User:Talskiddy/John Bell (inventor)

John Bell (1747 - 1798) was British inventor and British Army Officier of the royal artillery, contrived a similar method of saving persons from stranded ships, in the year 1791,

by providing a mortar between 500 and 600 weight, with a chamber, capable of containing one pound of powder, and a bore to admit a leaden ball sixty pounds or upwards. When a ship is stranded, the mortar is to be elevated about 45°, and a rope or deep-sea line is to be fastened by one end to the ball, while the line itself, being coiled round parallel handspikes, may be easily and rapidly unfolded to its full extent. On the discharge of the mortar towards the shore, the ball will carry with it the line or rope, and by burying itself in the earth make that end of the rope fast, while the other end is in the stranded vessel : thus the rope becomes stretched between the vessel and the shore, and a communication thence established by means of rafts. The rafts recommended by lieutenant Bell are each formed by lashing together with ropes five empty watercasks belonging to the ship, and lying above them a seaman's chest, with holes cut in its sides, to prevent its filling, and to allow the person who rides in it better convenience for taking hold; pullies are attached to this chest, through which the rope is to run : the raft is also to be ballasted underneath, to prevent its upsetting. The mortar and necessary balls or shells that would be used on such an occasion might form a part of the ballast of the vessel ; and whenever a ship is driving or unmanageable near the shore, the mortar might be brought on deck, and the apparatus prepared. In some cases grapnels may be advantageously fired from common ordnance to answer the same purpose.

The following is a relation of some trials made before a committee of the Society of Arts at Woolwich, in August, 1791. From a boat moored about 250 yards from shore, the shell was thrown 150 yards on shore, with the rope attached to it; the shell was of cast iron, filled with- lead ; it weighed seventy-five pounds ; its diameter eight inches ; the rope in the trial was a deep-sea line, of which 160 yards weighed eighteen pounds; the angle of the mortar, from whence the shell was fired, was 45°. By means of the line, lieutenant Bell and another man worked themselves on shore upon his raft of casks; there were many links in the rope, but they were cleared with ease by lieutenant Bell, with the assistance of his match-blocks. The second trial was repeated in a similar manner, and with equal success, the shell falling within a few yards of the former place; the gale of wind was brisk, and the water rough. The direction of the shell was nearly from north to south, and the wind blew nearly north-west. In the third trial, the mortar was elevated to 70° ; the rope attached to the shell was an inch and half tarred rope, of which every fifty yards weighed fourteen pounds and a half. The shell was of the kind above mentioned ; it fell 160 yards from the mortar, and buried itself about two-thirds in the ground ; the line or rope run cut was about 200 yards, and it required the force of three men to draw the shell out of the ground at that distance.

There can be little doubt that, in many cases when vessels are stranded near the shore, the adoption of the means pointed out by lieutenant Bell would tend to the preservation of many valuable lives; and since a suitable piece of ordnance, with a block carriage and leaden balls, would not cost above eleven or twelve pounds sterling, the expense furnishes no objection of tnoment. Indeed, in trading vessels, such a piece might farther answer the purpose of making signals of distress, by filling the chamber with powder, and well wadding it, when the report of the firing would be heard to the distance of some miles; and, in defence of a ship, such a gun would be highly useful, on account of the facility which its shortness gives to its loading and firing. The Society of Arts &c., rewarded Mr. Bell, at that time a sergeant in the royal artillery, with fifty guineas for his invention : they published the particulars in the tenth volume of theirTransactions, and thought it expedient again, in the year 1807, to insert a descriptive engraving that had been omitted at that time, with some farther particulars in the twenty-fifth volume. Models and drawings of the whole apparatus are reserved in the society's repository for the instruction of the public.

To save the lives of shipwrecked persons, and to rescue mariners from a watery grave, seems, even in idea, a contemplation so eminently benignant, and in its execution, to a warlike, commercial, and generous nation like this, an undertaking so truly benevolent, so extensively philanthropic, that we cannot sufficiently applaud the humanity of the inventor of an apparatus to save the lives and property of the shipwrecked mariners in the extremity of danger.

As there are few in this great nautical nation that are not directly, collaterally, or generally connected with marine affairs and marine adventures, the consideration, therefore, takes strong possession of the feelings of individuals, and of society at large, by the patriotic means of protecting the lives of a class of the most important members of the biter, and giving the former, that kind of moral security, and, consequently, mental happiness, which must arise from the perusal of a small octavo volume, published by captain G. W. Manby, of the royal navy, and an honorary member of the Humane Society.

contains info from The London encyclopaedia: or, Universal dictionary of science ..., Volume 20 edited by Thomas Curtis a book in the Public domain