Fredericton, Nov
16th, 1881
Sir,
In further pursuit of the subject of a Ship Railway for the Isthmus of
Chignecto, I may be permitted to reply to some criticisms of the press.
I have, as you are aware, courted publicity ever since the scheme was
broached, six and a half years ago. My plans were hung on the
walls of the News Room in Saint John for two years after they were
exhibited in the Mechanics’ Exhibition. Every opportunity has
been given to the public and to engineers to find fault with it if they
could. After all this publicity, the worst that has been said is
that it is a ‘novelty’ and an ‘experiment’. I think it deserves
no such appellation; but let me say that if nothing were to be
attempted that had ‘never been done before’, the world would be at a
standstill; there would be an end to all progress. We should
never have been civilized, but simply have remained in our original
savage state.
In 1718, Count Emanuel Swedenborg, who was a military engineer, and
also the founder of the sect of ‘Swedenborgians’, constructed a road
for carrying laden vessels from Stromstadt to Idefjal in Sweden.
This road was twenty miles in length, and passed over a very
mountainous country. Swedenborg was made a noble for this service
by the King of Sweden. I cannot inform you how long this road was
used, but history tells us that Charles XII used it in the war with
Russia in 1718 to transport cannon to the siege of Frederikshall, and
sloops of war, galleys and large boats were then carried over it by
what is described as a ‘rolling machine’.
To go back still further, a ship railway was built and worked over the
Isthmus of Corinth twenty-three centuries ago. Recent excavations
in Greece have discovered the remains of this ship railway. It
was called ‘The Dioclus’. It was established from the harbor of
Schoenus to the eastern extremity of Port Lechaeum. This Dioclus
was nothing if not a ship railway, - polished granite stones having
been used in place of iron rails.
The Dioclus was worked probably for two centuries or more, until the
Emperor Nero commenced a canal, which was never finished. It was
in existence in the time of Aristophanes, B.C. 427, and was worked up
to the time of the Peloponnesian war.
The object of the Dioclus was to avoid the difficulty of weathering
Cape Malea, and the short cut through the isthmus made Corinth the most
opulent city of Europe, for it became the emporium of trade between
Italy and Asia. In similar manner St. John may become the
distributing point for Canada of the West India trade when the
Chignecto Ship Railway is finished.
This work, whether as regards constructing or operating, is, with our
modern appliances and inventions, mere play compared with the Herculean
task of the Dioclus, without dynamite, steam power, iron rails, or
hydraulic lifts.
This Railway will be simply a Marine Slip extended, with hydraulic
lifts at either end. Marine slips are used in the naval arsenals
of every country of the world. Ships are dragged out of the
water up an incline, more or less steep, by ropes, sometimes chains,
the power applied being a stationary steam engine. The difference
between the ship railway and the marine slip is that the former is
longer and the track will be level or nearly so, and consequently
vessels will be more easily hauled along it than on a steep incline,
and they will not be liable to the same strain as on a slip.
The hydraulic lift is certainly not an experiment. It has been
used ever since the erection of the Brittania bridge over the Menai
Straits. It is in use at Anderton, Cheshire, England, for
transferring laden vessels from the Trent and Mersey Canal to the River
Weaver. Vessels with cargos have been raised and lowered by this
means a height of fifty feet for may years, without the slightest
accident or delay.
The lifts proposed for the Chignecto Ship Railway will be similar to
those of the Thames Graving Docks on the North Woolwich Railway, near
London, where vessels have been raised out of the water, for repairing
purposes, for upward of twenty years.
Stationary engines will be used to draw vessels off the lift and to set
them in motion for some distance beyond, when a powerful locomotive
will be all that is necessary to move the load the remaining
distance. There are locomotives on this continent capable of
doing this service.
I assisted in the construction of a work of great magnitude in
Brazil. I allude to the inclines of the Sao Paulo Railway, where
loaded trains are hauled up a mountain half a mile high on a grade of
five hundred and forty feet to the mile. These inclines cost a
million dollars a mile, and they were five miles long. The
stationary engines used there are capable of drawing 5,000 tons on a
level road.
We will not have to deal with such great weights on the Chignecto Ship
Railway. We do not propose to carry Cunard ships. The lake
propellers, three masted schooners and fishing vessels will be about
the average of laden vessels to be transported. We must, however,
be prepared to convey ships of larger size that may be seeking
cargo. In effect, we must do whatever the Baie Verte Canal was
designed to do. And, if I mistake not, we shall do it more
speedily, more cheaply and more efficiently.
I will refrain, however, from making comparison with the Canal; that
scheme is dead and buried. Requiescat in pace. Let us erect
on its grave a monument of engineering skill and commercial enterprise
more worthy of the nineteenth century.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
H.G.C. Ketchum, M.Inst. C.E.