Brunel, Isambard Kingdom

Brunel, Isambard Kingdom (1896–59), British-born engineer and ship designer. He began his engineering career in 1823 when he entered the office of his father, French-born Marc Isambard Brunel (1769–1849), who had fled to the USA to escape the French Revolution before settling in England in 1799 to work as an inventor and engineer. In 1825 Brunel was appointed his father's assistant engineer in the construction of the first tunnel under the River Thames, now used for the Rotherhithe–Wapping underground line, but in 1828 was injured in an inundation of the tunnel which delayed completion of its construction until 1843. He then worked on several projects constructing docks and piers in West Country ports before he was appointed engineer of the projected Great Western Railway in 1833, the design of which was mainly his work.

In addition to his railway and dock construction work, Brunel took a keen interest in the development of ocean steamships and steam propulsion, and in 1835 suggested to the directors of the Great Western Railway that the line should be extended to ‘have a steamboat to go from Bristol to New York and call it the Great Western’. His proposal was accepted and he designed and built the Great Western at Bristol, a wooden paddle steamer larger than any steamer of the day. It was the first steamship built to make regular crossings of the Atlantic and proved a most successful vessel, its first voyage to New York and back being made in 1838.

Brunel next designed an even larger ship, the Great Britain, which was the first large iron steamship, the largest ship afloat at the time, and the first big one in which a screw propeller was fitted. launched in 1843, the Great Britain made her first Atlantic crossing to New York in 1845, but the following year was carelessly run aground, and it was nearly a year before the ship was refloated. However, it was so little damaged that it was subsequently used for many years in the Australian trade, a great tribute to the strength of Brunel's design.

This connection with the Australian trade fired Brunel to envisage a ‘great ship’ large enough to carry in its bunkers all the coal required for a voyage to Australia without the need of calling at a coaling station on the way and, if no coal was available at the ship's port of destination, enough coal as well for the return voyage. He took his designs for his ‘great ship’ to the directors of the Eastern Steam Navigation Company, who accepted them and appointed him as their engineer for the project. In collaboration with J. Scott Russell, Brunel's Great Eastern was laid down in December 1853, but many difficulties were experienced during construction and in the launching, and the ship did not get finally afloat until the end of January 1858. The Great Eastern was by far the largest ship ever built up to that time, and had both screw and paddle propulsion. Brunel did not see her leave on her maiden voyage; two days before she was due to sail he suffered a severe stroke and died ten days later.

Many of the elements of Brunel's designs, as for example the construction of double bottoms in the Great Britain, remain standard practice in shipbuilding today.

Bibliography

Rolt, L. T. C. , Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1970).