Inauguration and Opening of Messrs. Tod and Macgregors’ New Graving and Tidal Dock
From the Glasgow Herald, Friday Morning, January 29th,1858

Photo of the dock in use

Yesterday having "been the appointed day for the opening of this magnificent work, an unusual excitement prevailed amongst all the classes more immediately interested in the shipping and navigation of the Clyde, whose name we need scarcely say is legion. The kind and assiduous courtesy of the enterprising firm.........had chartered the Craignish steamer to convey hundreds of their friends - specially invited - from the Broomielaw to Partick to witness the ceremony of wedding this graving dock to the Clyde…..

We have on former occasions so fully brought before our readers the nature and capabilities of the present work as well as the important details and operations associated with its progress and now successful consummation, that we shall now only briefly advert to one or two general facts. It was only in June 1856 that the plans and specifications were prepared by Messrs. Bell and Miller, the engineers in this great work. During the same month the relative tenders were accepted by Messrs, York and Gouper, the contractors, for the dock with Its basin and quays.

On the 28th, of January 1858 or within only about - eighteen months from the initial steps, the large space of vacant ground is excavated, the dock constructed after the most approved fashion, the gates opened, and the large ocean steamer Glasgow, plying between the Clyde and New York, quietly floated into this magnificent crip to receive all requisite repairs from the keel upwards. It may be said by some that we were too fast with our shipbuilding enterprise on the Clyde - that we put the cart before the horse or built the finest steamers, which are now afloat, without having the means to minister to their repairs,....... When invalided our vessels had to go hence to Liverpool or elsewhere, though we had thousands of hands who could have administered the necessary repair, if only they had got those small Leviathans high and dry.

Messrs, Tod and Macgregor have, through their private and magnificent enterprise, supplied this desideratum.......and we can now, thanks to Messrs, Tod and Macgregor, do everything, either for iron or wooden ships, from their birth to their close, within the waters of the Clyde, This graving dock - entering from a basin containing nearly an acre of surface space, with wharfs along the sides of the Clyde and Kelvin - is 500 feet in length inside of the gates. The width of the sole of the dock is 50 feet, and the gates will permit the entrance of a vessel of 56 feet beam and drawing 17 feet of water. In plain terms, the Persia, Australasian, Simla, Nemesis, and largest vessels built in the Clyde, being the largest in the mercantile marine afloat,......can find relief within this cave of refuge provided by the private enterprise of Messrs. Tod and Macgregor.

They have shown themselves men of action. While our Clyde Trust and the generality talked and debated about the feasibility of such a scheme-Messrs. Tod and Macgregor.........resolved the work should be done......Napoleon I said at St.Helena that impossibility was not a French word, and our citizens, Tod and Macgregor seem resolved that the term shall have as little meaning on the banks of the Clyde…..A large party assembled on board the Craignish steamer at the Broomielaw yesterday, about 11 o'clock and were soon carried down to Meadowside, Partick and landed adjacent to the new dock.

Most of the vessels on the river were gaily decorated with their colours, and a large crowd was congregated along the spacious sides of the new dock, and on the banks and rising ground around........The fine steamer Glasgow, decorated from stem to stern, with the band of the Queens Own on the hurricane deck, was stationed in the basin ready to enter as soon as the dock was opened. Immediately behind was the Albion steamer, a tight sea-going craft, but dwarfed by the proportions of the Glasgow. The fine band of the Rifles was stationed on the north side of the dock, and responded to that of the Queens Own on board the Glasgow.

All were thus assembled, awaiting the interesting spectacle of the opening, when, at a quarter past eleven o'clock, two guns were fired, and the winch commanding the sluice was turned. The water soon flooded the surface of the dock, and before 12 o'clock it was up to 17 feet. The massive gates then were gradually opened and thrown back, which called forth a loud cheer from the multitude, the operation somewhat reminding one of the marriage of Venice to the Adriatic. The Glasgow was quickly drawn within, the officer In the bow calling for three cheers for Tod and Macgregor, as the vessel commenced to cross the sill of the dock, which were heartily given,

(In his inaugural speech, Sheriff Steele, who was deputising for the Lord Provost, pointed out that "since the dock was to be opened, the first vessel that should enter that dock should also happen to be a monument of the skill and intelligence of the builders of that dock, the ground work, and an appropriate comparison for an appropriate enterprise? for when you consider that the gentlemen here today were the first to inaugurate steam navigation between distant shores, and when you find that they have themselves from their own resources provided such a dock for a shipping community! am perfectly convinced that there is not one who is not responsive with gratitude, nor one mind that does not wish them continued happiness, health and prosperity.")

After the real business of the day had been thus brought to so satisfactory a conclusion amidst the cheers of the multitude, the enlivening airs of the bands and repeated salvos from the guns stationed near the dock, a large company, amounting to, between 500 and 600, adjourned to the spacious drawing loft on Messrs. Tod and Macgregors’ works, Here a splendid entertainment was provided by the firm.

(Mr. Andrew Orr, in the chair, referred to the dimensions of the new dock, which had "at moderate tides 17 feet over the sill, at spring tides It might rise to 25 or 24 feet, admitting the largest ship in the mercantile marine and every ship afloat.")

(In his reply, Mr. Macgregor said of his audience Ho doubt you are perfectly aware of the want of a graving dock in connection with the trade of Glasgow........I don't think Tod and
Macgregor will ever make much out of it, but it will do well."

(The original article was written in fewer paragraphs)

                            The Dry Dock Entrance Now                                                        A similar Dry Dock in Greenock