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A
TREATISE ON FIRE & THIEF-PROOF DEPOSITORIES
AND
LOCKS AND KEYS
BY
GEORGE PRICE
1856
ON FIRE AND THIEF-PROOF DEPOSITRIES
PREFACE
The Substance of the chapters on fire and thief-proof depositories was delivered as a lecture in 1855, in the cities of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dublin, and in the town of Belfast; and, but for ill health, would have been delivered in some of the cities and towns of England. Having been repeatedly requested to publish it, and the press having given it a complimentary and approving notice, I have done so, in the hope that it may throw some light upon a subject very imperfectly understood, not only by the general public, but by those whose interests ought to make it a subject of deep consideration. It is almost incredible in these days, when the arts and sciences are lectured upon in almost every provincial town in the kingdom, when the artisan is taught not only that such a result follows a certain law, but the why and wherefore - the cause as well as the effect - that persons of general intelligence and scientific knowledge should place their valuable convertible property in a cast-iron safe, with a box of wards for a lock, expecting that it will preserve such contents from destruction by fire and abstraction by thieves. That others for the sake of saving a few shillings in the primary cost of a lock for the safe keeping of their property in an iron safe or other receptacle, will purchase one that can be readily picked with a quill or a skewer, not only by the accomplished burglar, but by an ordinary mechanic or intelligent artisan, as well as by the amateur lock-picker.
As there are no works in our language, except a few pamphlets and a rudimentary treatise, on the subject of locks, I have added the chapters on locks and keys to make this treatise as complete and useful as possible.
I am especially indebted for many extracts to Mr Granville Sharp's "Prize Essay on Practical Banking," Mr Chubb's paper "On the Construction of Locks and Keys," and the "Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Locks," by Messrs. Tomlinson and Hobbs, - works of such an interesting character that they should be read by all. Other general works have afforded me considerable information. Mr Chubb, in the work before-named, published in 1850, says - "Without intending in any way to depreciate the numerous inventions for the improvement of locks (many of which possess great merit, it will be sufficient to describe particularly the three principal locks which are well known and generally appreciated, viz., Barron's, Bramah's, and Chubb's." In Messrs. Tomlinson and Hobbs' work published in 1853, the only principal modern locks described are the "American" Inventions. It will, therefore, be seen that the improved locks which were the fruit of the "lock controversy" produced by the Great Exhibition of 1851, have not been described, with two or three exceptions, in any work hitherto published, many of which inventions possess considerable merit, and for security are far superior to nearly the whole of the locks known prior to the year 1851.
Portions of the first part, which is written in the first person singular, may be considered as somewhat egotistical, but the extraordinary opposition which the author experienced, and the strange course of conduct adopted towards him in certain instances by the agents and representatives, and in one case by the foreman of a competitor in the same trade, rendered such a tone imperative, and it is hoped will be deemed a sufficient excuse for it, as such parts were really written in self-defence. In the second part (on locks and keys) he has embraced the opportunity of writing under the modest and more unassuming plural - we.
As manufacturers are not expected to be also authors, and as the subject was beset with considerable difficulty in point of interest, especially as regarded scantiness of materials for illustration, I felt bound to spare no pains in acquiring all the available information that could be obtained to render it at least as clear and intelligible as possible. How far I have succeeded it is for my readers to determine; but whatever may be thought of this humble work, thrown off during the intervals of absorbing avocations, none, I am sure, will feel disposed to question the importance of the subjects treated of.
GEORGE PRICE
CLEVELAND SAFE WORKS,
WOLVERHAMPTON, DECEMBER 15th, 1856.
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