Descriptive Particulars of the "Great Eastern" Steam Ship With Illustrations and Sectional Plans
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Mt. Horeb earthworks, site 1, and the Drake mound, site 11, Fayette County, Kentucky, (The University of Kentucky, Reports in anthropology and archaeology, Volume V, No.2)
William Henry Webb was a 19th-century New York shipbuilder and philanthropist.
Background
William Henry Webb was born in New York City, a descendant of Richard Webb, a lowland Scot who settled at Cambridge, Massachussets, by 1632 and later went to Connecticut. His father, Isaac Webb, was a shipwright who, like Jacob Bell and Stephen Smith, moved from Stamford, Connecticut, to try his fortune in New York. There the scant mile of yards along the East River from Grand Street to Thirteenth Street contributed more than any other place, except perhaps the Clyde, to the development of shipbuilding between 1807 and 1865. Isaac perfected his art under the able Scot, Henry Eckford, and soon developed a prosperous yard of his own. His chief importance lay in his instructing two youths who became the greatest American shipbuilders of their time. One was Donald McKay; the other was his own son William.
Education
Isaac wanted William to enter a profession, so he educated him with tutors and sent him to the Columbia College Grammar School. The boy, however, stubbornly insisted on following his father's career. At fifteen he entered upon six years of intensive study of naval architecture and shipbuilding, taking only a week's vacation in that time.
Career
He combined in a remarkable way the qualities of naval architect and shipwright. Like J. W. Griffiths, he showed bold and successful ingenuity in the designing of vessels. Combined with this theoretical ability was the practical sense which enabled him to manage a thousand workers and make a fortune in turning out more than a hundred and fifty vessels whose construction was as sound as their design was brilliant. His unusual versatility adapted itself to both sail and steam, wood and iron, merchantmen and warships. When Webb started building at twenty, New York's transatlantic sailing packets were the finest ships afloat. His first product was the Black Ball packet Oxford in 1836, built on a sub-contract from his father. He had built several other vessels, including the packets New York, Pennsylvania, Ville de Lyons, and Duchesse d'Orleans, before his father's death in 1840, when he became a partner of his father's assistant, Allen. In 1843 Webb started twenty-five years of building in his own name. His yard, extending from Fifth to Seventh Streets on East River, gradually overshadowed the nearby rival establishments of Brown & Bell, Smith & Dimon, W. H. Brown, and the Westervelts. The bald-headed little genius, with his flat nose, close-cropped whiskers, and bulldog expression, always built on contract, which eliminated much of the risk. He continued to build such packets as the Yorkshire, the Guy Mannering, which was the first three-decker, the Ocean Monarch, Isaac Wright, Ivanhoe, Yorktown, and Isaac Bell. In 1843 he built the fast pre-clipper Cohota for the China trade, followed by the Panama and Montauk. He ranked high among the builders of regular clippers. His Celestial, in 1850, was the first built expressly for the California trade, while his Sword Fish, in 1851, made the fourth fastest run to San Francisco. He also built the Challenge, Comet, Gazelle, and Invincible (1851); Australia and Flying Dutchman (1852); Flyaway, Snapdragon, and Young America (1853); Intrepid and Uncowah (1856); and Black Hawk (1857). While McKay in his specialty of clippers, somewhat overshadowed Webb, eight of the latter's clippers made the San Francisco run in 110 days or less, against seven of McKay's. Clippers, however, were only one of Webb's varied accomplishments. On a single day, January 21, 1851, he launched a clipper, a Havre packet and a Pacific Mail steamship. He had already built the hulls for eight steamships, the machinery being furnished by nearby "iron works. " His only transatlantic liner, apparently, was the United States in 1848, but that same year he built for the Pacific Mail Steamship Company the California and Panama, followed by the Golden Gate, San Francisco, and Yorktown, three others being built by his brother Eckford on sub-contract. William also built the Cherokee, Augusta, and Knoxville for lines to Savannah or New Orleans, as well as a powerful Sandy Hook towboat which bore his name. During the decline of the merchant marine in the later fifties, Webb turned his attention to warships. In 1857 he built the steam revenue cutter Harriet Lane. Conceiving the idea of a powerful steam frigate, he was rebuffed at Washington but visited Russia and persisted until he received a $1, 125, 000 order for the General Admiral, launched in 1858. Adapting his yard to iron, he built for the new Italian navy in 1863 the Re d'Italia and Re di Portogallo. The former, probably the first ironclad warship to cross the Atlantic, was rammed and sunk by the Austrians at Lissa in 1866. Webb was decorated with the Italian order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus. His masterpiece was the strongest and fastest ironclad of the day, the great ram Dunderberg, which was laid down for the Union navy, but, not being launched until July 22, 1865, was sold to the French, who renamed her the Rochambeau. Webb retired from shipbuilding in 1869 after building the Sound steamers Bristol and Providence and the packet Charles H. Marshall, but continued for another four years in less successful efforts to operate steamship lines. He had been an original director of the Pacific Mail and a heavy shareholder in the Panama railroad. Now he started a line to rival the Pacific Mail, as well as lines from San Francisco to Australia and New York to Europe. He had been a pioneer in the guano trade and owned considerable New York real estate. At his death he was a director of several New York traction companies and other corporations. About 1870 he published Plans of Wooden Vessels, two volumes of plates showing designs of a hundred and fifty ships he had built. Keenly interested in local welfare, Webb was for fourteen years president of the New York City Council for Civic Reform and led the opposition to the Tammany plans of the Aqueduct Commission. Three times he declined a chance to run for mayor. He established and endowed Webb's Academy and Home for Shipbuilders, opened on May 5, 1894. He died in New York.