Lighthouses and Lightships: A Descriptive and Historical Account of Their Mode of Construction and OrganizationAdams, W. H. Davenport (William Henry Davenport)
History
Lighthouses and Lightships: A Descriptive and Historical Account of Their Mode of Construction and Organization
Adams, W. H. Davenport (William Henry Davenport)
Lighthouses; Lightships
Third, the kitchen, with a fireplace and sink, two settles with
lockers, a dresser with drawers, two cupboards, and a rack for dishes.
Fourth, the bedroom, with three cabin-beds, to hold one man in each,
with three drawers and two lockers in each to receive his separate
property.
Fifth, the lantern, in which a seat was placed all round, except at the
doorway.
* * * * *
Besides the windows of the lantern, ten other windows were constructed
for the edifice—namely, for the store-room two, and for each of the
upper rooms four. In fixing their bars, an accident happened to
Smeaton, which was nearly attended with fatal results.
“After the boat was gone,” he says, “and it became so dark that
we could not see any longer to pursue our occupations, I ordered
a charcoal-fire to be made in the upper store-room, in one of the
iron pots we used for melting lead, for the purpose of annealing the
blank ends of the bars; and they were made red-hot altogether in the
charcoal. Most of the workmen were set round the fire, and by way of
making ourselves comfortable, by screening ourselves and the fire
from the wind, the windows were shut; and, as well as I remember,
the copper cover or hatch put over the man-hole of the floor of the
room where the fire was—the hatch above being left open for the heated
vapour to ascend. I remember to have looked into the fire attentively
to see that the iron was made hot enough, but not overheated: I also
remember I felt my head a very little giddy; but the next thing of
which I had any sensation or idea was finding myself upon the floor of
the room below, half drowned with water. It seems that, without being
further sensible of anything to give me warning, the effluvia of the
charcoal so suddenly overcame all sensation, that I dropped down upon
the floor; and had not the people hauled me down to the room below,
where they did not spare for cold water to throw in my face and upon
me, I certainly should have expired upon the spot.”
Escaping this and other perils, Smeaton saw his beautiful edifice
finally brought to completion; and on the 16th of October a light was
once more shown from the Eddystone rock.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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