A Philosophical Dissertation on the Diving Vessel Projected by Mr. Day, and Sunk in Plymouth Sound;

£3,000 · Offered by Maggs Bros Ltd

The sorry tale of a Yarmouth labourer John Day, who though “illiterate and indigent in his circumstances” had a bold and unshakable confidence in his ability as a submariner. His efforts did find him the fame that he was “jealous of” - but alas - his notch on the belt of history was the unconverted title of first recorded submarine shipwreck fatality. Day’s initial experiments involved using the tide to submerge him in a diving-bell style vessel, which perhaps contributed to his crucial misunderstandings of the pressure implications of vertical submersion. After a modest but much exaggerated success, he took his expanded proposition to professional gambler Christopher Blake Esq. as “an affair by which money might be won”. Blake took the bait - he advanced Day £350 to construct the vessel and offered 10% of all winnings from wagers. With this, Day purchased a 50 ton sloop, the Maria , and employed a Plymouth shipwright Mr. Hunn to modify and refit her to his specifications. These modifications entailed the creation of a sealed internal chamber of 12ft by 9 by 8, with a volume of “75 hogshead” of air - “the whole frame of the chamber was seared, bolted, and secured with knees on all sides within.” Alongside this, an internal ballast of 10 tons of limestone was added, plus an additional mechanism by which “twenty rough stones, each of a ton weight” were suspended beneath the sloop with a means to detach from them rigged to the internal chamber, ostensibly with a thought to allow

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