practical service.

Again, in 1812, Ressel, a student in the University of Vienna, began to study the screw-propeller, and his first drawing dates from this time.

In 1826 he carried on experiments in a barge driven by hand, and in 1827 an Austrian patent was granted him. Two years later he applied his screw to a boat with an engine of six horse-power, and a speed of six miles per hour was said to have been attained. Then came a bursting steam-pipe, and the police put a stop to the experiments, which seem to have had no further results.

Likewise in 1823 Captain Delisle, of the French Engineers, presented a memorial to his Government in which he urged the use of the submerged propeller for the propulsion of steam vessels. No especial attention was given to the suggestion, however, and it was apparently forgotten until later, when the propeller had become a demonstrated success. Then this memorial was remembered, and its author brought forward to receive his share of credit in connection with the adaptation of the propeller to marine propulsion.

These various attempts to introduce the screw-propeller seem curiously enough to have had no lasting result. They were not followed up, and in the mean time had to some extent pa.s.sed out of memory, or, if remembered, the absence of result can hardly have acted as an incentive to fresh effort. At the same time it must be admitted that the screw-propeller as a possibility for marine propulsion was known in a vague way to the engineering practice of the day, and it is at this time of course quite impossible to say how much may have been known by Ericsson, Smith, or others concerned in later developments, or to what extent they may have been dependent for suggestion on what had preceded them. The question of who invented the screw-propeller in the absolute sense is entirely futile and without answer. No one could ever have reasonably advanced any such unique claim. At the best it is simply a question of the relative influence in the introduction, improvement, and practical application of what was the common property of the engineering practice of the day.

In 1833, or at the period now under consideration, however, the paddle-wheel was the recognized instrument of marine propulsion. Since the beginning of the century it had been growing in use with the gradual growth in the application of steam, and at this time it held the field alone. Some years earlier it appears that some of the objections to the paddle-wheel had become plainly apparent to Ericsson, although, occupied with other matters as he was, there was no immediate result. He apparently recognized that the slow revolutions possible with the paddle-wheel did not favor the improvement of the steam-engine along the lines which have since been followed, and he saw clearly that for wars.h.i.+p purposes the engines employed, exposed above the water-line to destruction from the sh.e.l.l of an enemy, were entirely out of the question. Finally in 1833 and 1834 we find him employed by a carrying company in London to conduct numerous trials with submerged propellers in the London and Birmingham ca.n.a.l. In an affidavit made in March, 1845, he states that in 1833 his attention was particularly called to the subject of oblique propulsion, and that under his direction propellers of various patterns and embodying these principles were fitted on a ca.n.a.l-boat named the "Francis," and later in 1834 to another called the "Annatorius." Shortly after this, or in 1835, his ideas took more definite form, and he refers to his work in a letter to his friend John Bourne in the following terms:--

"1835. Designed a rotary propeller to be actuated by steam-power consisting of a series of segments of a screw attached to a thin broad hoop supported by arms so twisted as also to form part of a screw. The propeller subsequently applied to the steams.h.i.+p 'Princeton' was identical with my said design of 1835. Even the mode adopted to determine, by geometrical construction, the twist of the blades and arms of the 'Princeton's' and other propellers was identical with my design of the year last mentioned."

At about this same time, or in 1835, the attention of Mr. F.P. Smith seems to have been drawn to the subject of the screw-propeller, and we find him taking out a patent for his form, consisting of an elongated helix or spiral of several turns, under date of May 31, 1836. Ericsson's patent followed some six weeks later, or on July 13, 1836. While it thus appears that Ericsson had been studying the problem since 1833 or earlier, according to his own statements, there is no evidence that Smith's attention was drawn to the matter earlier than 1835. Delay on Ericsson's part in the matter of patent gives the earlier date to Smith.

The mere date of a patent, however, is of small moment for our present purposes. It must be admitted that the modern form of screw-propeller is quite unlike either of these original forms, although they all involve of course the same fundamental principles. Ericsson's propeller may properly be called an engineering success, built on sound principles, but improved and largely modified by the results of later experience and research. Smith's propeller, while capable of propelling a boat, was the design of an amateur rather than of an engineer, and in comparison with Ericsson's seemed to show a somewhat less accurate appreciation of the underlying principles upon which the propeller operates.

In the present case, as we have noted above, the question is not so much one of invention as of influence in introduction, adaptation, and improvement. The screw-propeller was already known, but had not been introduced into and made a part of actual engineering practice. Services in this direction are all that can be claimed for any of those concerned with the question during the third decade of the Nineteenth Century.

From this point of view we must give to Ericsson large credit. He had the courage of his convictions, and did not allow his work in this direction to lapse for lack of effort on his part to secure its introduction into the practice of the day.

Thus, in 1837, the "Francis B. Ogden" was built for the special purpose of testing the power of the screw-propeller, and was operated on the Thames for the benefit of the British Admiralty and many others. Shortly after this, and largely through the influence of Capt. Robert F.

Stockton of the American Navy and Francis B. Ogden, the American Consul at Liverpool, Ericsson began to consider a visit to the United States for the purpose of building, under Stockton's auspices, a vessel for the United States Navy. While these negotiations were under way, in 1838, he built for Captain Stockton a screw-steamer named the "Robert F.

Stockton," the trials of which attracted much attention from the public at large and from engineers of the time. At about the same period Ericsson's propeller was fitted to a ca.n.a.l-boat called the "Novelty,"

plying between Manchester and London. This was presumably the first instance of a screw-propeller employed on a vessel actually used for commercial purposes.

Finally, in pursuance of Ericsson's plans with Captain Stockton, he left England Nov. 1, 1839, and started for New York in the steamer "Great Western," where he arrived November 23, after a long and stormy pa.s.sage.

We now reach the final scene of Ericsson's life and professional activities. His visit was at first intended only as temporary, and he seems to have antic.i.p.ated an early return after carrying out his plans with reference to a s.h.i.+p for the United States Navy. To quote from a letter to his friend, Mr. John O. Sargent, he says: "I visited this country at Mr. Ogden's most earnest solicitations to introduce my propeller on the ca.n.a.ls and inland waters of the United States. I had at the same time strong reasons for supposing that Stockton would be able to start the 'big frigate' for which I had prepared such laborious plans in England." The event was otherwise determined, however, and during the remaining fifty years of his life he lived and wrought in the New World, and as a citizen of his adopted country.

If the record of his twelve years of work in London was long, that for the remaining and maturer years of his life may well be imagined as vastly greater. During the earlier part of this period, or until the Civil War, when all his energies were concentrated upon his work in connection with the "Monitor" type of wars.h.i.+p, we find the same wealth of invention and human energy, but for the most part directed along lines related to marine and naval construction. It was a period of training for the fuller fruitage of his genius during the Civil War.

Shortly after his arrival, or in 1840, a prize was offered by the Mechanics' Inst.i.tute of New York for the best plan of a steam fire-engine. With his previous experience in London, Ericsson easily carried off the palm and was awarded the prize. He further occupied himself with the introduction of propellers on boats engaged in the inland navigation of the United States, with the design and construction of the United States steam frigate "Princeton," with the development of the compound principle in the steam-engine, then in 1851 with his hot-air s.h.i.+p "Ericsson," or s.h.i.+p propelled by hot-air or caloric engines, as they were then termed, and later with caloric engines in smaller sizes for stationary purposes, of which several thousand were sold during the next succeeding years.

In the work of introducing his propellers good progress was made, especially in boats built for use on the Great Lakes, so that by 1844, when the U.S.S. "Princeton" went into commission, there were in use some twenty-five vessels with the screw-propeller as a means of propulsion.

The project of building a vessel for the American Navy, the purpose which had most strongly attracted Ericsson to the United States, suffered long delay in connection with the arrangements between Captain Stockton and the naval authorities at Was.h.i.+ngton. At length, in 1841, Captain Stockton was authorized to proceed with the construction of a screw steam frigate of about one thousand tons. This was the U.S.S.

"Princeton," which marks an epoch as the first screw vessel-of-war. She was followed by the French "Pomone" in 1843, and the English "Amphion"

in 1844, for the equipment of which Ericsson's agent in England, Count Von Rosen, received commissions from the French and English governments respectively.

The "Princeton" was completed in due time and was equipped with two 12-inch wrought-iron guns, one brought by Ericsson from England and one designed and built under the direction of Captain Stockton. At the trials of the s.h.i.+p in 1844 the latter gun exploded, killing the Secretaries of State and of the Navy, besides other prominent visitors on board, and wounding several others. This terrible disaster threw an entirely undeserved stigma upon the s.h.i.+p herself and upon Ericsson's work, and it was not until many years after that his name was entirely free from some kind of reproach in connection with the "Princeton" and the deplorable results of the accident on board.

These are some of the princ.i.p.al lines of work with which Ericsson occupied himself during the twenty-two years between 1839 and 1861. At the latter date came the supreme opportunity of his life, and his services in the art of naval construction during the remainder of the Civil War, which was then in progress, are a part of the history of that great struggle. Here, as with the propeller, volumes might be written in the attempt to give a full account of the inception, growth, and final vindication of Ericsson's ideas regarding naval offence and defence, as expressed by the means available in the engineering practice of the day.

The leading points only can be summarized.

The question of armored s.h.i.+ps was in the air. The advantages of armor had been already demonstrated on the French s.h.i.+p "Gloire" and others in connection with the naval part of the Crimean War, and there was a feeling that ironclads of some kind were a necessity of the situation.

These facts were perhaps more clearly realized at the South than at the North; and early in 1861 we find Mr. Stephen R. Mallory, the Confederate Secretary of the Navy, taking active steps to raise the "Merrimac,"

which had been sunken at the Norfolk Navy Yard, and convert her into an armor-clad. Information regarding this project naturally became known to the Federal authorities, and occasioned President Lincoln and the entire Cabinet the most serious anxiety. At length on August 3, 1861, the appointment of a Board was authorized, the duty of which it should be to examine into the question fully, obtain plans, and recommend the construction of such armor-clads as they should judge best suited to the demands of the situation.

Shortly after this, Ericsson forwarded to President Lincoln a communication in which he offered to construct a vessel "for the destruction of the Rebel fleet at Norfolk and for scouring the Southern rivers and inlets of all craft protected by Rebel batteries." For one reason or another this communication does not seem to have produced any immediate result. Later, however, when the Board made its report dated September 16, they registered the opinion that the present demand called for "vessels invulnerable to shot, of light draft of water, before going into a more perfect system of large iron-clad seagoing vessels of war."

In pursuance of this idea they recommended the construction of three vessels,--Ericsson's floating battery, a broadside vessel later known as the "Ironsides," and the "Galena." Mr. C.S. Bushnell, who was instrumental in bringing Ericsson's plans actually before the Board, later a.s.sociated with himself and Ericsson in the project two gentlemen of means, and large manufacturers of iron plate, Mr. John A. Griswold and Mr. John F. Winslow, who advanced most of the money needed, Mr.

Bushnell supplying the remainder. The keel was laid Oct. 25, 1861, and the "Monitor," as she was named by Ericsson, was launched Jan. 30, 1862, and was turned over to the Government Feb. 19, 1862. This brief record of construction leaves untold all history of the ceaseless struggle against time and of the superb organization and distribution of the work which made possible the completion of such a piece of work in the period of one hundred working days.

One important fact which goes far to explain this astonis.h.i.+ng speed in design and construction is found in the fact that Ericsson was not dealing with an entirely new and freshly developed proposition. He has stated that the thought of a floating battery, which should be small in size, but impregnable to the heaviest guns known and yet heavily armed herself, had long occupied his thoughts in connection with the problem of the defence of Sweden. Ericsson never forgot his native land, and gave to her political troubles and to the question of her defence against her more powerful neighbors much serious thought. As a result of this study, he had produced as early as 1854 a design embodying all the essential features of the "Monitor," and this design, shown by a model, was in that year sent to Napoleon III., who was then at war with Russia.

This was in the hope that he might in this way contribute to the overthrow of the latter, the hereditary enemy of his native land.

The design, however, was not adopted, and after it was returned was laid aside to collect the dust of his office, until the experiences of the Civil War brought it again to the light. The plan in all its main features had therefore long been matured, and it only remained to proceed rapidly with the details and with the realization of the idea in the most suitable materials to be obtained.

The result of the battle between the "Monitor" and the "Merrimac" in Hampton Roads is a part of history. The relentless devastation which the latter had begun on the old wooden s.h.i.+ps of the American Navy at Hampton Roads was stayed, and the wild fears at the North concerning the destruction which she might cause to the s.h.i.+pping and to the seaboard cities was calmed. The "Merrimac" met her master, and retired from the conflict crippled and shorn of power for further evil. A short time later she sank beneath the waters of the Chesapeake, and is now remembered only as the antagonist of the "Monitor."