Stephenson's Rocket
by Jay Lake
 
 

 

March 17th, 1827

Mister George Stephenson

Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Northumberland 

My Dear Mister Stephenson,

I hope this letter finds you well.  Forgive my unaccustomed bluntness, but I am writing on a matter of some urgency to Mr. Canning the First Lord of the Treasury, as well as Mr. Richards and his colleagues at the Bank of England.  More to the point, His Majesty has elected to take a particular interest in this issue.

Our men in America have found that a Colonel John Stevens of the city of Hoboken, New Jersey is working at a feverish pace to complete a prototype of an American-designed 'steam waggon.'  This vessel is very similar in concept to your own Locomotion Number One so celebrated in its introduction to service these two years past on the Stockton and Darlington Railway.

Were this work under way in His Majesty's dominions, the Crown would be pleased to assist you in bringing Colonel Stevens' enterprise to a swift halt under the provisions of patent law.  As it takes place in the country of our cousins, so to speak, sheer commercialism must prevail.  While other, more extreme measures might in principle lie within our reach, they do not apply in this case for reasons of state.

The nub of the problem presents itself in the matter of locomotive performance.  As you know, the Reverend Doctor Lardner, one of England's pre-eminent experts on steam engines, has stated unequivocally that high speeds are not possible, as the induced vacuum will deplete the breathing air of the passengers.  Preliminary experiments conducted by the Royal Navy, the Greenwich Observatory and selected Fellows of the Royal Society working in confidence have initially verified the substance of the Reverend Doctor's prediction, with a speed of approximately twenty-eight miles per hour being sufficient to introduce partial vacuum in a well-enclosed railway carriage.  This would lead to the asphyxiation predicted by the Reverend Doctor, as well as various unpleasant physical effects on the corpus of the departed.

If Colonel Stevens were to succeed in his efforts and adduce the full and correct principles of high-speed motion and concomitantly induced vacuum prior to His Majesty's government possessing that same information, there is every reason to fear that our American cousins might pass that information on to inimical foreign powers.  I am therefore authorized to convey to you a purse of 5,000 pounds sterling and communicate to you His Majesty's sense of urgency in this regard.  I will expect regular reports and your utmost secrecy in this matter.

Yr. Odbt. Servant in support of Dame Progress.

Josiah Grimes, Treasury Clerk 

*     *     * 

September 12th, 1827

Mister George Stephenson

Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Northumberland

Mister Stephenson,

It saddens me to report that Colonel Stevens of New Jersey is rumored to have achieved a success similar to your own in the course of this year.  I hope that your motivations and funding are sufficient to ensure success for His Majesty's government in these matters of force-of-arms and commerce.

Please accept my most profound thanks for your kind offer.  It was not my intention in our recent correspondence to advance myself as a human observer in the matter of high speed transit.  Perhaps I inadvertently created confusion with my own small suggestions on the value of sapient perception in lieu of scientific instruments.  Even if it were within my heart to participate in such a great scientific adventure, my duties to the First Lord and His Majesty require me to stay here in London.

Clearly Providence was watching over me in the matter of the miscommunication, given the unfortunate outcome for the Berkshire hog placed within your rail cart as part of the reported testing effort of August the 2nd.  It gladdens my heart that you were at the least able to share the resultant vacuum-shredded pork with your workmen.  If there are any eruptions from the local farmers, please advise me.  I shall dispatch a suitably titled representative to deal with such grumbling.

I regret to read that your experiments in velocity have not progressed well since the Berkshire hog incident.  The perils and advantages of vacuum are but poorly understood even by the Reverend Doctor Lardner and his colleagues.  There is restiveness here in official London in the same regard, especially on the part of His Majesty.  Nonetheless, I have not yet been instructed to abandon the project.

I must question why you are attempting to acquire the entire English supply of Mr. Peal's vile caoutchouc.  The sticky stuff has little commercial value other than its mediocre powers of resistance to moisture.  Furthermore, it is costly due to the exigencies of transport from its native climes in Spanish America.  For my own part, I cannot understand what you see in Spanish American tree sap.  While reluctantly endorsing your project, Viscount Goderich, the late Mister Canning's successor, has made it clear that additional expenses should be fully accountable.

Caoutchouc is difficult to account for, Mr. Stephenson.

Please advise me as to your intentions in sufficient detail for me to make positive representations to my superiors.

Respectfully,

Josiah Grimes, Asst. Under-Sec.y to the First Lord

*     *    *

January 19th, 1828

Mr. George Stephenson

Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Northumberland

Mister Stephenson,

All is understood!  Your delivery to the Court of St. James of the vacuum apparatus, including pump boy and hog handler, was most well received.  Even His Grace the Duke of Wellington, the new First Lord, confessed to being overwhelmed by the explosive nature of the demonstration.  Or perhaps I should say 'implosive', if you will pardon the essay of a simple jest on my part.  Certainly the rapid vacuum-induced motion of the hog along the caoutchouc-coated canvas tube was a surprise even to many of the learned men of the court.  That you have repeated this experiment on the bottom of the River Tyne is a wonder, most presumably to the animal.

His Majesty was quite taken with the whole affair and has proceeded to despatch a fast vessel of the Royal Navy to acquire additional stocks of caoutchouc at the Caribbean ports.

I understand as well that you propose improvements in boiler design which may result in a locomotion engine of higher performance within a relatively small weight, important for your efforts to harness the Lardner vacuum effect as an asset rather than a liability to high speed transport.  I have shared your sparse comments with the Reverend Doctor Lardner, who, while skeptical, endorses the principle of your innovations.  I believe he may be in communication with the manufacturers in order to better his understanding.

As you requested, the marine engineer William James is being dispatched to your workshops, along with a team of Royal Navy sailmakers.  My meager learning is stretched to its bounds by my efforts to understand how the pressures of the waters can create an environment corresponding with the lack of pressures in a vacuum.  If Mr. James' diving suits further your efforts, so much the better.  I cling to the hope of future elucidation. After the happy conclusion of the caoutchouc affair, your word is bond here in official London.

I am furthermore told that Boulton & Watt will soon deliver the new boiler which you had ordered.  I am at a loss as to understand the confluence of submarine pigs and high-pressure boilers, but as always I remain eager to learn.

I eagerly await news of what miracles you may next wreak.

A most prosperous New Year to you sir,

J. Grimes

*     *     *

August 17th, 1828

Mr. George Stephenson

Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Northumberland

Mister Stephenson,

We are undone, I fear.  The Americans' uncouth President Adams has made a general announcement at their benighted capital that this past twentieth day of February, Colonel Steven's steam waggon 'Friendship Seven' has breached the thirty miles-per-hour barrier with a human observer aboard.  This was one Mister Glenn Johns of their Ohio province, who was to all appearances recruited for his rough frontier ways and fortitude.  Mister Johns is reported to have been wrapped in a canvas suit similar to your own designs, layered with silk and lacquered to achieve some resistance to vacuum.

His Majesty was devastated and waxed wrothful about the court for several hours upon being apprised of the news.  Since the dreadful American announcement, our own persistent fellows from The Times and other Fleet Street parasites have besieged Government with requests regarding our own stratagems for countering this terrible American advantage in military and civil affairs.  I am afraid the secrecy surrounding your own operations in Newcastle cannot persist much longer.

It therefore came as news of great import that you have wrought another miracle.  A sustained track speed in excess of thirty miles per hour!  And survival of the test subject!  Though the accident with the caoutchouc lining of the vacuum-suit was certainly regrettable.  I now see the worth of your adaptation of our latest marine engineering to the problem at hand.  Perhaps the design flaws will work themselves out soon.  In the matter of the unfortunate hog, I assume you mounted another feast for your workmen.

You report that Mr. Dalton's improved barometric instruments indicate the predicted partial vacuum inside the carriage does indeed come to pass, at approximately twenty-eight miles per hour.  I have conveyed this information to Reverend Doctor Lardner, who replies with his compliments and good wishes for your continued success.  He promises to forward a description of his theories regarding vacuum, atmospheric pressure and the best means to viably achieve higher speeds.

Our man in New York has passed the word that Colonel Stevens continues working with American Naval men.  On instructions directly from His Majesty and His Grace in joint consultation, I must charge you with ensuring that His Majesty's Admirals and Generals fully understand the employment of your new technologies.

Perhaps you could create a vacuum cannon that would cause enemies' bodies to erupt as have those of the unfortunate hogs?  Such a weapon would be so terrible that upon first demonstration, His Majesty's enemies must needs renounce their military ambitions for fear of its application.

For my own part, I must confess that I find it a blessing to live in such rapidly advancing times as ours.

In addendum, I forwarded your request for a battalion of Royal Engineers to the Board of Ordnance at Woolwich with an endorsement from His Grace.  I remain curious as to your purpose in employing such expertise in your works.

Yours,

J. Grimes

*     *     *

January 30th, 1829

Mr. George Stephenson

Newcastle-upon-Tyne

Northumberland 

Mr. Stephenson,

Felicitations for the New Year.  Your most recent missive arrived on Christmas Day and caused great consternation at the court.

That you have turned the problem around, from managing a vacuum inside the carriage to managing a vacuum outside the carriage, is a stroke of genius worthy of a modern Newton.  It seems that if one is to dress a pig in a vacuum-suit, one may as well manage the vacuum to one's own convenience.  My compliments also to whatever artillery veteran it was that suggested you should clad the locomotive like a shell ready for firing.  The sketchwork is most impressive.

The First Lord is of the opinion that Mister James, Major Xavier and yourself have perhaps been enjoying a bit too much vacuum in your diets.  Nonetheless, beyond any bounds of rational expectation, His Majesty has looked favorably upon your request for use of the mountain Ben Nevis as a site for a full-sized vacuum tunnel.

Troops have been dispatched to Fort William to clear the area in accordance with your wishes, with especial attentions to the eastern slopes.  Six shiploads of convict labor are being sent from Ireland, with a sufficiency of troops to control the savages should they prove unruly.  All available tonnage of Mr. Aspdin's Portland cement is being shipped to Fort William.  As it happens, His Majesty’s ship Viscount Moreland has returned from the Caribbean heavily loaded with caoutchouc.  The Admiralty has directed the vessel to call at Fort William and offload directly there.

For the love of God, Mr. Stephenson, I hope you know what you are about.  The diversion of resources to your project has become substantial, to the alarm of the Exchequer.  Parliament threatens the First Lord with Questions.  The hordes of Fleet Street are approaching and all the eyes of the Empire will shortly be upon you.

Another miracle would not be remiss.

With trepidation,

Jo. Grimes

*     *     *

July 17th, 1829

Mr. George Stephenson

Fort William

Inverness-shire 

Mr. Stephenson,

I am certain that word has reached your ears of the Vacuum Riots in London, Bristol and Belfast.  While your launching of the Berkshire hogs across the Irish Sea via the vacuum-tunnel may have been an engineering success qualified only by the poor condition of the animals upon arrival, the outcome in social costs has been a terrible burden on the Crown and upon the people of Great Britain.  Half a block of Belfast shops ruined in the arrival of the hogs, not to mention so many Irish injured, was most unexpected.

The county militias were turned out against British citizens; something it was to be hoped might never have come to pass in our lifetimes.  That dreadful termagant Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley is reputed to be at the head of the mobs crying for an end to the vacuum slavery of the free peoples of the world, especially women.  The Pankhurst sisters have gone over to the widow Shelley’s side, and she is supported as well by Reformists agitating against the so-called rotten boroughs, thereby binding two groups of radicals into one force.

What is your progress, sir?  I must warn you that your silence, except for terse requisitions brought in by messengers, imperils your continued freedom of enterprise.  The absence from London of both Sir Marc Isambard Brunel and the Reverend Doctor Lardner has been noticed by the Royal Society, which has been making inquiries of the First Lord’s office.  If not for the threat of Colonel Stevens and his works now at Mt. Vernon, Virginia, you would likely already be answering before the bench of His Majesty's justice for misappropriation of funds.

Come, man, I implore in the name of all that has gone between us, show your hand before it is too late for all concerned.

In haste,

Jo. Grimes.

*     *     *

October 1st, 1829

Mr. George Stephenson

Fort William

Inverness-shire

My Dear Mr. Stephenson,

I am in receipt of your invitation of the 4^th ult. to travel to Ben Nevis for an October showing of your enlarged vacuum tunnel project.  Even in my enthusiasm for your efforts, I must confess that what you hope to accomplish is simply beyond me, sir.

I have seen Major Xavier's latest diagrams, and read the reports, both of your efforts and those of Colonel Stevens.  The giant Boulton & Watt boilers with their mighty pistons that Reverend Doctor Lardner has helped you erect upon the withered heath must be picturesque, a very temple in iron to Dame Progress.  The miles of tunnels leading up the slopes of Ben Nevis, pumped out to dark vacuum, are like unto the labyrinth of the Minotaur.  The canvas hoses, sealed with caoutchouc, that stretch those miles, are like the arteries of the body.

I see the beauty, the metaphors, the empire-killing expense of it all, but damn my own eyes man, I do not see what it is for.  I suppose I shall learn shortly, as by express order of His Majesty I will be in attendance at Ben Nevis.  It pleases our monarch that I, who have watched over this project since the beginning on behalf of the privy council, should now come and witness the final bearing of fruit in person.

I do not believe I am remiss in observing the none too secretive hand of the Duke of Wellington behind my assignment to your benighted Scotch quarters.  He has always resented my agency on your behalf in this unprecedented drain on His Majesty’s Treasury.  If I may be permitted a terribly impolitic remark, it is the drear minds of Government that sometimes most retard the progress of Science.  You may expect me within a week of your receipt of this letter.

Along with me, it would appear that half of England shall be there.  I believe the First Lord plans to attend in person, and His Majesty will also send several personal representatives.  Almost the entire Royal Society is already under way in your direction.  Even Mr. Trevithick, overcome with jealousy, travels in their van.

I very much hope you are in full command of your faculties and intentions.  Were your project to fail, the embarrassment to both England and to yourself would be nearly fatal.

Mrs. Shelley has announced from her headquarters at Bristol that she and the New People's Army will be attending under flag of truce.  I should heartily recommend to you to stay out of any lines-of-sight in which she may stand.  There are many in Horse Guards who would be pleased to dispatch her even on pain of the noose for themselves.  The widow Shelley is a mortification to all of us.  It is to your luck that her adventures among the countrymen distract attention from the fiscal and social consequences of your unprecedented and mysterious efforts there on Ben Nevis.

I also appreciate your forwarding of a hundred pounds of salt-cured shredded pork.  The significance of the viands with respect to these enterprises is not lost on me, as good Berkshire hogs have given their all for England time and again.  Hopefully the final flaws in your vacuum-diving suits will shortly be resolved.  Even in the face of potential engineering perfection I still insist, however, that I shall not stand as your human observer in your first, great test of the enlarged vacuum tunnel.

My feet will never leave England's soil.

With kind regards,

Josiah Grimes

*     *     *

October 31st, 1829

Mr. George Stephenson

Fort William

Inverness-shire

Mr. Stephenson,

You have wrought a miracle!  I swear that I could almost touch the Sun.  Though I fear I am Icarus to your Daedelus, still my current condition is a glorious state unsought even by the dreaming mind of man.  I am grateful to the First Lord for offering me as a volunteer in this noble effort.  It is an honor to surrender my life for the betterment of England.

I write now for the most part only because it is my habit to think of you as a correspondent, even though we finally shook hands this past October the twelfth in Fort William.  I fear that my time is limited.  I have completed the instrument observations that required a keen human eye, and have placed the log book in its armored box.  Would that there were such armor to shield my person on landing!  I shall place this letter with the instrument log before sealing the box, in the event that our men in America can retrieve anything of the wreckage to come.

Please forgive the mediocre penmanship.  I have always despised those men who write with pencils, for that is the mark of a poor copyist, yet your Major Xavier was perfectly correct in his speculations.  My quills are worse than useless here above the roof of the sky.

The vacuum-diving suit is not such a terrible burden, though my bladder itches abominably, if you will pardon my directness on such a personal matter.  It was well that Major Xavier advised me not to eat this past day or more.  I shall not elaborate further except to say that while a condemned man is normally granted a last meal, I am now glad of forgoing such privilege.

And who would have dreamed of lining canvas with caoutchouc to shield against the vacuum of the aether?  You are genius, sir, this vacuum-diving suit only one of many great marks in the ledger of your life and work.

Most importantly, even as I gasp out my life before this view of unparalleled strangeness, the tight bonds of earth, against which we all strain without ever knowing, have released me to flight as if I were the most gracile bird.  I see oceans and clouds below me as the world curves away beneath these diamond hard stars, all the works of man and England so tiny as to be less than the hills of ants.  If only I were not so cold here, I might enjoy it more.

I suppose I shall momentarily arrive in America.  If I survive the landing, which I seem certain not to, they are more likely to imprison or hang me than to send me back.  Nonetheless Mr. Stevenson, I adjudge your rocket a success.

Railways mean so little now that you have delivered the ballistic arts into England's grasp.  I only hope my own missile is so terrible and wasteful of life in its impact with the earth that the Americans will foreswear their own works in the face of such destruction.  Thus would your efforts to secure the frontiers of the aether through vacuum for the good of the crown be also successful in binding the world to peace.

The end approaches, but I have no regrets.  I die in the arms of Dame Progress, serving England with my last breath.

Yours in flight,

J.

About the Author:

His next few projects include The River Knows Its Own (Wheatland Press), Mainspring (Tor Books) and Madness of Flowers (Night Shade Books). In 2004, Jay won the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. He has also been a Hugo nominee for his short fiction and a three-time World Fantasy Award nominee for his editing. Jay can be reached via his Web site at http://www.jlake.com/ or by email at jlake@jlake.com.