| Description | Written from London. The letter confirms that it would be possible to construct a floating sectional dry dock such as Campbell suggests which would lift the steam ship Leviathan completely out of the water for examination and repair without damaging the ship and his complete failure to conceive of any other way of exposing the hull. The letter also describes Botts' visit to see the ship and the investigations that he made as to how the ship is intended to be raised, his opinions of this proposed 'gridiron' method of raising the ship and the potential benefits of the proposed sectional dry dock as well as Botts' certainty that the Eastern Steam Navigation Company, if acquainted with his ideas, would find them by far the best option Botts also comments on the versatility of the sectional dock which could be used to inspect both the leviathan Eastern Steam ship but also merchant or admiralty ships at various ports and gives his assurance that the cost of the dock would more than pay for itself and confirms that his dock ideas has already been taken up by the government which has purchased four of them.
There are pencil annotations, indicating where the same line of text has been copied out twice in error at the bottom of Folio 396 and the top of Folio 397. |