3-003-873 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Birdseye view of the Sulina mouth of the Danube, showing the works of improvement lately carried out under the European Commission of the Danube by Charles A. Hartley, Engineer in Chief to the Commission, 1861. Completion of engineering works...for the purpose of deepening the bar channel which...[previously] was of so slight a depth as to hinder all but small vessels from entering the river...in former times the depth over the bar varied from 7½ to 10ft., there is now an excellent channel of 17ft., allowing vessels of considerable tonnage to enter the port, which has thus become a harbour of refuge at a point on the coast that three years ago was the most dangerous on the western shore of the Black Sea. In celebration of the successful termination of these works the commissioners, who represent the seven different Powers that signed the Treaty of Paris, gave a fete to a large number of the principal authorities, persons of distinction, and merchants residing in the Principalities and neighbouring districts...All the vessels and ships of war in the harbour were dressed, flags were flying from the various workshops and establishments of the Commission, and the piers were decked with banderols from one end to the other'. From "Illustrated London News", 1861.