3-028-195 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Blowing up of the wreck of the Golden Fleece in the Bristol Channel, 1870. Engraving of a sketch by Lieutenant C. E. Turner, R.E., of '...the operations which were lately carried out by a party of the Royal Engineers in the sea near the port of Cardiff. The Golden Fleece was an iron steamer...laden with 2200 tons of coal. She foundered off Sully Island, about six miles from Cardiff, where she had taken in her cargo of coals, early in September of the past year. Being found to be a great obstruction to the navigation, application was made by the Trinity Board to the School of Military Engineering at Chatham for assistance in removing her, and a party was accordingly dispatched with materials and apparatus for blowing her up on Dec. 2...The charges consist each of 100 lbs. of compressed gun-cotton, contained in a wrought-iron case, and fired by means of electricity. The sketch shows the explosion of one of these charges. In the distance are Sully Island and the mainland; near the front are the two boats from which the operations are conducted. In the larger boat is the drum of electric wire cable, with the frictional electrical machine, by which the charges are fired'. From "Illustrated London News", 1870.