The Perrysburg journal. [volume] (Perrysburg, Ohio) 1853-1861, 1854-09-30
A Live Yankee-Raising the Steam Frig-
ate Missouri at Gibraltar.

the 23d of August. 1912. She carPened as she
went down, and laying upon her beam ends,
presented one of her shafts upward very
near the surface of the water. This mass of
iron was nineteen inches in diameter, and Of
course offered dangerous obstruction to the
bay. The existence, moreover, OF SO vast a
body as the sunken frigate at the bottom Of
d harbor in which the tides ebbed and flowed,
and strong currents continually shifted the
sand was not TO be tolerated in an English
port, so important TO the commercial and
war marine of Britain as was Gibraltar
The British government accordingly present
ed the case to ours at Washington, and re-
quested us to remove the obstruction. We
agreed to do so.
The British Secretary, conceiving the job
to be a very bad one, kindly recommended
10 our government as very suitable engineers
for the work, Messrs. Lovi and Marshall.-
These gentlemen had acquired great reputa
lion in England by raising the lne-of bat
tie ship, the Royal George, which sunk so
suddenly at Spithead, and carried down with
her hundreds of men and women. Ournavy
department employed these engineers TO
raise the Missouri They went to Gibraltar,
and worked and strained, faithfully, for three
long wears, at the noble hulk under water,
Washington that the Missouri could not be
raised by human means. They abandoned
the enterprise and returned to England.
The necessities of the case induced Mr..
Webster TO take hold Of the matter. and find
Il nan who would free Gibraltar harbor of
that obstruction. He lighted on John T.
Cowen of Boston. This gentleman's docu
mentarv title to the character Of subma-
rine engineer was altogether in the certificate
of his birth as Yankee. to be found in his
fathers family Bible. He had no rarch-
ments. nor sheep-skins, ass-skin. nor other
skin Diplomas, to show to Mr.. Webster, but
when asked by the great Secretary if he could
remove the wreck Of the frigate as she lay
there in torty-one feet of water, he said that
he could. When asked if he would enter
into $4,000 bonds for the performance of a
contract to raise her, he said he would
When asked if he would bind himself to
have every stick of the frigate out of the
way within three years, he said he would
bind himself TO accomplish it within six
months. Webster had found his man. a
contract was Immediately made.
Mr.. Cowen was already equipped with his
invaluable submarine armor. The removing
apparatus remained for him to construct
On rejecting, he decided TO blow the frigate
10 pieces, and lift and remove the fragments
in detail.
The case, on full inquiry and investigation,
proved to be one of peculiar difficulty. The
sand had accumulated upon the wreck. 1t
was fifteen feet over her. Moreover the
English engineers had hurt the job, and made
it much more difficult, by using vast guam
titles of powder at random among the en-
gines and iron work. They had twisted and
tangled up the machinery badly. Above
the fifteen feet of accumulated sand was a
depth of twenty-six feet Of water to work
through.
Mr.. Cowen devised metal cases, which,
we believe, he afterwards patented, to con-
contain his charges of powder; and which,
of course, had to be placed under the fri
gates bottom, and through the fifteen feet OF
sand. These cases were of cast iron, six
feet long, fourteen inches diameter. and held
q charge of two hundred and fifty pounds OF
powder. At the conical end was large
thread, like that about post auger, cast on
TO the case, and to be used in boring into the
sand as with an auger. This lower end was
cast in chill, and was so hard and strong
that it stood, in one instance, the test OF
Being bored through McAdam street, in