A HISTORY OF CORNWALL 



the manufacture of dynamite (No. i), blasting 

 gelatine, gelatine-dynamite, and gelignite ; (2) 

 Acid Works ; (3) Nitrate of Lead Department ; 

 (4) Artificial Manure Works; (5) Engineering 

 Department. By means of the recently opened 

 railway line between Newquay and Chacewater 

 the factory has been brought into direct com- 

 munication with the Great Western Railway 

 system. It will be observed that this factory, 

 unlike that at Hayle, does not engage in the 

 manufacture of explosives required for the pur- 

 poses of ammunition. 



The manufacture of safety fuse at Tucking- 

 mill demands something more than a passing 

 notice, not only because it is the largest industry 

 of its kind, but also because the inventor of the 

 safety fuse was a Cornishman born in that 

 neighbourhood. The frequent accidents result- 

 ing from the use of explosives in tin and copper 

 mining, and chiefly owing to the uncertain 

 duration of the time between the lighting of the 

 rush or quill and the exploding of the charge, 

 led Mr. William Bickford in or about 1830 to 

 turn his thoughts towards the invention of some 

 method whereby blasting operations could be 

 conducted with the minimum of risk to the 

 miner. Mr. Bickford's motives were purely 

 philanthropic; it remained for his successors to 

 turn his invention into an extensive and legiti- 

 mate commercial enterprise. On 6 September, 

 1831, Mr. Bickford took out his first patent for 

 the ' Miners' Safety Fuse.' His object was to 

 provide a protected core of powder, thin and 

 continuous, along which the fire might travel 

 slowly at a uniform and determinate rate of 

 speed. This result he obtained by causing a 

 number of jute threads, passed through an orifice 

 and stretched by means of a weight attached to 

 their extremities, to rotate slowly while, at the 

 same time, a small current of fine powder fell 

 into the tube thus formed, and was retained 

 therein as a slender core. To use his own 

 words in the specification of his process : 



I embrace in the centre of my fuse, in a con- 

 tinuous line throughout its whole length, a small 

 portion, or compressed cylinder, or rod of gun- 

 powder, or other proper combustible matter pre- 

 pared in the usual pyrotechnical manner of fire- 

 work for the discharging of ordnance ; and which 

 fuse so prepared I afterwards more effectually 

 secure and defend by a covering of strong twine 

 made of similar material, and wound thereon, at 

 nearly right angles to the former twist, by the 

 operation which I call countering, hereinafter 

 described ; and I then immerse them in a bath 

 of heated varnish, and add to them afterwards a 

 coat of whiting, bran, or other suitable powdery 

 substance, to prevent them from sticking together 

 or to the fingers of those who handle them ; and 

 I thereby also defend them from wet or moisture 

 or other deterioration, and I cut off the same 

 fuse in such lengths as occasion may require for 

 use ; each of these lengths constituting when so 

 cut off a fuse for blasting of rocks and mining, 



and I use them either under water or on land, 

 in quarries of stone and mines for detaching 

 portions of rocks, or stone or mine, as occasions 

 require, in the manner long practised by, and 

 well known to miners and blasters of rocks. 



Previous to the invention of safety fuse the 

 devices for conveying the fire to the charge were 

 of the most crude and primitive description. 

 Sometimes a small trail of fine gunpowder from 

 the charge to an extemporized slow-match, such 

 as impregnated paper ; sometimes quills plucked 

 from geese, filled with fine grain powder and 

 lengthened where needful by the insertion of one 

 quill into another ; while, oftener still, rushes 

 were used, the rush having been first split, the 

 pith scooped out, its place filled with powder, 

 and the two halves bound together again by fine 

 string. Mr. Bickford's invention has been well 

 described as ' the very best means of blasting ever 

 devised, combining certainty, economy, and 

 safety.' 1 



Numerous and important improvements have 

 since been effected by the inventor's successors, 

 resulting in the adoption of Bickford's safety 

 fuse throughout the world. It has for many 

 years been used by the English War Office, 

 Admiralty, and other Government departments 

 both at home and in the colonies; whilst its 

 adoption by foreign governments and by foreign 

 engineers and miners has led the proprietors to 

 establish many factories on the continents of 

 Europe, America, and Australia. Of the im- 

 provements introduced within the last twenty 

 years, the most important has been an ingenious 

 device whereby the danger resulting from the 

 use of a naked light or spark, for the purpose of 

 igniting the fuse, has been completely obviated. 

 By means of this ' Colliery Fuse and Safety 

 Lighter,' blasting operations can be performed 

 with safety in collieries and mines where inflam- 

 mable gases are present, both the ignition and 

 combustion of the fuse being effected without 

 the emission of any spark or flame to the sur- 

 rounding atmosphere. Another invention worthy 

 of note is the volley-firer and instantaneous fuse, 

 by means of which several charges can be fired 

 simultaneously, and a greater effect obtained than 

 if the same charges were fired independently. 



To the late Major John Soloman Bickford, 

 and to the late Dr. George Smith, antiquary and 

 historian, who married the inventor's daughter, 

 belongs the credit of laying the foundations of 

 safety fuse as a commercial undertaking. They 

 directed its manufacture throughout their lives, 

 and were succeeded by the inventor's three 

 grandsons, the late Mr. Bickford Smith, M.P., 

 Sir George J. Smith of Treliske, and Mr. H. 

 Arthur Smith, M.A., Barrister-at-law. With 

 the two latter are now associated four great- 

 grandsons of Mr. Bickford. To Mr. Thomas 



1 Dr. Ure's Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures and 

 Mines, p. 5Z7- 



516 



