known as the Bessemer process, and a patent was granted me over Mr. Bessemer."
There has been a feeling among metallurgists in both hemispheres that William Kelly's claims as an originator of a process similar in all its essential features to that invented by Henry Bessemer rest on a very unsubstantial foundation of experimental facts and experience. This impression is entirely erroneous, as was proved in the interference proceedings before the Commissioner of Patents, pending the issuance of a patent to Kelly (June 23, 1857); and again in 1870, when the question of granting an extension of Bessemer's patent (of November 11, 1856) was before the United States Patent Office, the commissioner refused to grant such extension, holding that the patent should not have been issued, as William Kelly was the prior inventor; and still again, when in 1871 William Kelly's patent was extended for seven years, it having been proved to the satisfaction of the commissioner that he had not been sufficiently remunerated for the invention; and yet again, by the fact of royalties having been regularly paid by the manufacturers of steel during the whole of the seven years for which Kelly's patent was extended, for the right to use his invention; and so unimpeachable was the evidence on which his claims were founded, that there was no attempt to set them aside during that time.[1]
The plain, straightforward statement of Mr. Kelly above quoted is an additional proof that he was no mere schemer or dreamer. It is evident that he had a definite end in view—the making of malleable iron—and had he possessed more. capital and been situated where he could have availed himself of the best facilities, it is quite probable that he would have arrived at that end by the employment of methods and apparatus which would have left little to be desired; but, located in a small community (Eddyville had not five hundred inhabitants), in a part of the country remote from the best mechanical appliances and with limited means, it is remarkable that he carried his invention as far as he did before the heavy hand of bankruptcy crushed alike his ledgers and experiments.
As matters stood when Kelly's patent was issued, Bessemer had received a patent for the same invention, and at a later date a number of patents for apparatus the design of which was clearly very far in advance of anything accomplished by Kelly. Joseph G. Martien also had obtained a patent (February 24, 1857) for sub-
- ↑ In this connection it is proper to note that all the profits which the owners of the patents of Bessemer, Kelly, and Mushet ever received were earned and divided during the seven years covered by the extension of the patent of William Kelly; and had not that extension been granted, the parties who had put their money into the purchase of these patents would never have received one cent for their investment.
