CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE ARRANGEMENT, CONSTRUCTION, AND MODE OF APPLYING CERTAIN APPARATUS FOR PROPELLING SHIPS AND OTHER VESSELS
Year: 1840

page_text: DEN
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, MILES
BERRY, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery Lane, in the County of
Middlesex, Patent Agent, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her present most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her
Royal Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at
Westminster, the Fourteenth day of August, in the fourth year of Her reign,
did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me, the said
Miles Berry, Her especial license, full power, sole privilege and authority, that I,
the said Miles Berry, my executors, administrators, and assigns, and such others
as I, the said Miles Berry, my executors, administrators, or assigns, should at
any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all times during
the term of years therein mentioned, should and lawfully might make, use,
exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed,
and in all Her Majesty's Colonies and Plantations abroad, an Invention of
"CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE ARRANGEMENT, CONSTRUCTION, AND MODE OF APPLYING
CERTAIN APPARATUS FOR PROPELLING SHIPS AND OTHER VESSELS," being a communi-
cation from a foreigner residing abroad; in which said Letters Patent is
contained a proviso obliging me, the said Miles Berry, by an instrument
in writing under my hand and seal, particularly to describe and ascertain
the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be
performed, and to cause the same to be inrolled in Her Majesty's High Court
of Chancery within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of
the said in part recited Letters Patent, as in and by the same, reference being
thereunto had, will more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Miles Berry, do hereby declare that the nature of the said Invention, and the
manner in which the same is to be performed, are particularly described and
ascertained in and by the following description thereof, reference being had to

page_text: the Drawings hereunto annexed, and to the letters and figures marked thereon
(that is to say)-
The following is the description of this Invention, as communicated to me by
my correspondent residing abroad.
The accompanying Drawing represents the manner in which this Invention
may be carried into operation in canal boats, but the same principle, or manner
of construction, is applicable to vessels of other kinds, whether intended for
inland navigation or sea service. The Invention consists in constructing the
bow or fore part of the boat or other vessel so as to accommodate the screw or
other propellers which are placed there, and which are intended, by their
particular position and mode of action, to draw the water directly from the
bow, and to give it, as it passes towards the stern, such a direction as shall
greatly diminish the resistance offered to the passage of the boat.
Fig. is a top view of the bow of a boat furnished with two screw propellers,
constructed and arranged upon this plan. Fig. 2 is a side view of the-same.
A, A, are two spiral or screw wheels, which I will suppose to be placed on a
canal boat, measuring about fifteen feet in width, and ninety feet in length
For a boat of this size the spiral propellers may be made about seven feet-in
diameter, and about twelve feet-in-length. The screw propellers are repre-
sented as having each four spiral wings, or threads, one-wheel being a right and
the other a left handed screw, the threads winding at an angle of about forty-five-
degrees. They are made to taper each way from the centre towards the ends,
where, the wings or threads are rounded. Their shafts incline towards towards
each other as they approach the bow, so as to be about six feet apart at their
fore, and nine feet at their rear ends. They have their fore bearings attached
to the guard or bow timbers, near the stem of the boat; their aft ends may
pass through-stuffing boxes, or be in any other suitable manner connected to
the driving machinery. Instead of using continuous wings or threads to the
screw wheels, said wings may be divided into segments of five, six, or more
inches in width, as has been frequently done in propelling wheels.. The dimen-
sions which I have given are intended merely as practical guides, deduced
from experiments already tried, but they may be varied in any degree which
further experience, may justify. The bottom of the boat may be carried
forward under the propellers, so that its fore end stands immediately under the
prow, as shewn at B. Fig. 2, and I give such a form to it, and to the fore part
of the boat, as that it shall occupy the space between the propelling wheels,
and come as near as may be in contact with the propellers without actually
touching them.
As represented in the Drawing of the canal boat, the pro-
pelling wheels are supposed to be immersed about two fifths of their diameter

page_text: under water. In deeper water they may be still more immersed; and in lakes
or other waters where the depth is sufficient they may be entirely submersed.
Fig. 3 is a plan view, shewing one modification of my plan of propelling
boats. Although screw propellers have hitherto been alluded to as the best
adapted to the purpose of propelling upon this plan, two wheels resembling the
ordinary paddle wheels may be substituted therefor, in which case the axis of
the said paddle wheels are to be placed horizontally, but so that they will
form an obtuse angle with each other, and that the action of the paddles shall
be in the line of the direction of the shafts of the screw propellers, or nearly so,
as above described. The bottom and bows of the boat must in this case be so
formed as to adapt them to the reception of such wheels. The object
of locating the propelling wheels, and of so constructing and arranging them as
that they shall not act in the direction of or parallel to the keel, but outwards
towards the bilge, as above described, is, that they may withdraw the water
from the bows of the vessel, and give to it a direction which will lessen its
retarding action, and carry it most directly to the stern, by which means it has
been experimentally proved that the water will be left much more smooth and
undisturbed than by any other mode of propelling hitherto essayed.
Having thus fully described the manner in which this propelling apparatus
is to be constructed, and the boats or other vessels with which they are to be
used, what is claimed herein as this Invention, and desired to be secured
by Letters Patent, is the within-described manner of locating the two propellers
in the bows of the boat or vessel, and the causing them to act upon the water
in a direction inclined from each other in the manner and for the purpose
herein set forth.
In witness whereof, I, the said Miles Berry, have hereunto set my hand
and seal, this Thirteenth day of February, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and forty-one.
MILES (L.s.) BERRY.
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Thirteenth day of February, in the
fourth year of the reign of Her Majesty Queen Victoria, the said Miles Berry
came before our said Lady the Queen in Her Chancery, and acknowledged the
instrument aforesaid, and all and every thing therein contained and specified,
in form above written. And also the instrument aforesaid was stamped
according to the tenor of the Statute made in the fifty-fifth year of the reign of