The Sun.
London, England, 1867-10-12 00:00:00

THE BATTLE OF THE SAFES.

The committee appointed to give its opinion on
the comparative merits of the two safes respec-
tively exhibited by Mr. Chatwood, of Bolton, and
by Mr. Silas C. Herring, of New York, has just
issued its report. After stating that the four
members named by the parties, viz., Messrs. E•
Holmes, Thomas R. Pickering, Mullet, and Fairlie,
had elected M. P. Douliot, civil engineer of Paris,
to be their president, and that this committee bad
assigned to each of the competitors the task of em-
ploying drilling instruments, gunpowder, steel
wedges, crow-bars, steel screws, and any other k4.Pcl
of burglars' appliances on his advcrsary'ssafe in order
to teat its capability of resistance, the report says
—" llerring's experts commenced by attempting
to drill through the door of the safe, but with-
out attaining any other result than that of convinc-
ing the committee that the safe was invulnerable to
this mode of attack ; and although no attempt by
drilling was tried upon the Herring safe, a subse -
qucnt examination convinced the entire com-
mittee that his safe possessed this quality in all
equal degree." After much labour, however, a small
groove was chiselled along the whole depth of
Chatwood's safe, whereby the position of the joints
was discovered, and the steel plate forming the
exterior was torn off by means of steel wedges
and hammers. A second plate was thus brought
to view, which, on being broken to pieces, dis-
covered a third bolted to the door-frame, and
which resisted all their efforts, until the groove
system was again employed, where the safe was
ultimately opened in 198 minutes. Herring's safe,
constructed on an entirely different principle, re-
sisted, in its principal inner part, all the men's
efforts for a long time, and it took 254 minutes
to open it, being 56 minutes more than Chatwood's.
The report then says :—" Admitting the excellence
of both the safes submitted to trial, and also admit-
ting that the force brought to bear upon them was
far superior to any even likely to be employed by
burglars, a careful consideration of the facts compels
us to the following conclusions :—Firstly, that cousi-
, dering the intrinsic quality of the materials employed
as being equal in the two safes, Mr. Herring has
by his happy combination rendered the material
more efficacious, and indeed given to the hard
cast-iron the tenacity which it lacks by nature,
and we therefore are of opinion from this point
of view--Ist. That Mr. Herring's safe is the better
in the quality of the material employed. 2d. That the
exterior aspect of the Chatwood Safe, from the close-
ness of its joints and simplicity of its form, would disin-
cline burglars to attack it, but if they should have the
security necessary to make the attempt, its great um'
formity of constructive detail would give them great
hope of success, their difficulties would considerably
diminish as they proceeded, and this would act as 3
moral stimulant to their physical force, until they
attained the prize coveted. The Herring safe, which
appears at first more easy of attack, presents to the
end difficulties always great and always varied, and
therefore tends to exhaust both the physical and
moral energy, and to this extent offers a superior
guarantee against the successful attack of burglars•
We are therefore of opinion that the. Herring saf°
is the best in its capability of resisting drilling in•
struments, gunpowder, steel wedges, crowbars, steel
screws, or any other kind of burglars' appliances•
We therefore, in accordance with the foregoing de'
cision, direct that the 15,000 fr. deposited by lYir.
Herring be returned to him, and that the 15,000 ft.
deposited by Mr. Chatwood be applied—first, to
the necessary expenses of the trial, and that the
balance be divided into three equal portions, to he
given to the charities of London, Paris, and Wash"
ington, as directed by Mr. Herring."