Colonel Wilmot was greatly astonished, and so was the experienced foreman of the hammer shop who conducted the experiment, and who expressed his admiration with a forcible adjective, which I need not repeat. I gave one steel and one pure iron cylinder to Colonel Wilmot, and retained the other two, which were exhibited in the International Exhibition of 1862.

After personally inspecting the crushing of the two pure iron cylinders and the two mild steel ones, Colonel Wilmot was so convinced of the immense importance to the State of Bessemer mild steel as a material for guns, that he said he would no longer delay taking active steps for its manufacture at Woolwich. On his asking me if he might go over our Sheffield Works, and see for himself how everything was done, I at once assented. A day was fixed, and Colonel Wilmot and I went down together to Sheffield, where he passed the greater part of the following day in making himself fully acquainted with all the details of what was in reality a very simple process, and with which he expressed himself perfectly satisfied. I cannot omit to mention a very curious and somewhat significant fact, which more than justified Colonel Wilmot in the strong opinion he had formed of the value and practicability of the process. The well- known and extensive steel works of Sir John Brown and Co. are only separated by a wall from the Bessemer Steel Works at Sheffield, but neither Sir J. Brown, nor any of his people, had taken the smallest apparent interest in what we were doing, and, indeed, like the rest of the good people at Sheffield, had a profound disbelief in the production of steel direct from pig-iron by any conceivable process. Now Colonel Wilmot, during this visit to Sheffield, had occasion to see Sir John Brown on other business, and, so ardent a convert had he become, that he succeeded in persuading Sir John Brown and his partner Mr. Ellis, to go with him next door and see the Bessemer process in operation. They came, and had but a short time to wait before the cupola furnace was tapped, and a charge of molten pig-iron was run by a spout directly into the empty converter. They seemed much interested in watching the great change which took place in the flame and sparks emitted as the process proceeded; but when the eruption of cinder, and the accompanying huge body of flame, were seen to issue from the converter, they were greatly astonished. In about twenty minutes the flame had dropped, the mouth of the huge vessel was gradually lowered, and a torrent of incandescent metal was poured into the casting ladle. Up to this moment they merely expressed surprise at the volume of flame, the brightness of the light, and the entire novelty of the process. But no sooner did they see the incandescent stream issue from the mouth of the converter, than their practised eyes in an instant recognised it to be fluid steel, and they themselves were "converted," never to fall back again into a state of unbelief. They stayed to witness the casting operation, and accepted one of the hot ingots for testing at their own works, the result being that Sir John Brown and Company became the first licensees in Sheffield under my steel patents.

The moral to be drawn from these facts is simply this;-- that the state of the manufacture was at that period such, that after once witnessing the process and testing the material at their own works, these eminently practical steel-makers resolved, at the risk of entirely revolutionising their old established business, to put up plant and become Bessemer Steel manufacturers. Now, I would ask any impartial person if this fact did not justify, and more than justify, Colonel Wilmot in the conclusion to which he had arrived independently -- that this cheap and rapid production of steel ought at once to be utilised in the manufacture of guns for the British Government.²

After my return to London, I waited on Colonel Wilmot by appointment, went with him to inspect the gun-foundry at the Arsenal, and chose a suitable spot for the erection of the Bessemer Steel plant. It was finally arranged by us to remove one of the three large reverberatory furnaces that had been used to melt pig-iron for casting guns, and in its place put up a pair of converters, utilising the other two furnaces for melting the Bessemer pig. I took accurate measure of the foundry and its contents, so as to enable me, at my own offices, to arrange all the details of a converting plant to be erected in the old gun-foundry and to make an estimate of the cost.

When this was done, I handed to Colonel Wilmot an approximate estimate of £6,000, for erecting a steam- engine, boilers, and converting plant of sufficient size to produce 100 tons of gun steel per day, and I guaranteed that the cost of the steel poured into their own moulds should not exceed £6 10s. per ton,