In 1801, Robert R. Livingston had arrived in France as American Minister to the French Government. He and Fulton met at the critical period in the latter’s career. The statesman, whose mind was sympathetic to the consideration of mechanical applications, soon became interested in his countryman’s projects. Stimulated by Livingston’s personal encouragement and supported by his financial aid, Fulton pushed his studies of a practical steam engine for navigation and entered into correspondence with Messrs. Boulton and Watt, then the most prominent builders of engines in England. The junior member of this firm was the famous James Watt (1736–1819), the discoverer of the principle that power could be produced from the elastic energy of steam, and the inventor of the steam condensing engine. Livingston as an individual with his own limited resources was about to accomplish in a few years a complete revolution of vessel propulsion that Napoleon with the almost unlimited resources of France could have done in much less time, certainly in time to offset England’s superiority on the high seas. Livingston with greater vision seized the opportunity that Napoleon rejected. But with this we are not concerned. While Fulton was working under Livingston’s direction, the British Government was not unmindful of what he had done in the matter of submarine experiments. They had a secret service at work in enemy lands as other governments have done before and since. In England there were some men in authority who appreciated the possibilities lying dormant in the scheme of under-water attack. In the British naval archives there has recently been found the following letter with its enclosure, recording the information possessed by the government and sent confidentially to the naval commanders that they might be on their guard against attack, if, perchance, any of Fulton’s boats should have been made secretly and unknown to the British navy. The British authorities did not deceive themselves, nor were they oblivious of the latent merits and actual accomplishments of Fulton’s design. _SECRET_ CIRCULAR Adml. Lord Keith Sheerness. Admiral Montagu /20th/ Portsmouth. Rear Adml. Montagu Downs. Honbl. Adml. Cornwallis /20th/ at Sea. Adml. Sir Jno. Colpoys, K. B. /20th/ Plymouth. Admiralty Office, 19th June, 1803. My Lord,