Hl'J.J 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECTS JOURNAL. 



71 



CJAISK OF THE CATASTROPHE AT BARENTIN. 



Our professional correspondents write to us expressiDg tlieir inability to 

 make out tlie trutli regarding llie recent catastrophe of the Barentin via- 

 duct, and their desire to obtain such authentic intelligence regarding the 

 facts of the case as may enable us to guard, if possible, against the recur- 

 rence of similar casualties, so disastrous to railway enterprise. Similar 

 accidents have happened in this country, generally from injudiciously tip- 

 ping the stuli' out of wagons on the arches while yet very green, and un- 

 equally loading them so as to push in the haunch, and raising up the 

 crowu so as to destroy the equilibrium of the arch. In other cases, the 

 foundation has given way ; but this Barentin case appears still to be 

 a mystery. 



From the French papers we have endeavoured, but in vain, to gather 

 consistent intelligence. The statement seems directly opposite, and so 

 mixed with prejudice and manifest ill-feeling, that it is not possible to 

 ground any tolerably consistent opinion on their statements. Even the 

 French railway journal contradicts itself flatly, so as to display either the 

 greatest ignorance or the greatest prejudice, on a subject on which every- 

 body would naturally have expected it to be intelligent and just. We 

 have it one day assuring us that the structure was built in conformity with 

 the plans of the engineer, that the railway company must therefore incur 

 all the loss, and so leading the shareholders in this country to believe 

 that their plans were faulty, and that a design, of course ill-proportioned 

 and injudiciously planned, was the origo malis. Then, next week, «e find 

 in the same journal a letter from the coutractors themselves, giving the lie 

 to the journal, and stating that the work was altered from the plans to 

 suit their wishes, that they held themselves and not the company respon- 

 sible for the loss, and that they were immediately to recommence their 

 work. This is a little creditable to the English contractors — creditable to 

 Mackenzie & Brassey, of whom we expected no less; it is in every way 

 calculated to enhance their character, which is respected both abroad and 

 at home, and it is also a step which must tend to give the public confidence 

 in whatever they may in future undertake. It also justifies those direc- 

 tors of the company who have reposed in them implicit confidence for the 

 execution of works ofenormousexteut, and gives confidence also to English 

 shareholders. But what are we, what are the shareholders in England, 

 to say to a French journal, which professes to watch over their interests in 

 France, and yet spreads false alarms among them and the public, so peril- 

 ling the value of their property, by increasing the fears it ought to have 

 assuaged by a judicious and well-timed statement of the truth, and, wheu 

 obliged to publish an oBicial contradictiou from another source, does not 

 even frankly apologize for its former delinquency, nor advert to the injus- 

 tice of which it had been guilty? Surely, it is manifest the interests of 

 shareholders are not safe in such keeping. 



We have, therefore, endeavoured to obtain from our correspondent, from 

 the spot, a true account of the accident; and we now give our readers, 

 with the assistance of his sketches, a fair and tolerably precise account of 

 the matter. But, first we give the contradiction referred to. 



The following letter was addressed to the editor of the Journal des Che- 

 mins de Fer : — " Sir, — In reply to the article in your number of Saturday 

 last, we have the honour to iuform you that we take upon ourselves the 

 whole responsibility of the accident, and will begin to rebuild the viaduct 

 without delay. We are not in a condition to say with certainty how the 

 accident originated, but are disposed to attribute it to the substitution 

 (with Mr. Locke's approbation) of stone-work in the basrs of the piers for 

 the brick-work prepared in the original plan. This alteration was made 

 at our request, with a view to accelerate the progress of the work, and 

 fulfil the engagement we had contracted with the company. — We have the 

 honour to be, &c. Mackenzii! & Brassi;y." 



The arches are semicircular, and designed of ample dimensions and 

 strength — some engineers, whom we know, would have been satisfied with 

 considerably less strength. The whole work was brick, excepting the bases 

 of the piers, which were of stone ; and the fact is unquestionable, that on 

 the day before the accident not the slightest flaw had been discovered in any 

 part of the brick-work, but that vertical cracks near the corners had been 

 observed iu the stone-work. Now, be it observed, this stone- work was 

 ashlar facing hearted with rubble. Let our engineering reader look at 

 the plan, and then let him think over the probable eflect of this — taking 

 into account, as we formerly stated, a little haste and a great deal of wet 

 weather. 



We must here notice a sort of professional controversy which exists in 

 France between the English engineers and the French, We English like 



brick-work— we understand it, andwe make it good, so good that from one 

 endjto the other of the railway, not a single Haw could be detected by the in- 

 spector-general in any part of the brick. work of the line. The French eu. 

 gineers do not like brick-work. They are, perhaps, better acquainted 

 with stone, and certainly like it better. Be this as it may, the conse- 

 quence, as regards this work, has been as follows :— This bridge was ori- 

 ginally designed by the engineer and contracted for as all in brick. The 

 contractors partly to expedite the work and partly to please the French en- 

 gineers, asked leave to make the bases of the piers up to a certain point in 

 stone-work : they obtained the permission of the engineers to do so ; and 

 thus, in a desire to expedite the work and to please the French engineers, 

 they have brought on themselves a loss, in which we must all sympathize 

 with them, and which we can attribute to nothing but the best intentions. 

 This casualty, while it entails pecuniary loss, will raise the character of 

 the contractors for honesty and responsibility, both here and abroad. 



Well, to return to the accident. This stone base was 19 feet greater 

 diameter than the brick pier resting on it. The chief pressure of the weight 

 of pier and bridge was thus brought to bear on the rubble hearting. The 

 tendency of this to crush the hearting and burst the facing is manifest. 

 The vertical cracks visible that morning in the stone casing were evident 

 symptoms of it ; and as the upper work was perfectly sound, and had been 

 some time completed, and as the pile foundations are still perfectly sound 

 as far as can be discerned, the cause is manifest. 



The lessons it teaches are also obvious : we are all wise after the fact — 

 we can all now see that it was weak to yield to an idle prejudice and not 

 use brick throughout as intended — we can all see that it would have been 

 better to wait until the bricks were got, than to build work to tumble 

 down! But who would have ventured to say beforehand, to this point 

 may you go, both in haste and in matf rials, and no further? No! Con- 

 tractors and engineers must often make sacrifices of mere opinion to 

 accomplish what they conceive their duty to the companies they serve ; 

 and ifiu doing so, they commit errors, they are but men gaining ex- 

 perience, and they have to pay for it. But iu this country, at least, when 

 they bravely set their face to do their work honestly and well— and when 

 taken as a whole, the work is honestly and creditably done, as everytliing 

 is that English engineers and English contractors have done in French 

 railroads — they will meet with that sympathy and support from their 

 countrymen which they have a right to expect, and they will be entitled 

 to that respect and esteem abroad, which their acliieveraents must command 

 from all right-minded and judicious mea.— Railivay Chronicle. 



TRACT ON VOLCANOES, SPRINGS OF HOT WATER, AND 

 EARTHQUAKES. 



During the period of my altering the hot-water baths, at Buxton, in 

 Derbyshire, I was naturally led to reflect upon the causes of the various 

 hot springs of water, and the regularity of the supply, and temperature at 

 every season of the year. Thirty-five years have since elapsed, and the 

 interval has aflforded me maoy opportunities of judging whether the notions 

 which I then entertained were correctly founded, and whether they de- 

 served to be promulgated. 



Reading lately in a Colonial .Journal an article on Volcanoes, which 

 contaius the following remarks, I have been led to set set down the con- 

 ceptions alluded to, and in reference to the writei's observations, viz ; — 



" When these fires were kindled, by what sort of fuel they are still 

 maintained, at what depths below the surface of the earth they are placed, 

 whether tiiey have a mutual connexion, and how lonj- they may continue 

 to burn, are questions which do not admit au easy decision. The greater 

 number of volcanoes rise in a cone, their mouth or crater, has generally 

 the shape of a cap or an inverted tunnel ; but iu some instances the lava 

 breaks out at the sides. AV'hen the fires find no issue they produce earth- 

 quakes. When Vesuvius throws ofl'its inflammable contenis by moderate 

 and regular eruptions, the inhabitants of Naples have but little to dread 

 on, the occurrence of an earthquake : after a long repose the volcano breaks 

 out with additional force ; the extent of its influence is astonishing; that 

 of Toniboraa in one of the Islands of the Indian Archipelago, was felt 

 througli a circular space of 2000 miles in diameter." 



I submit with great diffidence whether it may not be possible to show 

 that the origin of almost all the internal heat of the earth arises simply fi oni 

 the attraction of the particles composing it, in fact constituting an universal 

 pressure, greater in the exact ratio that these particles collectively have 

 to one another. Let me instance, what we all know, that independently Of 



