I was kept for some time in daily expectation of a reply from the War Office accepting my tender, but no letter arrived, and at last I ventured on seeking an interview with the Minister of War, Mr. Sidney Herbert. He appeared to know very little on the subject. I took, however, the opportunity of explaining to him, in as clear and concise a manner as possible, the great national interests hanging on his decision. I told him that steel, the strongest of all known conditions of the metal iron, had hitherto been so costly as to considerably restrict its use; that by my process we produced it at a cost not exceeding £6 or £7 per ton, instead of £50 or £60, its ordinary market value; that instead of being made in small crucibles of 40 lb. or 50 lb. only in weight, we could make five tons of it in the short space of twenty minutes in a single operation; and, what was still more important, instead of being the hard and brittle material, such as is required to make cutting implements, the new steel possessed a toughness and tenacity far exceeding the very finest qualities of wrought iron known in commerce. I also endeavoured to impress on him the fact that Colonel Eardley Wilmot had seen the process in operation, had amply tested it, and had in his office at Woolwich pieces of gun-tubes that had been put to such unheard-of proofs as to afford to the meanest capacity overwhelming evidence of its fitness for the construction of ordnance. I also told him that in the chemical laboratory numerous analyses had been made by their own chemist; that in their rolling mill, bars had been rolled, and in their testing-house an immense number of most satisfactory tests had been made as to the tenacity and toughness. I said that the people at the head of each of these departments at Woolwich could adduce abundance of corroborative evidence of every statement I had made.
Mr. Sidney Herbert listened to all this, and remarked that it was a technical question which he was not prepared to deal with at that moment; but said that he would give the whole matter his most earnest attention, and that I might call on him that day week to hear his reply.
I waited impatiently for this second interview, in full confidence that Colonel Wilmot, and other heads of the chemical and testing departments, would have been called on to corroborate, or disprove, the statements I had made, and would have given him such proofs in favour of mild Bessemer steel as would at once have secured me the contract to erect at Woolwich the converting apparatus which Colonel Wilmot was so anxious to see in practical operation there. But Mr. Herbert did not examine or consult Colonel Wilmot, who could have told him all about it. He made no enquiries at the testing or other departments at Woolwich, nor did he take the trouble to look at the flattened gun-tubes, and other proofs, which would have irresistibly convinced any man of ordinary capacity and intelligence that this material was, at least, well worthy of being put to a practical proof in the interests of the State, by the immediate construction of a gun. He informed me that he had consulted Sir William Armstrong, who, he said, had at once declared that "steel was wholly inapplicable to the construction of ordnance;" and who, if Mr. Sidney Herbert's statements were true, had succeeded in convincing him that it would be a waste of time and public money to put up the Bessemer apparatus at Woolwich. It was quite evident that Mr. Sidney Herbert had made up his mind to fling to the winds all the labours and trials of Colonel Wilmot, and at the same time to utterly ignore me and the expense and trouble to which I had been put.
The strongest protest on my part at this injustice, and my urgent request to have my process tried, failed to move Mr. Sidney Herbert one iota from his firm resolve to keep me and my process out of Woolwich, and to allow Sir William Armstrong, with his immensely more expensive welded iron gun, to have the field to himself. There was nothing for it but to submit, and I retired from this interview in deep disgust with Mr. Herbert and his arbitrary proceedings.
The event just recorded, although it had the effect of closing my connection with Woolwich Arsenal, did not in any way determine the fitness or otherwise of mild Bessemer steel for the construction of ordnance. I feel bound in honour, and in justice to my own name, to vindicate, not by mere words, but by an army of well-authenticated facts such as no intelligent person can lessen or deny, the perfect adaptability of this discarded material for that purpose.
It will be remembered by my readers that Bessemer steel, which is now
used, and its value acknowledged, over the whole civilised world, was
the direct outcome of my investigations in search of a more suitable
metal than was at that time employed in the construction of ordnance.
It is my present purpose to show that I had succeeded in attaining the
result which I sought, and thus not permit the mere assertion of one
man to obliterate from the page of history the fact that I originated a
process and produced a material which, at the time the experiments
were made by Colonel Wilmot at Woolwich, and for twelve years after
that period,*[1]
and consequently during the whole tenure of office of Sir
William Armstrong at Woolwich, stood unrivalled as a material for the
construction of ordnance. No other known process could, at that period,
produce steel with such marvellous rapidity, and at such an enormous
reduction in price; no other known method could produce in large masses
steel of such a degree of mildness as to pass, by almost imperceptible
gradations, downwards until it became soft iron; nor did there exist
any other known process by which large masses of almost chemically pure
iron could be produced without weld or joint.*[2]
Thus it happened that those ironmasters who had adopted my process had
to struggle against difficulties quite unknown in any old-established
trade. Need we wonder, then, that the quality of their steel sometimes
differed from day to day?
The ironmaster had been in the habit of making bar iron from every kind
of pig, and he could not realise the fact that good steel by my process
could only be made from a special quality of iron. This he did not like
to buy from other makers; in those early days he did not fully
understand how to make it himself, and hence he would use inferior
hematite iron, or mix some of his own phosphoric pig with it, to eke it
out and lessen the cost. The bad results so produced were all set down
to the uncertainty of the Bessemer process; nor did the extreme
jealousy of the steel trade prevent such unfavourable reports from
being published with all the usual embellishments naturally arising
from ignorance or prejudice.
This adoption of my process by the ironmaster for making rails went far
to discredit it. If you told a steel maker that it was being largely
used, he would say: "Well, perhaps it is good enough for rails;
anything is good enough for rails." Indeed, it is true that in the case
of rails moderate variations of temper were not
fatal. The rail might be a little too hard or too soft, but in either
case it was immensely superior to iron, and so it passed muster. But it
was when boiler plates, ships' plates or crank-axles, were required,
that the inexperienced ironmaster, with his inexperienced workmen,
began to realise the fact that steel was wanted of a certain standard
of quality for special purposes; and that he must train his men, who
were little else than mere apprentices learning a new trade, to
produce these several qualities with certainty. It is not at all
surprising, under such conditions, that Bessemer steel acquired the
character of being uncertain and not trustworthy. Hundreds of workmen
who had never before worked a plate of steel in their lives, and were totally
ignorant of its proper treatment, were engaged in the
manufacture of steel boilers and in building steel ships. Such workmen
had no hesitation in putting a hot steel plate down on the floor, with
one end in a puddle of water; or in placing a mass of cold iron on a
red-hot plate to keep it flat while cooling; or, on the other hand, in
overheating it in a furnace, quite unconscious that no steel would bear
the same high temperature as iron. And when they had thus succeeded in
spoiling a plate originally of good quality, they did not hesitate to
lay all the blame on the Bessemer process, which they honestly
believed was the sole cause of the mischief that their own want of
experience as steel-smiths had occasioned.
When the investigation of the character and properties of Bessemer
Steel, undertaken by Colonel Eardley Wilmot at Woolwich Arsenal, was
completed, all the early difficulties of the process had been entirely
removed. We had become intimately acquainted by use, and by analysis,
with several brands of Swedish pig-iron, from which either soft ductile
iron, or steel of any degree of carburation, could be -- and in fact
was -- daily produced at our Sheffield works, on a commercial scale
without the employment of spiegeleisen. We had command also of a
practically unlimited supply of a very high-class non-phosphoric
hematite Bessemer pig-iron, suitable for conversion into steel. We had
also magnesian pig-iron from Germany, and Franklinite pig-iron from the
United States, the latter containing about 11 per cent. of manganese,
which was greatly preferred for deoxydising steel derived from British
coke-made iron. We had our converting vessels at that time mounted on
axes; and, infact, the Bessemer process was so complete, and so under
command, as to enable us to produce at will, pure Swedish steel of all
tempers down to soft iron, and also mild hematite steel, as good in all
respects as we are able to make at the present day. Above all, we had
the advantage of the knowledge and experience of Mr. W.D. Allen,
Managing Partner of the Bessemer Steel Works at Sheffield. In proof of
my assertion that the Bessemer process was at that time as perfect in
results as at any later date, I will give a few examples of our
products, commencing at a period several months prior to the advent of
Sir William Armstrong at Woolwich, covering the whole five years of his
official power, and extending for some years after his departure from
the Arsenal.
Fig. 49, Plate XIX., is a photographic
reproduction of some test specimens, to which I have already alluded,
representing three out of four pieces of gun-tube tested at Woolwich,
two of them made of mild steel, and the others being nearly chemically
pure iron. It will be remembered that these cylinders were made at my
works at Sheffield, and were crushed flat, in the presence of Colonel
Wilmot and myself at Woolwich, while cold, under the heavy blows of a
large steam hammer. In order to give a correct idea of the nature and
appearance of these crushed gun-tubes and hoops, I refer my readers to
the photographic reproduction, Fig. 49. The specimens illustrated were
made of Bessemer hematite pig-iron, converted into steel by the
Bessemer process, and of a quality precisely the same as we were, at
that early period, daily using in the manufacture of railway-carriage
axles, piston-rods of steam engines, and other general machine
forgings.
In the illustration, A represents a portion of a gun-tube for a rifled
gun, machined and finished; B is one of these pieces, flattened, as
shown, and C is a larger hoop, crushed flat with the heavy blows of the
steam hammer. The two sides where the bend takes place are immensely
stretched on the exterior surface, and also greatly compressed on their
inner side, but at no point does the metal exhibit the smallest trace
of fracture. The dimensions of these specimens will be readily seen by
reference to the two-foot rule photographed with them. These examples
of the toughness and endurance of Bessemer mild steel, after being
subjected to violent and sudden strains, were exhibited in my large
glass case at the International Exhibition of 1862, and must have been
seen by hundreds and thousands of persons. When one reflects on the
extent and prominence of my exhibit, covering an enclosed area of 1,225
square feet, and surrounded by a counter of more than 100 ft. in
length, covered with steel exhibits, and having a 24-pounder gun
forging on a pedestal at the central entrance, and an 18 pounder
finished gun in the large central case, it is difficult to believe that
this gun-hoop and these crushed gun-tubes were not seen during the time
of the Exhibition by every engineer in London, and by every employe at
Woolwich Arsenal, as well as by our Minister of War, who with a light
heart excluded Bessemer process from Woolwich.
I desire to draw the reader's earnest attention to these crushed gun
tubes, for it is impossible, in my opinion, for any intelligent person
to look at these marvellous proofs of the toughness and power of
extension and distortion of the metal, and not be convinced that such a
material was pre-eminently suited for the construction of ordnance.
The two similar crushed cylinders which I gave to Colonel Wilmot were
greatly prized by him, and were kept as trophies, with several other
experimental proofs, on the writing-table in his private office at the
Arsenal, where I saw them on several occasions prior to his vacating
the office.
I may mention that when Colonel Wilmot inspected my Sheffield Steel
Works, he happened to see on the scrap-heap a large mass of Bessemer
malleable iron, which he wished to have for the purpose of experiment,
and which, at his request, was sent to him to Woolwich. On May 24th,
1859, speaking of Bessemer iron and steel at a meeting of the
Institution of Civil Engineers, he referred to this piece of iron
during the discussion, and stated that a cylindrical piece of Bessemer
pure iron, when only extended by forging to twice its original length,
had a tenacity per square inch of 28 tons 13 cwt. 1 qr. and 2 lb., a
tenacity which it possessed in all directions alike, as against the
best Yorkshire iron, which was usually credited with a tenacity of 25
tons in the direction of its length, and very considerably less across
the grain, even after being rolled and piled and again rolled into long
bars. These bars, when welded together to form a large forging of any
kind, will never afterwards possess the strength of the original bar,
by two or three tons per square inch. The analysis given by Colonel
Wilmot was issued from the Chemical Laboratory of the War Department,
and can be fully relied on as showing that no impurity but sulphur
existed in the specimen analysed in sufficient quantity to estimate,
while no spiegeleisen or manganese was used in its production. (This
metal was converted from Swedish pig.)
Colonel Eardley Wilmot's remarks are herewith reproduced from the
Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers.
Colonel Eardley Wilmot, R.A., said he had, from the commencement of
these inquiries, taken a great interest in them, and had mechanically
tested the products originally produced. A chemical examination was
also made at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, and the result had
indicated, and it had been stated at the same time, that the Bessemer
process was perfectly
effectual for removing the silicon from iron, but that it did not
operate upon the phosphorus or the sulphur. Acting on this knowledge,
which was corroborated in many quarters, Mr. Bessemer had wisely dealt
with such iron as yielded the desired result. As regarded the
difficulties of the process, as well as the results of it, he thought
that the best thing for a member of a practical society to do, was to
follow his example, and to go and see it for himself. Nothing could be
more simple, or more perfectly under control; and having, by a few
trials, ascertained the particular kind of treatment required, with the
sample of iron to be dealt with, it was operated upon with certainty.
It was said that there was nothing new in the process; but it might be
fairly asked, was it, or was it not, a new result, that a bar of iron
4 in. in diameter could be bent cold into a perfect contact, without
any sign of flaw? As regarded the particular product in which he was
most interested, namely, a cast metal for cannon, projectiles, iron
plates for shot-proof ships, and all military purposes, a circumstance
had not being mentioned which he would name as being peculiarly
instructive; while the metal, after having being operated on to the
extent required to make it malleable iron, was in the ladle ready for
pouring into the moulds, an accident occurred to the tapping-hole of
the ladle, and the metal was allowed to get cold in it, instead of
being poured out. Here was the ordinary condition of a common casting
in a gun mould, with, however, this important difference, that in this
case it was very shallow, as compared with the gun mould, and there
was, therefore, no condensation of the material from fluid pressure. A
cylinder of 2 in. diameter was taken out of this mass, and gave a
tenacity of 42,908 lb. on the square-inch, and a specific gravity of
7.626. A similar cylinder was drawn out under an ordinary smith's
hammer to twice its length, and then gave a tenacity of 64,426 lb., and
a specific gravity of 7.841. This portion of metal was examined by the
Chemist to the War Department, and was found to contain
As regarded the steel, he had been using it for turning the outside of
iron guns, cutting off large shavings several inches in length, and he
had found none superior to it, although much more costly. It was only
necessary to witness the operation of the manufacture by the Bessemer
process to be satisfied that the expense of converting the pig-iron
into any of the products involved scarcely any cost beyond the labour,
and that for a very short
period of time. And as far as the price went, Mr. Bessemer had offered
to supply such sizes as it was worth his while to make at the prices
stated.
The above quotation serves to corroborate what I have previously said
as to the deep interest taken by the Superintendent of the Royal Gun
Factories on this subject, and I much regret that the numerous analyses
made from time to time at the Arsenal have not been preserved. But I
find that I gave in my Paper, which I read in May, 1859, at the
Institution of Civil Engineers, when Colonel Wilmot was present, a
number of official tests of the tensile strength of soft Bessemer
malleable iron in its cast unhammered state, and also when hammered.
There were also several tests of highly-carburised Bessemer steel, in
hammered and unhammered condition.
The extreme limits of tensile strength of the converted metal are shown
in the following Tables, which give the results of many trials made at
different times at the Royal Arsenal at Woolwich, under the
superintendence of Colonel Wilmot :-
Footnotes
[2] I am speaking of a period of about twelve years
prior to the manufacture of any kind of open-hearth steel, and when the
production of mild crucible steel was extremely difficult and pure
malleable iron in large cast masses was impossible by any known process
but mine.
Many persons who are not intimately acquainted with the early history
of Bessemer steel have fallen into great error, and honestly believe
that the Bessemer process was in itself uncertain and incapable of
perfect control, and that the excellent material commercially produced
at the present time has been the result of a long succession of
improvements in the process since it left my hands. Nothing could be
more absolutely erroneous or more historically untrue, as I shall show
further on by incontestable proofs. No doubt all popular beliefs and
prejudices
have some real, or supposed, good reason for their origin, and this
particular popular error was, I admit, the outcome of circumstances only
too well calculated to give rise to, and perpetuate, such a belief! The
Bessemer process was sprung upon the iron trade suddenly, and in a
moment, as it were, it excited the wildest hopes and the direst
apprehensions. But it was very soon afterwards discovered that with
ordinary phosphoric pig-iron it failed to produce iron or steel of any
commercial value. It is almost impossible at this distant period to
realise the sudden revulsion of feeling which then took place, and the
utter disbelief in the whole scheme which followed, and, passing beyond
all reasonable bounds, has not, even at the time I am now writing,
entirely disappeared. When, after the labour of two years, I had
succeeded in making "Bessemer Pig" from British hematite; when from
that pig I had produced steel of excellent quality for all structural
purposes; when I had manufactured a high-class tool steel from Swedish
pig; and when also the tipping vessel was invented with the ladle
provided with a bottom valve, the conical mould, and the hydraulic
crane; when, in fact, the general system of the present day was a
proved commercial reality at my own works in Sheffield; then, and not
till then, did I again bring my process before the trade, when it still
met with blank incredulity and distrust. But this time I was backed
with proofs that could not be denied, for there, in the town of
Sheffield, in the very heart of the great steel industry of the
country, stood the Bessemer Steel Works, in daily commercial operation,
underselling the old-established manufacturer, who still resisted its
encroachment and obstinately refused to believe in it. But the
temptation to the ironmaster to become a steel manufacturer at then
existing prices was very great, and the adaptability of the process to
the manufacturer of rails was self evident. Rail mills and steel works
were established by people who had no previous knowledge or experience
of steel and its peculiarities, and, what was still worse, there was
not a manager or foreman, or even an ordinary workman, to be found who
had any knowledge whatever of the new process. As an instance of this
difficulty, I may mention a case in point. A very handy carpenter,
whom I had employed to assist in the works, had acquired a certain
amount of routine knowledge of the process. This
made him a valuable man, and one of my licensees who had adopted my
process bid a high price for this small amount of practical knowledge,
and engaged this carpenter's services, under a five years' agreement,
at £5 per week. It is only fair to say that he was quite worth it.
Silicon . . 0.00
Graphite . . 0.00
Combined Carbon . minute quantity
Sulphur . . 0.02
Phosphorus . . trace
Manganese . . trace
This appeared to him to approach more nearly to true iron than any he
had seen. The ordinary iron of the market was, in that sense, not iron,
but a compound of iron and certain other ingredients. The ordinary
re-melting would remove, or combine, the graphite only; the Bessemer
process would remove the silicon, and when applied to an iron having
but little phosphorus and sulphur, would do all that was required. If
an additional process was discovered for removing these, all the iron
ores of England, instead of only a very large portion of them, could
be converted into pure iron.
TESTS MADE AT WOOLWICH OF BESSEMER STEEL.
Tensile Strength per Square Inch.
. .
Bessemer Steel. . Various Trials. . Mean Tensile Strength.
.....................................................................
. lb .
. 42,780 .
. 48,892 .
In the cast . 57,295 . 63,023 lb.= 28.13 tons
unhammered state. . 61,667 . per square inch.
. 64,015 .
. 72,503 .
. 77,808 .
. 79,223 .
.....................................................................
. .
. 136,490 .
After hammering . 145,512 . 152,912 lb.= 68.26 tons
or rolling. . 146,676 . per square inch.
. 156,862 .
. 158,899 .
. 162,970 .
. 162,974 .
.....................................................................
COLONEL WILMOT'S EXPERIMENTS TESTS MADE AT WOOLWICH OF BESSEMER IRON.
Tensile Strength per Square Inch.
. .
Bessemer Iron. . Various Trials. . Mean Tensile Strength.
..........................................................................
. lb .
. 38,197 .
In the cast . 40,234 . 41,243 lb.= 18.41 tons
unhammered state. . 41,584 . per square inch.
. 42,908 .
. 43,290 .
...........................................................................
. .
. 64,059 .
After hammering . 65,253 . 72,643 lb. = 32.43 tons
or rolling. . 75,598 . per square inch.
. 76,195 .
. 82,110 .
...........................................................................
. .
. 63,591 .
Flat Ingot rolled . 63,668 . 68,319 lb. = 30.50 tons
into Boiler Plate . 72,896 . per square inch.
without piling. . 73,103 .
...........................................................................
Go to next chapter
[1] The open-hearth process was patented in 1865,
and practically introduced in 1869.