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Ref NoDM1306/11/1/2/folio 252-256
TitleLetter from John Scott Russell to Isambard Kingdom Brunel
DescriptionWritten from 37 Great George Street, Westminster, London. The letter expresses Russell's satisfaction with his calculations of the true weight of the Eastern Steam Navigation Company's ship and argues that he does not feel the ship's weight as important as Brunel does and confirms that he has built the ship exactly to Brunel's plans, dimensions and sizes and agrees that a redistribution of the materials did take place soon after the building work commenced. Russell argues that since the building work started, there have been many alterations, additions and improvements to the ship which Russell has had to incorporate and which he has tried to record and he was not aware that Brunel considered these alterations as extra work. Russell debates that the initial contract included mention of 7000 tons of iron but maintains that this figure came from his original tender which was used as a guideline rather than a firm amount. Russell argues that he has faithfully built the ship as intended by both Brunel and Russell and that Russell believes he is entitled to an extra payment due to his additional work in designing better building methods specially adapted for the improving the ship's strength and durability and that his original price for building the ship was more than fair and based on the existing cost of ships and debates the fairness of the company's demanding that Russell accept part of his payment in the form of shares and that this means the payments do not cover his expenditure. Russell also mentions the work still to be done on the ship and offers to show Brunel's assistant Jacomb the model and drawings, the list of specifications and all the orders for iron to demonstrate that all the remaining iron for the ship is in storage in the yard.

See also DM162/10/12/243].
Date29 September 1855
FormatManuscript volume
Extent5 pages
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Access ConditionsThis material is held at the Brunel Institute - please contact the Brunel Institute to arrange access.
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