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LIV, Method of preventing and curing the Dry Hoi in Ship 

 Timber. By Ambrose Bowden, Esq.* 



I Navy Office, April 9, 18J8. 



N June 1815 I published a treatise on Dry Rot, a copy 

 of which I presented to the Society for the Encouragement of 

 Arts, &:c. I am now happy to inform the Society that several 

 of the measures 1 then recommended have been since adopted 

 by Government, particularly that of sinking ships in sea-water, 

 which has been attended with success equal to my most sanguine 

 expectations. 



A ship of 451 tons (the Eden) was sunk in November 1816, 

 and raised in March 1817 ; and on her being taken into dock and 

 opened last month, there was not the least appearance of recent 

 fungus, although many of her timbers had been destroyed by this 

 %'egetation, previously to her being sunk ; and what old fungus 

 was found on the timbers had been completely deprived of vege- 

 table life. It is with infinite satisfaction 1 reflect on having dis- 

 covered a simple, easy, cheap, and effectual remedy for a decay 

 which has consumed the navy for many years past, at an expens* 

 of many millions sterling to the public. I now beg to appeal to 

 the liberality of the Society for that consideration which so im- 

 portant a discovery deserves. I shall be happy to wait on the 

 Society with documents sufficiently attested to prove the truth 

 of these representations. 



I am, sir, &c. 

 A. Aikin, Esq. Secretary, &c. A. Bowden. 



Navy Office, April 12, 1818. 

 • Sir, — I omitted to state in my letter, as a confirmation of the 

 efficacy of sinking ships to cure the dry rot, that many pieces of 

 timber, which had lain for some years in the vard at Milford, had 

 been much decayed by the growth of the fungus ; but after they 

 were immerged in the sea, the vegetation was entirely destroyed, 

 and those timbers which were not too rotten, are now used for 

 building ships without the least apprehension. In consequence 

 of these satisfactory experiments, an order has been issued by the 

 Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, directing all the timbers 

 ^nd planks to be submerged after they are cut to the proper shape, 

 and previously to their being used for building a ship. They have 

 also ordered theMersey (a ship built at the same time as the Eden, 

 of the same tonnage, and nearly in the same state of decay) to be 



* From the Transactions of the Soc'iety for the Encouragement of Arti, 

 Manufactures, and Cmamerce, for 181!>. The Society's gold medal was pre- 

 scuted to Mr. Bowden for this communication. 



repaired 



