Hydraulics: the Flow of Water Through Orifices, Over Weirs, and Through Open Conduits and Pipes
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Hamilton Smith was an American mining engineer. His Exploration Company became an important factor in the development of mines throughout the world, but notably in South Africa, where gold had been discovered in 1885.
Background
He was born on July 5, 1840 in Louisville, Kentucky, United States. He was the grandson of Valentine Smith, a judge at Durham, New Hampshire, where the family had been established for over a century. His father, also named Hamilton Smith, was trained in the law and went to Louisville, Kentucky, where he practised with brilliant success. He married Martha, daughter of William Hall of Bellows Falls. His mother died when he was small, his father married again, and at the age of six the boy was sent back to his grandfather at Durham.
Education
He attended the village school at Durham.
Career
His father had established a cotton factory and coal mines at Cannelton, Ind. , and there Hamilton was sent, in his fourteenth year, to acquire a mastery of those enterprises through experience in their engineering and accounting departments. He soon demonstrated his ability, and at an early age was recognized as the chief of the engineering and accounting departments of the Cannelton coal mines.
During the sixties, he was engaged in developing other collieries in Kentucky and Indiana, but in 1869 was attracted to the Pacific Coast by its apparently greater opportunities. His first work there was as engineer and manager of the Triunfo mine in Lower California. He was also active in efforts to reduce the cost of high explosives and in the establishment of the Vulcan Powder Works.
Attracting the favorable attention of Baron Rothschild, who made a visit of inspection to the properties, he became consulting mining engineer for the Rothschild interests. For them he reported on the El Callao mine, Venezuela, in 1881, and then developed it and supervised its operation.
In 1885 he opened a consulting office Exploration Company in London, in partnership with Edmund de Crano.
His own work was done mostly in London, but he visited South Africa in 1892 and 1895, and was the author of important papers on conditions there, especially on the possibility of mining at deep levels. Subsequent events showed his views to be sound. He participated in the organization of many important mines, formed the Fraser & Chalmers mining machinery company, at Erith, England.
After the death of Edmund de Crano in 1895, he took H. C. Perkins into partnership and soon moved the firm's offices to New York, though he spent much time in Washington, California, and New Hampshire. At the time of his death at Durham, New Hampshire, from accidental drowning, he was engaged in attempting to develop the Mariposa grant in California.