The first iron steamer, however, was the _Aaron Manby_, built in 1821 at the Horseley Iron Works near Birmingham, to the order of Captain Napier, afterwards Admiral Sir Charles Napier, and Mr. Manby. She was put together at Rotherhithe, and in May 1822 at Parliament Stairs took on board a distinguished party of naval officers and engineers, whom she conveyed for a trip of several hours up and down the river between Blackfriars and Battersea. A contemporary newspaper described her as “the most complete specimen of workmanship in the iron way that has ever been witnessed.” This little vessel was 106 feet long and 17 feet broad, and carried a 30-horse-power engine. Her wheels were of the type known as Oldham’s revolving bars. Her only sea voyage was to France under the command of Captain Napier. Upon arrival she was employed on the Seine or Loire. Another iron vessel intended for navigation on the Seine was shortly afterwards made in this country, and the parts sent to France to be put together. Little appears to have been attempted in this country for some years in the way of iron shipbuilding, although in Ireland three or four small iron sailers or steamers were constructed for inland navigation purposes. But in 1828 John Laird of Birkenhead had his attention directed to iron shipbuilding, and completed his first iron vessel there the following year. Other builders followed where he showed the way, and in less than three years there were shipbuilders on the Thames, Clyde, and east coast of Scotland who were launching iron vessels, the great majority of which were sailing ships. The famous yards on the Cheshire side of the Mersey remained for some time the headquarters of the new industry. The first iron vessels for the United States--not the first iron-plated vessels, and this is a distinction which should be noted--were launched there, and so immediate was the recognition of the advantages of iron ships over wooden ones that by 1835 there had been built at Laird’s the first iron vessels for use on the rivers Euphrates, Indus, Nile, Vistula, and Don. They were small compared with the wooden vessels afloat.