A BOAT AND VARIOUS APPARATUS WHEREBY HEAVY BURTHENS CAN BE CONVEYED ON SHALLOW WATER ON RIVERS WHEREIN SHOALS AND OTHER DIFFICULTIES IMPEDE NAVIGATION, AND WHEREBY THE LIVES OF MEN WILL BE SAVED FROM WRECKS AND OTHER SITUATIONS OF IMMINENT DANGER AT SEA OR ON RIVERS, AND WHEREBY THE APPARATUS ABOVE SPECIFIED MAY, IN ITS CONSEQUENCES AND CONSTRUCTIONS, EMBRACE OTHER IMPORTANT RESULTS HIGHLY BENEFICIAL TO THE BRITISH NAVY AND COMMERCE, BY ENABLING THE BOTTOMS OF SHIPS TO BE EXAMINED WITH ACCURACY AND EXPEDITION, WITHOUT THE NECESSITY OF MOVING THE MASTS on CARGO
Year: 1810

page_text: LINDSAY'S SPECIFICATION.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, the Honor-
able JOHN LINDSAY, late Lieutenant-Colonel of the Seventy-first Regiment, of
Grove House, in the County of Middlesex, send greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third did, by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of His United Kingdom, bearing
date at Westminster, the Nineteenth day of June, in the fiftieth year of His
reign, give and grant unto me, the said John Lindsay, my exors, admors,
and assigns, His especial licence, full power, sole privilege, and authority,
that I, the said John Lindsay, my exors, admors, 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 "A BOAT AND VARIOUS APPARATUS WHEREBY HEAVY BURTHENS
CAN BE CONVEYED ON SHALLOW WATER ON RIVERS WHEREIN SHOALS AND OTHER
DIFFICULTIES IMPEDE NAVIGATION, AND WHEREBY THE LIVES OF MEN WILL BE
SAVED FROM WRECKS AND OTHER SITUATIONS OF IMMINENT DANGER AT SEA OR ON
RIVERS, AND WHEREBY THE APPARATUS ABOVE SPECIFIED MAY, IN ITS CONSEQUENCES
AND CONSTRUCTIONS, EMBRACE OTHER IMPORTANT RESULTS HIGHLY BENEFICIAL TO THE
BRITISH NAVY AND COMMERCE, BY ENABLING THE BOTTOMS OF SHIPS TO BE EXAMINED
WITH ACCURACY AND EXPEDITION, WITHOUT THE NECESSITY OF MOVING THE MASTS
on CARGO;" in which said Letters Patent there is contained a proviso that if
I, the said John Lindsay, shall not particularly describe and ascertain the
nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be per-
formed, by an instrument in writing under my hand and seal, and cause the
same to be enrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery within six

page_text: calendar months next and immediately after the date of the said recited Letters
Patent, that then the said recited Letters Patent, and all liberties and advan-
tages whatsoever thereby granted, shall utterly cease, determine, and become
void, as in and by the said recited Letters Patent, relation being thereunto
had, may more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
John Lindsay, do hereby describe and ascertain the nature of my said Inven-
tion, and in what manner the same is to be performed, in manner following,
that is to say:-
My boat, for the purpose of the conveyance of merchandize of all descrip-
tions on rivers or shoal water, may either be a barge, boat, or any other vessel,
the flatter the better. When the boat or vessel is loaded with a cargo, and
after having proceeded part of her voyage is stopped in her progress by a
shoal of rock or sand, which frequently occurs in the summer in rivers that
are at other times navigable, I then place on each side of the loaded vessel a
Jong flat trough, the sides of which two troughs (which I call lightners) are
considerably higher from the surface of the water than the loaded vessel that
is now placed between the two said troughs or lightners; having thus placed
my three vessels abreast of each other, I place two strong beams, which I call
depressers, across the three vessels, which beams may be placed twelve or
fifteen feet asunder, but equidistant from stem to stern of my boat; the loaded
vessel has fixed in a strong kilson in her bottom two powerful screws,
and of length higher than her gunnels; the said two beams or depressers,
having holes bored in the centre of them, receive the heads of the two screws ;
two capstans with bars being fixed in the head of each screw, the vessel
which is loaded becomes, by the action of these elevated screws, gradually
raised, while two beams laid across the vessel and lightners, so that by raising
the loaded vessel, and depressing the lightuers at the same time, the weight is
divided on the three. When the shoals and difficulties in a river are so great
in places that the lightners cannot enable the loaded vessel to pass, in that case
I make use of a number of water troughs, which I call moveable weirs, the
first of which I fix with a kedge anchor on the opposite side of the river when
the vessel is to pass the shoal, and by attaching a number of these moveable
weirs to each other in a diagonal position, and by placing a tarpawling along
them to prevent the escape of the water, I sink the said weirs by weights in the
river, by which means I direct the current of the river into so narrow a
channel that the encrease of water will so deepen the shoal that the vessel and
apparatus will be enabled to pass the said shoal, and thereby continue her
voyage; and when the stream is too narrow and shoal for the barge and

page_text: lightners both to float, the barge may be buoy'd up so as to be clear of the
bottom, when the lightners must necessarily be stranded. In this case two
iron wheels are requisite at the ends of the beams to run in a trough affixed
above the gunnels of the trough in the centre, and by securing the cable by
anchor or otherwise the vessel may, with her windlass, be warped off by
degrees. And as to that part of my right for a Patent as relates to this boat
and apparatus being capable of saving the lives of men from wrecks and other
situations of imminent danger at sea or on rivers, I relinquish all claim to
patent right on that subject, as well as the application of similar powers to
those of this boat and apparatus enabling the bottoms of ships to be examined
with accuracy and expedition.
In witness whereof, I, the said John Lindsay, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, this Nineteenth day of December, in the year of our
Lord One thousand oight hundred and tan