The Great Eastern Rock

During the Great Eastern’s sixth voyage and with her seventh captain, Captain Paton, the ship, heavy with cargo, struck a huge rock pinnacle, which had until then lay unnoticed under the sea, just off the coast of New York. The rock gouged an 83 feet long and 9 feet wide hole into the Great Eastern’s hull below the waterline and it is a testament to the ingenuity of Brunel’s double hull design that the ship didn’t sink there and then.

The ship was to be repaired by an equally ingenious device called a cofferdam. The cofferdam was to be clamped to the side of hull covering the 83 feet long hole. The cofferdam would then be made watertight and the hole pumped dry from within the hull of the Great Eastern.

Whilst it took several attempts to get it right, a fire-hose was used as a huge washer around the mouth of the cofferdam. When the cofferdam was clamped to the side of the ship by throwing vast chains around the entire ship and tightening them against the cofferdam, the fire-hose was filled with water and a watertight seal was created. Once pumped dry from inside the hull, the pressure of the water outside the cofferdam helped to maintain the seal so that the repairs could be carried out from within the hull.

During repairs the diver went down to make a routine inspection of the cofferdam from where he immediately bolted back to the surface looking as if he had seen a ghost. He claimed that he had heard the unearthly hammering of the ghost riveter who had become trapped and died inside the hull during the ships construction.

Having their fears increased by a spirit medium who happened to be on board at the time (the flourishing ‘trade’ for spirit mediums at this time was an unfortunate and popular bi-product of the civil war in America) the riveters immediately refused to go down into the ships hull and all work on the repair ceased. Captain Paton and the engineers made a complete inspection of the ship and heard for themselves the knock-knock-knocking from within the hull. The captain, keen to avoid a mutiny, paddled around the ship only to find a loose chain knocking against the hull below the waterline as it swayed with the waves of the sea. He showed this to his men, made the chain secured, had the spirit medium thrown overboard and the repairs continued with renewed vigour.

The rock that caused the damage to the Great Eastern was named after the ship itself and remains on marine charts to this day.


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