Observations on the Duke of Richmond's Extensive Plans of Fortification, and the New Works He Has Been Carrying on Since These Were Set Aside by the House of Commons in 1786 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1794 edition. Excerpt: ...Are there no inland depots without land-carriage? Are not Chatham, Woolwich, Deptford, &c. inland depots, in comparifon of Portfmouth and Plymouth? And as our fhipping cannot poffibly, in cafe of an attack, remain jat Portfmouth, even after your lines fhall be finifhed, what great difficulty will there be in their taking molt of the fails and hemp with them to thefe depots? No perfon but your Grace, who difcriminates and combines fo accurately, could have brought together, on this fubjecl, ideas fo heterogeneous, difcordant, and unconnected. But there is no neceflity even for this expedient. The idea of fmking powder with the combuftible ftores of a dock-yard, is unqueftionably new. Nobody will difpute the difcovery with you. It is worthy of the philofophic Duke of Richmond, and may be very fitly, in point of excellence, compared to another projecl of his, viz. that that of raifing the Royal George hy means of air balloons. His ideas on every fubject are extenfive. And even on this it is manifeft, that he has already gone greatly beyond Blanchard or Lunardi. Sure I am, however, that the Author of the Short Eflay never once thought, fpoke, or wrote of finking powder. It is well known that our powder magazines are always bomb-proof, and never in our dock-yards. But mould even a partial deftruction of the inflammable lores in a dock-yard take place; does it follow, that they could not be replaced in lefs than four or five years as you affert, when it cannot be queftioned that there are in ftore-houfes and yards on the river Thames ten times the quantity that there has ever been, both in Plymouth and Portfmouth, at any one time whatever? If your Grace would only deign to confult pfficers who have feen fervice on which bomb-proofs of logs have been...