AN IMPROVED METHOD OR MEANS OF PROPELLING SHIPS, BOATS, AND OTHER VESSELS
Year: 1815

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, ROBERT
KINDER, of Hill Street, Liverpool, in the County of Lancaster, Gent., send
greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third did, by
His Letters Patent, under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Nineteenth day of
December, in the fifty-sixth year of His reign, give and grant unto me, the
said Robert Kinder, my exors, adñiors, and assigns, His especial licence, full
power, sole priviledge and authority, that I, the said Robert Kinder, my exors,
adiors, and assigns, during the term of years therein mentioned, should and
lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within England, Wales, and
the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, and also in all His Majesty's Colonies and
Plantations abroad, my Invention of "AN IMPROVED METHOD OR MEANS OF
PROPELLING SHIPS, BOATS, AND OTHER VESSELS;" in which said Letters Patent
there is contained a proviso obliging me, the said Robert Kinder, by an instru-
ment in writing under my hand and seal, to cause a particular description of
the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be
performed, to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery within
two calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said recited
Letters Patent, as in and by the same (relation being thereunto had) may more
fully and at large appear.

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Robert Kinder, do hereby declare that my said Invention, and the manner in
which the same is to be performed, are particularly described and ascertained
in and by the Drawings hereunto annexed, and the following description, that
is to say:
My said Invention consists in the form and situation of one or two cisterns
or wells, or frames of wood or other materials, applicable to vessels of all sizes
and of every description; the said cistern or cisterns being open at the bottom
and at the end next to the stern of the vessel in which it or they may be con-
structed. The size of the said cistern or cisterns, must be regulated by the
dimensions of the machinery that is to be worked within it or them. The end
of the said cistern or cisterns, towards the fore part or head of the vessel, must
rise from the keel or bottom of the vessel towards the level of the gunwale
thereof, as high above the water-mark of the said vessel as is requisite for
security, and the said end may be-flat or-circular, and may rise perpendicular or
obliquely from the keel. The after end of the cistern or cisterns must terminate
at the stern of the vessell; or as near thereto as the requisite materials to
strengthen that part of the vessel will permit. When two cisterns are used, and
the vessel has one keel, in the usual way, the division between the two cisterns
forming the inner side of each, may be made by raising the keel of the said
vessel within the cisterns as high above the water-mark of the said vessel as is
requisite for security, or if the vessel have not a keel in the usual way, then by
a division leading directly towards the stern post; if the said division be intended
to support the machinery, as in small vessels it often may, it must be raised
as high or nearly so, as the outer sides of the aforesaid cisterns. When two
cisterns are used, the side nearest to the gunwale of each cistern, and when
only one cistern is used both sides of the said cistern, must rise from their
junction at the keel or bottom of the vessel with the forward end of the cistern
or cisterns until the junction of the said sides with or near the stern of the
vessel. Should the vessel have a counter rising quickly to a high stern, then
the lower edges of the sides next to the gunwale of the aforesaid cistern or
cisterns may rise towards the stern, conformably with the said counter. But
in every case the stern must be so high above the water, and the lower edges of
the outer sides of the cistern or cisterns must rise so much from the junction
of the keel or bottom of the vessel with the fore end of the cistern or cisterns,
as to admit of the water being thrown out directly under the stern of the vessel
from the working of the machinery, without any intermediate trough or
channel.

page_text: By means of the Invention above described (with the
assistance of the Drawings in the margin) it is intended to
navigate vessels of every size and of every description.
Small vessels by hand, with paddles or paddle or water
wheels turning in the aforesaid cistern or cisterns, either on
one shaft or on two. Larger vessels it is intended to navi-
gate by the same sort of paddles or paddle or water wheels,
with the assistance of any of the powers now in use for
working machinery that may best suit the vessel and the
purposes for which she is designed, placing the paddles on
one shaft for both cisterns, if two cisterns be used. It is
also intended to assist with vessels so navigated, whether by
hand or by more powerful agents, in navigating other vessels.
The great advantages attending this mode of propelling
vessels are obvious. First, the facility in steering, owing
to the weight of water forced with rapidity against the rud-
der. Secondly, the security arising from having the paddles
or paddle wheels so intirely inclosed within the sides of the
vessel. Thirdly, the manner of forcing the water directly
in the wake of the vessel does away the objections which
have hitherto prevented the use of vessels with paddles or
paddle wheels upon canals.
In witness whereof, I, the said Robert Kinder, have
hereunto set my hand and seal, this Fifteenth
day of February, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and sixteen.
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Fifteenth day of February, in
the year of our Lord 1816, the aforesaid Robert Kinder came before our
said Lord the King in His Chancery, and acknowledged the Specification
aforesaid, and all and every thing therein contained and specified, in form
above written. And also the Specification aforesaid was stampt according to
the tenor of the Statute made for that purpose.
Inrolled the Seventeenth day of February in the voor of our Lord.