idges" is used as a text-book.
Professor Gillespie, writing from Europe, remarked that the greatest
engineer of the age, Robert Stephenson, and his distinguished
associates, had spoken of this book in terms of the highest
commendation.

After the publication of the controversial papers between Messrs.
Stephenson and Fairbairn in regard to the Britannia Bridge, it became
apparent that neither of these gentlemen, with all their calculations
and expenditures in experiments, had determined the proper distribution
of the strains, and the size and strength required for the side-plates
of tubular bridges, but only for those at the top and bottom. General
Haupt solved the problem mathematically, and sent a communication on the
subject to the American Association for the Advancement of Science,
which has been extensively copied into the scientific journals of
Europe, and has added largely to the reputation of its author. In the
Victoria Bridge at Montreal, the distribution of material in the
vertical plates conforms to the proportions given by General Haupt.

About the year 1853, General Haupt, then Chief Engineer of the
Pennsylvania Railroad, reviewed the work of Charles Ellett on the Ohio
and Mississippi Rivers, with other plans of improvement that had been
suggested, and, in a pamphlet of about a hundred pages, proposed a
novel, bold, and simple method for the improvement of these rivers,
costing scarcely a tenth as much as the estimated expense of some of the
other methods, and promising greater durability and efficacy. The
Pittsburg Board of Trade recently appointed a scientific commission to
investigate the whole subject; and their report, which is thorough and
exhaustive, gives unanimously the preference to the plan of General
Haupt, as the only practicable mode of improving the Ohio River, so as
to insure a permanent depth of water of not less than six feet. In
passing, we would remark that one of the greatest difficulties the War
Department has had to contend with has been the lack of suitable
navigation on the Ohio River, and it is to be regretted that Government
did not at once seize upon the plans of General Haupt and carry them
into execution.

In the spring of 1862, General Haupt was solicited to take charge of the
reconstruction of the railroad from Acquia Creek to Fredericksburg.
Without material other than that furnished by forests two miles distant,
and without skilled mechanics, but simply by the aid of com