Royal Naval Biography/Swinburne, Charles Henry
CHARLES HENRY SWINBURNE, Esq.
[Commander.]
Second son of Sir John Swinburne, Bart., F.A.S., by Emma, daughter of Richard Henry Alexander Bennet, Esq., of Beckenham, co. Kent, and niece to the late Frances Julia, dowager Duchess of Northumberland.
This officer was made a lieutenant on the 14th July, 1818; appointed to the Glasgow frigate, Captain (now Sir Bentinck C.) Doyle, fitting out for the East India station. Mar. 26th, 1821; and promoted to the rank of commander April 30th. 1827. His last appointment was, Sept. 7th, 1829, to the Rapid sloop; which vessel he paid off, at Portsmouth, July 15th, 1833. The following is his official report to Vice-Admiral the Hon. Sir Henry Hotham, of a curious and interesting discovery on the south-west coast of Sicily:–
“H.M. sloop Rapid, at Malta, July 22d, 1831.
“Sir,– I have the honor to inform you that on the 11th of July, 1831, at 4 p.m., the town of Marsala hearing hy compass E. ½ N. 9 miles, I observed from on board H.M. sloop under my command., a high irregular column of very white smoke or steam, bearing S. by E. I steered for it, and continued to do so till 8-15, p.m., when having gone about thirty miles by the reckoning, I saw flashes of brilliant light mingled with the smoke, which was still distinctly visible by the light of the moon.
“In a few minutes the whole column became black and larger; almost immediately afterwards several successive eruptions of lurid fire rose up amidst the smoke; they subsided, and the column then became gradually white again. As we secured to near it fast, I shortened sail, and hove to till daylight, that I might ascertain its nature and exact position. During the night the changes from white to black with flashes, and the eruption of fire, continued at irregular intervals, varying from half an hour to an hour. At daylight I again steered towards it, and about 5 a.m., when the smoke had for a moment cleared away at the base, I saw a small hillock of a dark colour a few feet above the sea. This was soon hidden again, and was only visible through the smoke at the intervals between the more violent eruptions.
“The volcano was in a constant state of activity, and appeared to be discharging dust and stones with vast volumes of steam. At 7-30, the rushing noise of the eruptions was heard. At 9, being distant from it about two miles, and the water being much discoloured with dark objects at the surface in various places, I hove to and went in a boat to sound round and examine it. I rowed towards it, keeping on the weather side and sounding, but got no bottom till within twenty yards of the western side, where I had eighteen fathoms soft bottom; this was the only sounding obtained, except from the brig, one mile true north from the centre of the island, where the depth was 130 fathoms soft dark brown mud. The crater (for it was now evident that such was its form) seemed to be composed of fine cinders and mud of a dark brown colour; within it was to be seen in the intervals between the eruptions a mixture of muddy water, steam, and cinders dashing up and down, and occasionally running into the sea over the edge of the crater, which I found on rowing round to be broken down to the level of the sea on the W.S.W. side for the space of ten or twelve yards. Here I obtained a better view of the interior, which appeared to be filled with muddy water violently agitated, from which showers of hot stones or cinders were constantly shooting up a few yards, and falling into it again; but the great quantities of steam that constantly rose from it prevented my seeing the whole crater.
“A considerable stream of muddy water flowed outward through the opening, and, mingling with that of the sea, caused the discolouration that had been observed before. I could not approach near enough to observe its temperature; but that of the sea, within ten or twelve yards of it, was only one degree higher than the average, and to leeward of the island, in the direction of the current (which ran to the eastward), no difference could be perceived, even where the water was most discoloured; however, as a ‘mirage’ played above it near its surface, it was probably hot there. – The dark objects on the surface of the sea proved to be patches of small floating cinders. The island or crater appeared to be 70 or 90 yards in its external diameter, and the lip as thin as it could be, consistent with its height, which might be 20 feet above the sea in the highest, and six feet in the lowest part, leaving the rest for the diameter of the area within. These details could only be observed in the intervals between the great eruptions, some of which I witnessed from the boat. No words can describe their sublime grandeur; their progress was generally as follows: – After the volcano had emitted for some time its usual quantities of white steam, suddenly the whole aperture was filled with an enormous mass of hot cinders and dust, rushing upwards to the height of some hundred feet, with a loud roaring noise, then falling into the sea on all sides with a still louder noise, arising in part, perhaps, from the formation of prodigious quantities of steam, which instantly took place. This steam was at first of a brown colour, having embodied a great deal of dust; as it rose it gradually recovered its pure white colour, depositing the dust in the shape of a shower of muddy rain. While this was being accomplished, renewed eruptions of hot cinders and dust were quickly succeeding each other, while forked lightning, accompanied by rattling thunder, darted about in all directions within the column, now darkened with dust and greatly increased in volume, and distorted by sudden gusts and whirlwinds. The latter were most frequent on the lee side, where they often made imperfect water-spouts of curious shapes. On one occasion some of the steam reached the boat; it smelt a little of sulphur, and the mud it left became a gritty sparkling dark brown powder when dry. None of the stones or cinders thrown out appeared more than half a foot in diameter, and most of them much smaller.
“From the time when the volcano was first seen till after I left it, the barometer did not fall or rise; the sympiesometer underwent frequent but not important changes, and the temperature of the sea did not bespeak any unusual influence.
“After sunset, on the 18th, soundings were tried for every hour, to the average depth of eighty fathoms, no bottom. The wind was N.W., the weather serene.
“On the forenoon of the 19th, with the centre of the volcano bearing by compass S. by W. ½ W. one mile distant, good sights, for the chronometer gave the longitude 12° 41' East; and at noon on the same day, when it bore W. by N. ½ N. by compass, the meridian altitude of the sun gave the latitude 37° 7' 30" North; an amplitude of the sun the same morning gave the variation of 1½ point westerly. It is worthy of remark, that on the 28th of June last, at 9-30 p.m., when passing near the same spot in company with the Britannia, several shocks of an earthquake were felt in both ships. I have the honor to be, &c.
(Signed)“C. H. Swinburne.”
The appearance of this volcanic island, in Aug. 1831, is thus described by Mr. Alick Osborne, surgeon of the Ganges 84, Captain George Burdett:–
“On the 19th, we got sight of Graham Island in the afternoon; it is about twenty-seven miles from Sciacca on the southern coast of Sicily, lat. 37° 11' N., long. 12° 44' E. It appeared two hummocks, united by a lower neck of land; and from the southern extremity emitted a column of smoke or vapour of uncertain density and magnitude. On the 20th, after diligently working to windward all night, we approached the island considerably; and the breeze springing up favourable from the S.E., we were enabled to heave to within one mile distance, at ten o’clock, a.m. On our approach to the island we observed immense shoals of porpoises, and multitudes of sea-fowl, chiefly gulls, attracted, no doubt, by the fish which may have been destroyed by the late volcanic eruptions. It was very remarkable what a regular distance these voracious tribes kept from the land, about four or five miles, not one being observed near the shore on our visit to the volcano.
“The island appeared about 160 feet high, presenting a various aspect, as the bearing by compass altered; but in general, that of two longitudinal hills connected by intermediate low land, sending up smoke or vapour in abundance. On the western and highest part we observed the union flag of England waving majestically over this new and appalling scene of danger and desolation. At ten a.m., the boats were lowered down and manned; and in pursuance of previously concerted arrangements with the commander-in-chief, all officers impelled by curiosity or science, desirous of witnessing the phenomenon, took their places in them accordingly.
“We pushed off from the ship, made sail, and landed in a little bay on the N.E. side of this sombre lonely isle. A boat from the St. Vincent preceded us a few yards, and the bowman, an officer, pepared to be first ashore, touched the ground with the boat-hook, laid his weight upon it, pushed it down the second time firmly, with a kind of apparent misgiving of terrestrial stability, and jumped upon the beach. We were all on shore in an instant, scampering up the hill to the flag-staff, through a dense, oppressive vapour of carburetted hydrogen gas. The flag-staff is on the highest point of the island, bearing the name of Lieut. Coleman, of the cutter Hind, and from it we had a bird’s-eye view of the wonderful scene.
“In the centre of the island, to the eastward of us, was a circular basin, of about ninety feet diameter, of boiling salt water, of a dingy red colour, from the peroxide of iron in solution. The active ebullition from the centre, and emission of steam from the whole surface were evident to every one. From the summit where we stood, this basin appeared like a funnel a quarter full, the bank shelving down in the same imaginary proportion. The vapour here was oppressive to most of us, affecting the digestive more than the respiratory organs, producing nausea and faintness, without any sense or feeling of suffocation. The pulse was not affected in the least; mine was 86, accelerated by the exertion of quickly ascending the hill, breathing a highly rarefied atmosphere, not a little augmented by the internal caloric emitted copiously in vapour from the earth, as well as the heat of a scorching sirocco sun, which was extremely fervent this day.
“On the S.W. side of the island, adjoining the principal crater, was a terrific ebullition and agitation of the sea, evidently the commencement of a new crater, with constant ascension of dense white steam, impregnated with the carburetted hydrogen gas, which blackened the silver and watches in the pockets of the observers. That this vapour was not impregnated with sulplur, I infer, first, from the absence of that peculiar fetor, and its not atFecting the lungs; secondly, from the colour of the water in the crater, which, by coming in contact with sulphuretted hydrogen gas, would have been changed to a protoxide, and been black in place of red. This last chemical test I consider conclusive on this point; but it has been the custom to speak of sulphureous smoke, which, by-the-bye, may have been ejected in actual combustion, during the violence of previous eruptions, but certainly not now, in form of gas.
“On our descent, passing the margin of the crater, where it was not more than twenty feet to the boiling surface, I threw off my jacket, and jumped down, to the astonishment of all present, anxious alike to procure something from the cauldron, and try the temperature of the water.
I plunged my hand into the margin, but quickly withdrew it, finding it about 190° of Fahrenheit; the reduction of twenty-two degrees being easily explained, on reflecting on the extended surface becoming exposed to the atmosphere in a basin, as before mentioned, of two hundred and seventy feet in circumference. The water was excessively salt, owing to the continued evaporation, since the direct communication with the sea has been closed (probably with the last eruption), and appears something lower than the sea, leaving evident marks of decrease on the coloured masses of scoria round the margin.
“The island is about a mile in circumference, nearly round, or perhaps an imperfect spheroid, indented at the ends, where the great crater was at different periods connected with the sea. It is about one hundred and fifty or sixty feet high. The substance of which the island is composed is chiefly ashes, the pulverised remains of coal deprived of its bitumen, iron scoria, and a kind of ferruginous clay or oxided earth. Thee scoria occurs in irregular masses: some compact, dense, ami sonorous; others light, friable, and amorphous with metallic lustre, slightly magnetic, barely moving the load-stone. I only procured one native stone, a piece of limestone about two pounds weight, thrown up with the incumbent earth, having no marks of combustion. There was no trace whatever of lava, no terra puzzolana, no pumice stone, no shells or other marine remains, usually found at AEtna and Vesuvius. Around the island, where Neptune makes his advances, the sides fall down in abrupt precipices; and we could discern every strata ejected by each separate eruption; the water evaporating, left an incrustation of salt, which now appears a white, firm layer, plainly marking the regular progress and formation of the island. The surface of the island is likewise covered with a similar incrustation, in some places so thick as to be visibly white at some distance at sea.
“From the nature of this island, there being no bond of coherence in its heterogeneous particles, and from the precipitous falling down of its sides by the action of the sea, I am inclined to think, that there is not the stability of permanence in its composition. The insatiable ocean will encroach upon its base; the winds of heaven will scatter the dusty surface to the four cardinal points of the compass; the rain will dissolve the saline bond of union, and the crumbling ruin will gradually sink and extend its base, to a bank barely above the level of the sea. Its loss will not be deplored, for the screaming sea-bird instinctively wheels and directs his flight to a distant part of the ocean, to avoid the dark and desolate spot; and even the inhabitants of the deep seem to avoid the unhallowed shore.”
The following particulars respecting the disappearance of this extraordinary phenomenon, appeared in the Nautical Magazine for April, 1832:–
“On the 16th Nov. the island was seen by the master of a trading vessel, between Malta and Marseilles, at which time it had diminished to within a very few feet above the surface of the water. The same person, returning to Malta from Marseilles, having shaped a course for it from Maritimo, with fine weather, passed within two miles of the place where it had been, without seeing it.
“The master of another of these traders, on the 11th and 12th Dec. observed the sea breaking over the place where it had been, but could not see the island. Bad weather obliged him to bear up for Trapani, where he was informed, by the officer commanding a Sicilian gun-boat, that he had hoisted the Sicilian flag on the low hummock, which still remained on the 1st Dec. and that, having returned to it on the 9th following the whole had disappeared.
“The American brig Flora passed the situation of it on the 19th Dec. being in lat. 37° 9' N. and long. 12° 43' E. at noon of that day. The weather being fine, and the water smooth, an extensive reef was seen, and this vessel passed about half a mile to the northward of it.
“The master of the Lady Emily (the government yacht of Malta) passed the reef on the 9th Jan. and saw the sea breaking on it; and the fishermen of Pantellaria assert that there was then six feet of water on it.
“the French Admiral Hugon searched for it unsuccessfully during a whole day, previous to his arrival at Malta on the 14th Jan.
“Lieutenant Andrew Kennedy, commanding H.M. steam-vessel Hermes, passed it on the 4th and 5th Feb. and found a sensible change in the smoothness of the water when under its lee for a short time, when a heavy cross sea was running, and the wind was strong.”
“H.M. sloop Rapid, Aug. 25th, 1932.
“Sir.– I have the honor to inform you, that, in compliance with your order of the 18th June last, I have examined the spot where the volcanic island appeared last summer. It has left a dangerous shoal, consisting principally of black sand and stones, with a circular patch of rock in the middle of it, about 42 yards in diameter, on which there are two fathoms of water generally, but on one spot only nine feet. All around the rock there are from 2 1/2 to three fathoms, deepening gradually to five and six fathoms at the average distance of 100 yards from the centre; then more rapidly to 10, 20, 30, 40, &c. fathoms. A small detached rock, with 15 feet water on it, lies 130 yards to the S.W. of the central patch. About 3/4 of a mile N.W. of the centre there is a detached bank, with 23 fathoms on it. All the rock appears to be dark coloured porous lava; and the sand, which is extremely fine in the deepest water, is composed entirely of particles of the same substance. By this the soundings near the shoals may be distinguished, but it should be approached with great caution, as a large extent of deep water discoloured, which lies to the south-west, may be mistaken for it, while the real danger is seldom visible till it is near, being composed of very dark-coloured materials, and it is so steep that the lead cannot be trusted. Its latitude and longitude, as far as my limited means of observation enabled me to decide, are 37° 9' north, and 12° 43' east of Greenwich. In four days, during which the wind was constantly from N.W., currents were perceived from N.W., N., and N.E., the N.W. prevailing, and sometimes running at the rate of a mile an hour. The temperature of the water, on and near the shoal, does not differ from that of the sea at a distance. I have moored in three fathoms water, at the N.W. side of the shoal, a water cask, painted white, with a pole on it, surmounted by a white ball, and at the S.E. side of the shoal, in 31/2 fathoms, a similar cask, painted black, bearing a black ball on a pole. These two buoys are about 120 yards apart.
(Signed)“C. H. Swinburne.”
“To Vice-Admiral the Hon. Sir Henry Hotham,
K.C.B. &c. &c. &c.”
Thus has a volcanic eruption become a most formidable danger to our Mediterranean cruisers and trade.