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Isambard Kingdom Brunel (; 9 April 1806 – 15 September 1859) was a British
civil engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history," "one of the 19th-century engineering giants," and "one of the greatest figures of the
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
,
hochanged the face of the English landscape with his groundbreaking designs and ingenious constructions." Brunel built dockyards, the
Great Western Railway (GWR), a series of steamships including the first propeller-driven
transatlantic steamship, and numerous important bridges and tunnels. His designs revolutionised public transport and modern engineering.
Though Brunel's projects were not always successful, they often contained innovative solutions to long-standing engineering problems. During his career, Brunel achieved many engineering firsts, including assisting in the building of the
first tunnel under a
navigable river (the
River Thames
The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the R ...
) and the development of the , the first propeller-driven, ocean-going iron ship, which, when launched in 1843, was the largest ship ever built.
On the GWR, Brunel set standards for a well-built railway, using careful surveys to minimise gradients and curves. This necessitated expensive construction techniques, new bridges, new viaducts, and the
Box Tunnel. One controversial feature was the "
broad gauge" of , instead of what was later to be known as "
standard gauge" of . He astonished Britain by proposing to extend the GWR westward to North America by building steam-powered, iron-hulled ships. He designed and built three ships that revolutionised naval engineering: the (1838), the (1843), and the (1859).
In 2002, Brunel was placed second in a
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
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...
public poll to determine the "
100 Greatest Britons." In 2006, the bicentenary of his birth, a major programme of events celebrated his life and work under the name ''Brunel 200''.
Early life
Isambard Kingdom Brunel was born on 9 April 1806 in Britain Street,
Portsea,
Portsmouth,
Hampshire
Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in western South East England on the coast of the English Channel. Home to two major English cities on its south coast, Southampton and Portsmouth, Hampshire ...
, where his father was working on
block-making machinery. He was named
Isambard after his father, the French civil engineer Sir
Marc Isambard Brunel
Sir Marc Isambard Brunel (, ; 25 April 1769 – 12 December 1849) was a French-British engineer who is most famous for the work he did in Britain. He constructed the Thames Tunnel and was the father of Isambard Kingdom Brunel.
Born in Franc ...
, and Kingdom after his English mother,
Sophia Kingdom
Sophia Kingdom (15 February 1775 – 5 January 1855), later known as Lady Brunel, was the mother of Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Her father was William Kingdom, a contracting agent for the Royal Navy and the army, and her mother was Joan Spry. She wa ...
.
He had two elder sisters, Sophia, the eldest child, and Emma. The whole family moved to
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
in 1808 for his father's work. Brunel had a happy childhood, despite the family's constant money worries, with his father acting as his teacher during his early years. His father taught him drawing and observational techniques from the age of four, and Brunel had learned
Euclidean geometry
Euclidean geometry is a mathematical system attributed to ancient Greek mathematician Euclid, which he described in his textbook on geometry: the '' Elements''. Euclid's approach consists in assuming a small set of intuitively appealing axioms ...
by eight. During this time, he also learned to speak French fluently and the basic principles of engineering. He was encouraged to draw interesting buildings and identify any faults in their structure.
[Buchanan (2006), p. 18]
When Brunel was eight, he was sent to Dr Morrell's boarding school in
Hove, where he learned
classics. His father, a Frenchman by birth, was determined that Brunel should have access to the high-quality education he had enjoyed in his youth in France; accordingly, at the age of 14, the younger Brunel was enrolled first at the
University of Caen
The University of Caen Normandy (French: ''Université de Caen Normandie''), also known as Unicaen, is a public university in Caen, France.
History
The institution was founded in 1432 by John of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford, the first rector ...
, then at
Lycée Henri-IV in Paris.
[Brunel, Isambard (1870), p. 5.]
When Brunel was 15, his father, who had accumulated debts of over £5,000, was sent to a
debtors' prison
A debtors' prison is a prison for people who are unable to pay debt. Until the mid-19th century, debtors' prisons (usually similar in form to locked workhouses) were a common way to deal with unpaid debt in Western Europe.Cory, Lucinda"A Histori ...
. After three months went by with no prospect of release, Marc Brunel let it be known that he was considering an offer from the
Tsar of Russia
This is a list of all reigning monarchs in the history of Russia. It includes the princes of medieval Rus′ state (both centralised, known as Kievan Rus′ and feudal, when the political center moved northeast to Vladimir and finally to Mos ...
. In August 1821, facing the prospect of losing a prominent engineer, the government relented and issued Marc £5,000 to clear his debts in exchange for his promise to remain in Britain.
When Brunel completed his studies at Henri-IV in 1822, his father had him presented as a candidate at the renowned engineering school
École Polytechnique, but as a foreigner, he was deemed ineligible for entry. Brunel subsequently studied under the prominent master clockmaker and
horologist Abraham-Louis Breguet
Abraham-Louis Breguet (10 January 1747 – 17 September 1823), born in Neuchâtel, then a Prussian principality, was a horologist who made many innovations in the course of a career in watchmaking industry. He was the founder of the Bregue ...
, who praised Brunel's potential in letters to his father.
In late 1822, having completed his apprenticeship, Brunel returned to England.
Thames Tunnel
Brunel worked for several years as an assistant engineer on the project to create a tunnel under London's
River Thames
The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the R ...
between
Rotherhithe
Rotherhithe () is a district of south-east London, England, and part of the London Borough of Southwark. It is on a peninsula on the south bank of the Thames, facing Wapping, Shadwell and Limehouse on the north bank, as well as the Isle of D ...
and
Wapping
Wapping () is a district in East London in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. Wapping's position, on the north bank of the River Thames, has given it a strong maritime character, which it retains through its riverside public houses and steps, ...
, with tunnellers driving a horizontal shaft from one side of the river to the other under the most difficult and dangerous conditions. The project was funded by the Thames Tunnel Company and Brunel's father, Marc, was the chief engineer. The ''American Naturalist'' said "It is stated also that the operations of the
Teredo hipwormsuggested to Mr. Brunel his method of tunnelling the Thames."
The composition of the riverbed at Rotherhithe was often little more than waterlogged sediment and loose gravel. An ingenious
tunnelling shield designed by Marc Brunel helped protect workers from cave-ins, but two incidents of severe flooding halted work for long periods, killing several workers and badly injuring the younger Brunel.
The latter incident, in 1828, killed the two most senior miners, and Brunel himself narrowly escaped death. He was seriously injured and spent six months recuperating. The event stopped work on the tunnel for several years.
Though the Thames Tunnel was eventually completed during Marc Brunel's lifetime, his son had no further involvement with the tunnel proper, only using the abandoned works at Rotherhithe to further his abortive ''Gaz'' experiments. This was based on an idea of his father's and was intended to develop into an engine that ran on power generated from alternately heating and cooling carbon dioxide made from ammonium carbonate and sulphuric acid. Despite interest from several parties (the Admiralty included) the experiments were judged by Brunel to be a failure on the grounds of fuel economy alone, and were discontinued after 1834.
In 1865, the East London Railway Company purchased the Thames Tunnel for £200,000, and four years later the first trains passed through it. Subsequently, the tunnel became part of the London Underground system, and remains in use today, originally as part of the
East London Line now incorporated into the
London Overground
London Overground (also known simply as the Overground) is a suburban rail network serving London and its environs. Established in 2007 to take over Silverlink Metro routes, (via archive.org). it now serves a large part of Greater London as w ...
.
[Bagust, Harold, "The Greater Genius?", 2006, Ian Allan Publishing, , (pp. 97–100)]
Bridges
Brunel is perhaps best remembered for designs for the
Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol, begun in 1831. The bridge was built to designs based on Brunel's, but with significant changes. Spanning over , and nominally above the
River Avon, it had the longest span of any bridge in the world at the time of construction. Brunel submitted four designs to a committee headed by
Thomas Telford, but Telford rejected all entries, proposing his own design instead. Vociferous opposition from the public forced the organising committee to hold a new competition, which was won by Brunel.
Afterwards, Brunel wrote to his brother-in-law, the politician
Benjamin Hawes
Sir Benjamin Hawes (1797 – 15 May 1862) was a British Whig politician.
Early life
He was a grandson of William Hawes, founder of the Royal Humane Society, and son of Benjamin Hawes of New Barge House, Lambeth, who was a businessman and Fello ...
: "Of all the wonderful feats I have performed, since I have been in this part of the world, I think yesterday I performed the most wonderful. I produced unanimity among 15 men who were all quarrelling about that most ticklish subject—taste".
Work on the Clifton bridge started in 1831, but was suspended due to the
Queen Square riots caused by the arrival of Sir
Charles Wetherell in Clifton. The riots drove away investors, leaving no money for the project, and construction ceased.
Brunel did not live to see the bridge finished, although his colleagues and admirers at the
Institution of Civil Engineers
The Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) is an independent professional association for civil engineers and a charitable body in the United Kingdom. Based in London, ICE has over 92,000 members, of whom three-quarters are located in the UK, whi ...
felt it would be a fitting memorial, and started to raise new funds and to amend the design. Work recommenced in 1862, three years after Brunel's death, and was completed in 1864.
In 2011, it was suggested, by historian and biographer Adrian Vaughan, that Brunel did not design the bridge, as eventually built, as the later changes to its design were substantial. His views reflected a sentiment stated fifty-two years earlier by
Tom Rolt
Lionel Thomas Caswall Rolt (usually abbreviated to Tom Rolt or L. T. C. Rolt) (11 February 1910 – 9 May 1974) was a prolific English writer and the biographer of major civil engineering figures including Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Thomas Tel ...
in his 1959 book ''Brunel.'' Re-engineering of suspension chains recovered from an earlier suspension bridge was one of many reasons given why Brunel's design could not be followed exactly.
Hungerford Bridge, a
suspension footbridge across the Thames near
Charing Cross Station in London, was opened in May 1845. Its central span was , and its cost was £106,000. It was replaced by a new railway bridge in 1859, and the suspension chains were used to complete the Clifton Suspension Bridge.
The Clifton Suspension Bridge still stands, and over 4 million vehicles traverse it every year.
Brunel designed many bridges for his railway projects, including the
Royal Albert Bridge
The Royal Albert Bridge is a railway bridge which spans the River Tamar in England between Plymouth, Devon and Saltash, Cornwall. Its unique design consists of two lenticular iron trusses above the water, with conventional plate-girder app ...
spanning the
River Tamar
The Tamar (; kw, Dowr Tamar) is a river in south west England, that forms most of the border between Devon (to the east) and Cornwall (to the west). A part of the Tamar Valley is a World Heritage Site due to its historic mining activities.
T ...
at
Saltash
Saltash (Cornish: Essa) is a town and civil parish in south Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It had a population of 16,184 in 2011 census. Saltash faces the city of Plymouth over the River Tamar and is popularly known as "the Gateway to Corn ...
near
Plymouth,
Somerset Bridge (an unusual laminated timber-framed bridge near
Bridgwater), the
Windsor Railway Bridge, and the
Maidenhead Railway Bridge over the Thames in
Berkshire. This last was the flattest, widest brick arch bridge in the world and is still carrying main line trains to the west, even though today's trains are about ten times heavier than in Brunel's time.
Throughout his railway building career, but particularly on the
South Devon
South Devon is the southern part of Devon, England. Because Devon has its major population centres on its two coasts, the county is divided informally into North Devon and South Devon.For exampleNorth DevonanSouth Devonnews sites. In a narrower se ...
and
Cornwall Railway
The Cornwall Railway was a broad gauge railway from Plymouth in Devon to Falmouth in Cornwall, England, built in the second half of the nineteenth century. It was constantly beset with shortage of capital for the construction, and was eventu ...
s where economy was needed and there were many valleys to cross, Brunel made extensive use of wood for the construction of substantial viaducts; these have had to be replaced over the years as their primary material,
Kyanised Baltic Pine, became uneconomical to obtain.
Brunel designed the
Royal Albert Bridge
The Royal Albert Bridge is a railway bridge which spans the River Tamar in England between Plymouth, Devon and Saltash, Cornwall. Its unique design consists of two lenticular iron trusses above the water, with conventional plate-girder app ...
in 1855 for the Cornwall Railway, after
Parliament rejected his original plan for a train ferry across the
Hamoaze
The Hamoaze (; ) is an estuarine stretch of the tidal River Tamar, between its confluence with the River Lynher and Plymouth Sound, England.
The name first appears as ''ryver of Hamose'' in 1588 and it originally most likely applied just to a ...
—the estuary of the tidal
Tamar,
Tavy and
Lynher. The bridge (of ''bowstring girder'' or ''tied arch'' construction) consists of two main spans of , above mean high
spring tide, plus 17 much shorter approach spans. Opened by
Prince Albert on 2 May 1859, it was completed in the year of Brunel's death.
Several of Brunel's bridges over the Great Western Railway might be demolished because the line is to be electrified, and there is inadequate clearance for overhead wires.
Buckinghamshire County Council is negotiating to have further options pursued, in order that all nine of the remaining historic bridges on the line can be saved.
Brunel's last major undertaking was the unique
Three Bridges, London. Work began in 1856, and was completed in 1859.
The three bridges in question are a clever arrangement allowing the routes of the
Grand Junction Canal,
Great Western and Brentford Railway, and Windmill Lane to cross each other.
Great Western Railway
In the early part of Brunel's life, the use of railways began to take off as a major means of transport for goods. This influenced Brunel's involvement in railway engineering, including railway bridge engineering.
In 1833, before the Thames Tunnel was complete, Brunel was appointed chief engineer of the
Great Western Railway, one of the wonders of
Victorian Britain, running from London to
Bristol and later
Exeter.
The company was founded at a public meeting in Bristol in 1833, and was incorporated by
Act of Parliament
Acts of Parliament, sometimes referred to as primary legislation, are texts of law passed by the Legislature, legislative body of a jurisdiction (often a parliament or council). In most countries with a parliamentary system of government, acts of ...
in 1835.
It was Brunel's vision that passengers would be able to purchase one ticket at London Paddington and travel from London to New York, changing from the Great Western Railway to the ''
Great Western'' steamship at the terminus in
Neyland, West Wales.
He surveyed the entire length of the route between London and Bristol himself, with the help of many including his solicitor Jeremiah Osborne of Bristol Law Firm
Osborne Clarke who on one occasion rowed Brunel down the River Avon himself to survey the bank of the river for the route.
Brunel even designed the Royal Hotel in Bath which opened in 1846 opposite the railway station.
Brunel made two controversial decisions: to use a
broad gauge of for the track, which he believed would offer superior running at high speeds; and to take a route that passed north of the
Marlborough Downs—an area with no significant towns, though it offered potential connections to
Oxford and
Gloucester
Gloucester ( ) is a cathedral city and the county town of Gloucestershire in the South West of England. Gloucester lies on the River Severn, between the Cotswolds to the east and the Forest of Dean to the west, east of Monmouth and east ...
—and then to follow the Thames Valley into London. His decision to use broad gauge for the line was controversial in that almost all British railways to date had used
standard gauge. Brunel said that this was nothing more than a carry-over from the mine railways that
George Stephenson
George Stephenson (9 June 1781 – 12 August 1848) was a British civil engineer and mechanical engineer. Renowned as the "Father of Railways", Stephenson was considered by the Victorians
In the history of the United Kingdom and the ...
had worked on prior to making the world's first passenger railway. Brunel proved through both calculation and a series of trials that his broader gauge was the optimum size for providing both higher speeds
[Pudney, John (1974). ''Brunel and His World''. Thames and Hudson. .] and a stable and comfortable ride to passengers. In addition the wider gauge allowed for larger
goods wagon
Goods wagons or freight wagons (North America: freight cars), also known as goods carriages, goods trucks, freight carriages or freight trucks, are unpowered railway vehicles that are used for the transportation of cargo. A variety of wagon type ...
s and thus greater freight capacity.
Drawing on Brunel's experience with the Thames Tunnel, the Great Western contained a series of impressive achievements—soaring
viaducts such as the one in
Ivybridge
Ivybridge is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the South Hams, in Devon, England. It lies about east of Andy Hughes’ new house in Ivybridge now he’s forgotten Ugborough. It is at the southern extremity of Dartmoor, a N ...
, specially designed stations, and vast tunnels including the
Box Tunnel, which was the longest railway tunnel in the world at that time. There is an anecdote claiming that the Box Tunnel was deliberately aligned so that the rising sun shines all the way through it on Brunel's birthday.
The initial group of locomotives ordered by Brunel to his own specifications proved unsatisfactory, apart from the
North Star locomotive, and 20-year-old
Daniel Gooch
Sir Daniel Gooch, 1st Baronet (24 August 1816 – 15 October 1889) was an English railway locomotive and transatlantic cable engineer. He was the first Locomotive Superintendent, Superintendent of Locomotive Engines on the Great Western Rai ...
(later Sir Daniel) was appointed as
Superintendent of Locomotive Engines. Brunel and Gooch chose to locate their
locomotive works at the village of
Swindon, at the point where the gradual ascent from London turned into the steeper descent to the Avon valley at
Bath.
Brunel's achievements ignited the imagination of the technically minded Britons of the age, and he soon became quite notable in the country on the back of this interest.
After Brunel's death, the decision was taken that standard gauge should be used for all railways in the country. At the original Welsh terminus of the Great Western railway at
Neyland, sections of the broad gauge rails are used as handrails at the quayside, and information boards there depict various aspects of Brunel's life. There is also a larger-than-life bronze statue of him holding a steamship in one hand and a locomotive in the other. The statue has been replaced after an earlier theft.
The present
London Paddington station
Paddington, also known as London Paddington, is a Central London railway terminus and London Underground station complex, located on Praed Street in the Paddington area. The site has been the London terminus of services provided by the Great W ...
was designed by Brunel and opened in 1854. Examples of his designs for smaller stations on the Great Western and associated lines which survive in good condition include
Mortimer
Mortimer () is an English surname, and occasionally a given name.
Norman origins
The surname Mortimer has a Norman origin, deriving from the village of Mortemer, Seine-Maritime, Normandy. A Norman castle existed at Mortemer from an early point; ...
,
Charlbury
Charlbury () is a town and civil parish in the Evenlode valley, about north of Witney in the West Oxfordshire district of Oxfordshire, England. It is on the edge of Wychwood Forest and the Cotswolds. The 2011 Census recorded the parish's po ...
and
Bridgend (all
Italianate
The Italianate style was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. Like Palladianism and Neoclassicism, the Italianate style drew its inspiration from the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century Italian ...
) and
Culham
Culham is a village and civil parish in a bend of the River Thames, south of Abingdon in Oxfordshire. The parish includes Culham Science Centre and Europa School UK (formerly the European School, Culham, which was the only Accredited Europe ...
(
Tudorbethan). Surviving examples of wooden
train shed
A train shed is a building adjacent to a station building where the tracks and platforms of a railway station are covered by a roof. It is also known as an overall roof. Its primary purpose is to store and protect from the elements train car ...
s in his style are at
Frome
Frome ( ) is a town and civil parish in eastern Somerset, England. The town is built on uneven high ground at the eastern end of the Mendip Hills, and centres on the River Frome. The town, about south of Bath, is the largest in the Mendip d ...
and
Kingswear
Kingswear is a village and civil parish in the South Hams area of the English county of Devon. The village is located on the east bank of the tidal River Dart, close to the river's mouth and opposite the small town of Dartmouth. It lies within ...
.
The
Swindon Steam Railway Museum
STEAM – Museum of the Great Western Railway, also known as Swindon Steam Railway Museum, is housed in part of the former railway works in Swindon, England – Wiltshire's 'railway town'. The museum opened in 2000.
The site
The museum is ...
has many artefacts from Brunel's time on the Great Western Railway. The
Didcot Railway Centre
Didcot Railway Centre is a railway museum and preservation engineering site in Didcot, Oxfordshire, England. The site was formerly a Great Western Railway engine shed and locomotive stabling point.
Background
The founders and commercial backers ...
has a reconstructed segment of track as designed by Brunel and working steam locomotives in the same gauge.
Parts of society viewed the railways more negatively. Some landowners felt the railways were a threat to amenities or property values and others requested tunnels on their land so the railway could not be seen.
Brunel's "atmospheric caper"
Though unsuccessful, another of Brunel's interesting use of technical innovations was the
atmospheric railway
An atmospheric railway uses differential air pressure to provide power for propulsion of a railway vehicle. A static power source can transmit motive power to the vehicle in this way, avoiding the necessity of carrying mobile power generating e ...
, the extension of the Great Western Railway (GWR) southward from Exeter towards
Plymouth, technically the
South Devon Railway (SDR), though supported by the GWR. Instead of using
locomotives, the trains were moved by Clegg and Samuda's patented system of atmospheric (
vacuum) traction, whereby stationary pumps sucked the air from a pipe placed in the centre of the track.
The section from Exeter to Newton (now
Newton Abbot
Newton Abbot is a market town and civil parish on the River Teign in the Teignbridge District of Devon, England. Its 2011 population of 24,029 was estimated to reach 26,655 in 2019. It grew rapidly in the Victorian era as the home of the So ...
) was completed on this principle, and trains ran at approximately .
[Dumpleton and Miller (2002), p. 22] Pumping stations with distinctive square chimneys were sited at two-mile intervals.
Fifteen-inch (381 mm) pipes were used on the level portions, and pipes were intended for the steeper gradients.
The technology required the use of leather flaps to seal the vacuum pipes. The natural oils were drawn out of the leather by the vacuum, making the leather vulnerable to water, rotting it and breaking the fibres when it froze during the winter of 1847. It had to be kept supple with
tallow, which is attractive to
rats. The flaps were eaten, and vacuum operation lasted less than a year, from 1847 (experimental service began in September; operations from February 1848) to 10 September 1848. Deterioration of the valve due to the reaction of
tannin and
iron oxide has been cited as the last straw that sank the project, as the continuous valve began to tear from its rivets over most of its length, and the estimated replacement cost of £25,000 was considered prohibitive.
The system never managed to prove itself. The accounts of the SDR for 1848 suggest that atmospheric traction cost 3s 1d (three shillings and one penny) per mile compared to 1s 4d/mile for conventional steam power (because of the many operating issues associated with the atmospheric, few of which were solved during its working life, the actual cost efficiency proved impossible to calculate). Several
South Devon Railway engine houses
South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west.
Etymology
The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþaz ...
still stand, including that at
Totnes
Totnes ( or ) is a market town and civil parish at the head of the estuary of the River Dart in Devon, England, within the South Devon Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. It is about west of Paignton, about west-southwest of Torquay and abo ...
(scheduled as a grade II listed monument in 2007) and at
Starcross
Starcross is a village with a 2011 census recorded population of 1,737 situated on the west shore of the Exe Estuary in Teignbridge in the English county of Devon. The village is popular in summer with leisure craft, and is home to one of t ...
.
A section of the pipe, without the leather covers, is preserved at the
Didcot Railway Centre
Didcot Railway Centre is a railway museum and preservation engineering site in Didcot, Oxfordshire, England. The site was formerly a Great Western Railway engine shed and locomotive stabling point.
Background
The founders and commercial backers ...
.
In 2017, inventor Max Schlienger unveiled a working model of an updated atmospheric railroad at his vineyard in the Northern California town of Ukiah.
Transatlantic shipping
Brunel had proposed extending its transport network by boat from Bristol across the Atlantic Ocean to New York City before the Great Western Railway opened in 1835. The
Great Western Steamship Company was formed by Thomas Guppy for that purpose. It was widely disputed whether it would be commercially viable for a ship powered purely by steam to make such long journeys. Technological developments in the early 1830s—including the invention of the
surface condenser
A surface condenser is a water-cooled shell and tube heat exchanger installed to condense exhaust steam from a steam turbine in thermal power stations. These condensers are heat exchangers which convert steam from its gaseous to its liquid stat ...
, which allowed boilers to run on salt water without stopping to be cleaned—made longer journeys more possible, but it was generally thought that a ship would not be able to carry enough fuel for the trip and have room for commercial cargo. Brunel applied the experimental evidence of
Beaufoy and further developed the theory that the amount a ship could carry increased as the cube of its dimensions, whereas the amount of resistance a ship experienced from the water as it travelled increased by only a square of its dimensions. This would mean that moving a larger ship would take proportionately less fuel than a smaller ship. To test this theory, Brunel offered his services for free to the Great Western Steamship Company, which appointed him to its building committee and entrusted him with designing its first ship, the .
[Beckett (2006), pp. 171–73]
When it was built, the ''Great Western'' was the longest ship in the world at with a
keel. The ship was constructed mainly from wood, but Brunel added bolts and iron diagonal reinforcements to maintain the keel's strength. In addition to its steam-powered
paddle wheels, the ship carried four masts for sails. The ''Great Western'' embarked on her maiden voyage from
Avonmouth
Avonmouth is a port and outer suburb of Bristol, England, facing two rivers: the reinforced north bank of the final stage of the Avon which rises at sources in Wiltshire, Gloucestershire and Somerset; and the eastern shore of the Severn Es ...
, Bristol, to New York on 8 April 1838 with of coal, cargo and seven passengers on board. Brunel himself missed this initial crossing, having been injured during a fire aboard the ship as she was returning from fitting out in London. As the fire delayed the launch several days, the ''Great Western'' missed its opportunity to claim the title as the first ship to cross the Atlantic under steam power alone. Even with a four-day
head start, the competing arrived only one day earlier, having virtually exhausted its coal supply. In contrast, the ''Great Western'' crossing of the Atlantic took 15 days and five hours, and the ship arrived at her destination with a third of its coal still remaining, demonstrating that Brunel's calculations were correct. The ''Great Western'' had proved the viability of commercial transatlantic steamship service, which led the Great Western Steamboat Company to use her in regular service between Bristol and New York from 1838 to 1846. She made 64 crossings, and was the first ship to hold the
Blue Riband with a crossing time of 13 days westbound and 12 days 6 hours eastbound. The service was commercially successful enough for a sister ship to be required, which Brunel was asked to design.
Brunel had become convinced of the superiority of
propeller-driven ships over paddle wheels. After tests conducted aboard the propeller-driven steamship , he incorporated a large six-bladed propeller into his design for the , which was launched in 1843.
''Great Britain'' is considered the first modern ship, being built of metal rather than wood, powered by an engine rather than wind or oars, and driven by propeller rather than paddle wheel. She was the first iron-hulled, propeller-driven ship to cross the Atlantic Ocean. Her maiden voyage was made in August and September 1845, from Liverpool to New York. In 1846, she was run aground at
Dundrum, County Down
Dundrum () is a village and townland in County Down, Northern Ireland. It is beside Dundrum Bay, about 4 miles outside Newcastle on the A2 road. The village is best known for its ruined Norman castle. It had a population of 1,555 people at ...
. She was salvaged and employed in the
Australian service. She is currently fully preserved and open to the public in Bristol, UK.
In 1852 Brunel turned to a third ship, larger than her predecessors, intended for voyages to India and Australia. The (originally dubbed ''Leviathan'') was cutting-edge technology for her time: almost long, fitted out with the most luxurious appointments, and capable of carrying over 4,000 passengers. ''Great Eastern'' was designed to cruise non-stop from London to Sydney and back (since engineers of the time mistakenly believed that Australia had no coal reserves), and she remained the largest ship built until the start of the 20th century. Like many of Brunel's ambitious projects, the ship soon ran over budget and behind schedule in the face of a series of technical problems. The ship has been portrayed as a
white elephant
A white elephant is a possession that its owner cannot dispose of, and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is a metaphor used to describe an object, construction project, sch ...
, but it has been argued by David P. Billington that in this case, Brunel's failure was principally one of economics—his ships were simply years ahead of their time. His vision and engineering innovations made the building of large-scale, propeller-driven, all-metal steamships a practical reality, but the prevailing economic and industrial conditions meant that it would be several decades before transoceanic steamship travel emerged as a viable industry.
''Great Eastern'' was built at
John Scott Russell
John Scott Russell FRSE FRS FRSA (9 May 1808, Parkhead, Glasgow – 8 June 1882, Ventnor, Isle of Wight) was a Scottish civil engineer, naval architect and shipbuilder who built '' Great Eastern'' in collaboration with Isambard Kingdom Brune ...
's
Napier Yard in London, and after two trial trips in 1859, set forth on her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York on 17 June 1860. Though a failure at her original purpose of passenger travel, she eventually found a role as an oceanic
telegraph cable-layer. Under Captain
Sir James Anderson, the ''Great Eastern'' played a significant role in laying the first lasting
transatlantic telegraph cable, which enabled telecommunication between Europe and North America.
Renkioi Hospital
Britain entered into the
Crimean War
The Crimean War, , was fought from October 1853 to February 1856 between Russia and an ultimately victorious alliance of the Ottoman Empire, France, the United Kingdom and Piedmont-Sardinia.
Geopolitical causes of the war included the ...
during 1854 and an old Turkish barracks became the British Army Hospital in
Scutari. Injured men contracted a variety of illnesses—including
cholera,
dysentery
Dysentery (UK pronunciation: , US: ), historically known as the bloody flux, is a type of gastroenteritis that results in bloody diarrhea. Other symptoms may include fever, abdominal pain, and a feeling of incomplete defecation. Complications ...
,
typhoid
Typhoid fever, also known as typhoid, is a disease caused by ''Salmonella'' serotype Typhi bacteria. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often there is a gradual onset of a high fever over several d ...
and
malaria
Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects humans and other animals. Malaria causes symptoms that typically include fever, tiredness, vomiting, and headaches. In severe cases, it can cause jaundice, seizures, coma, or death. S ...
—due to poor conditions there, and
Florence Nightingale sent a plea to ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...
'' for the government to produce a solution.
Brunel was working on the ''Great Eastern'' amongst other projects but accepted the task in February 1855 of designing and building the
War Office
The War Office was a department of the British Government responsible for the administration of the British Army between 1857 and 1964, when its functions were transferred to the new Ministry of Defence (MoD). This article contains text from ...
requirement of a temporary,
pre-fabricated hospital that could be shipped to
Crimea
Crimea, crh, Къырым, Qırım, grc, Κιμμερία / Ταυρική, translit=Kimmería / Taurikḗ ( ) is a peninsula in Ukraine, on the northern coast of the Black Sea, that has been occupied by Russia since 2014. It has a pop ...
and erected there. In five months the team he had assembled designed, built, and shipped pre-fabricated wood and canvas buildings, providing them complete with advice on transportation and positioning of the facilities.
Brunel had been working with
Gloucester Docks-based
William Eassie on the launching stage for the ''Great Eastern''. Eassie had designed and built wooden prefabricated huts used in both the Australian gold rush, as well as by the British and French Armies in the Crimea. Using wood supplied by timber importers Price & Co., Eassie fabricated 18 of the 50-patient wards designed by Brunel, shipped directly via 16 ships from Gloucester Docks to the
Dardanelles
The Dardanelles (; tr, Çanakkale Boğazı, lit=Strait of Çanakkale, el, Δαρδανέλλια, translit=Dardanéllia), also known as the Strait of Gallipoli from the Gallipoli peninsula or from Classical Antiquity as the Hellespont (; ...
. The
Renkioi Hospital was subsequently erected near Scutari Hospital, where Nightingale was based, in the malaria-free area of
Renkioi.
[. ''Hospital Development Magazine''. 10 November 2005. Retrieved 22 September 2009.]
His designs incorporated the necessities of
hygiene
Hygiene is a series of practices performed to preserve health.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), "Hygiene refers to conditions and practices that help to maintain health and prevent the spread of diseases." Personal hygiene refer ...
: access to
sanitation
Sanitation refers to public health conditions related to clean drinking water and treatment and disposal of human excreta and sewage. Preventing human contact with feces is part of sanitation, as is hand washing with soap. Sanitation syste ...
, ventilation, drainage, and even rudimentary temperature controls. They were feted as a great success, with some sources stating that of the approximately 1,300 patients treated in the hospital, there were only 50 deaths. In the Scutari hospital it replaced, deaths were said to be as many as ten times this number. Nightingale referred to them as "those magnificent huts". The practice of building hospitals from pre-fabricated modules survives today,
with hospitals such as the
Bristol Royal Infirmary
The Bristol Royal Infirmary, also known as the BRI, is a large teaching hospital situated in the centre of Bristol, England. It has links with the nearby University of Bristol and the Faculty of Health and Social Care at the University of the Wes ...
being created in this manner.
Personal life
On 10 June 1830 Brunel was elected a
Fellow of the Royal Society.
Brunel married Mary Elizabeth Horsley (b. 1813) on 5 July 1836. She came from an accomplished musical and artistic family, being the eldest daughter of composer and organist
William Horsley. They established a home at Duke Street, Westminster, in London.
While performing a
conjuring trick for the amusement of his children in 1843 Brunel accidentally inhaled a
half-sovereign coin, which became lodged in his windpipe. A special pair of
forceps
Forceps (plural forceps or considered a plural noun without a singular, often a pair of forceps; the Latin plural ''forcipes'' is no longer recorded in most dictionaries) are a handheld, hinged instrument used for grasping and holding objects. Fo ...
failed to remove it, as did a machine devised by Brunel to shake it loose. At the suggestion of his father, Brunel was strapped to a board and turned upside-down, and the coin was jerked free. He recuperated at
Teignmouth, and enjoyed the area so much that he purchased an estate at Watcombe in
Torquay, Devon. Here he commissioned William Burn to design
Brunel Manor and its gardens to be his country home. He never saw the house or gardens finished as he died before it was completed.
Brunel, a heavy smoker, who had been diagnosed with
Bright's disease
Bright's disease is a historical classification of kidney diseases that are described in modern medicine as acute or chronic nephritis. It was characterized by swelling and the presence of albumin in the urine, and was frequently accompanied ...
(
nephritis), suffered a stroke on 5 September 1859, just before the ''Great Eastern'' made her first voyage to New York. He died ten days later at the age of 53 and was buried, like his father, in
Kensal Green Cemetery
Kensal Green Cemetery is a cemetery in the Kensal Green area of Queens Park in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London, England. Inspired by Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, it was founded by the barrister George Frederick ...
, London. He is commemorated at
Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an historic, mainly Gothic church in the City of Westminster, London, England, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the Unite ...
in a window on the south side of the nave. Many mourned Brunel's passing, in spite and because of his business ventures; an obituary in ''
The Morning Chronicle
''The Morning Chronicle'' was a newspaper founded in 1769 in London. It was notable for having been the first steady employer of essayist William Hazlitt as a political reporter and the first steady employer of Charles Dickens as a journalist. It ...
'' noted:
Brunel was the right man for the nation, but unfortunately, he was not the right man for the shareholders. They must stoop who must gather gold, and Brunel could never stoop. The history of invention records no instance of grand novelties so boldly imagined and so successfully carried out by the same individual.
Brunel was survived by his wife, Mary, and three children:
Isambard Brunel Junior (1837–1902),
Henry Marc Brunel (1842–1903) and
Florence Mary Brunel (1847–1876). Henry Marc later became a successful
civil engineer.
[
]
Legacy
A celebrated engineer in his era, Brunel remains revered today, as evidenced by numerous monuments to him. There are statues in London at
Temple (pictured),
Brunel University and Paddington station, and in Bristol, Plymouth, Swindon, Milford Haven and Saltash. A statue in
Neyland in
Pembrokeshire in
Wales
Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...
was stolen in August 2010. The topmast of the ''Great Eastern'' is used as a flagpole at the entrance to
Anfield, Liverpool Football Club's ground. Contemporary locations bear Brunel's name, such as
Brunel University in London, shopping centres in
Swindon and also
Bletchley, Milton Keynes
Bletchley is a constituent town of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. It is situated in the south-west of Milton Keynes, and is split between the civil parishes of Bletchley and Fenny Stratford and West Bletchley.
Bletchley is best known ...
, and a collection of streets in Exeter: Isambard Terrace, Kingdom Mews, and Brunel Close. A road, car park, and school in his home city of Portsmouth are also named in his honour, along with one of the city's largest public houses. There is an engineering lab building at the University of Plymouth named in his honour.
A public poll conducted by the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
in 2001 to select the