Brunel Launches the Iron Steamship SS Great Britain

On 19 July 1843, Prince Albert arrived at the Great Western Railway terminus in Bristol to attend the launch of a revolutionary ocean vessel, the SS Great Britain. Conceived by chief engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel for the Great Western Steamship Company, the ship was floated out from a specially adapted dry dock. The christening ceremony encountered an immediate mishap when the ceremonial bottle of champagne thrown by Clarissa Miles, wife of a company director, reportedly missed the vessel. By one account Prince Albert then threw a second bottle from his table, though the evidence on who christened the ship is conflicting. The day marked a defining transition in maritime design.

The Great Western Steamship Company had initially planned a conventional wooden paddle steamer as a companion to its successful Great Western. Two experimental vessels altered Brunel's approach. By one account, in late 1838 Brunel had his colleagues Christopher Claxton and William Patterson make a trial voyage to Antwerp aboard the iron-hulled steamer Rainbow. Persuaded by iron's structural rigidity and immunity to dry rot, Brunel abandoned timber plans. Then, in early 1840, trials in Bristol with the SS Archimedes demonstrated the mechanical efficiency of screw propulsion over side paddlewheels. After Brunel reported in favour of the screw in October 1840, the company's directors agreed to adopt a screw propeller, accepting substantial delays.