Blogs by Kumar Biswas: Death of Diesel

Source: Internet

It was dead of night of 29 September 1913. A steamship named SS Dresden was on her voyage from Antwerp, Belgium to Harwich, England. The ship sailed through the water of English Channel; little murmur of the engine was breaking the eerie silence of the surroundings.

At around 10 pm, one of the passengers of the vessel, who had boarded the vessel in the evening, after his dinner, went to his cabin to sleep. While leaving the dining hall, he told the porter to wake him up at 6:15 am next day morning. That was the last time, he was seen by the fellow passengers and the crew of the ship. Subsequent morning when the porter went to wake him up, he found the door of the room was kept ajar. His bed was still neatly laid up which meant that he had not slept on the bed on the previous night. His night-suit was intact and unused. A search was undertaken at all possible corners of the ship. But no trace of the person was found. He had vanished in the thin air of the channel. He was declared missing from the board.

A diary was found on the side table of his bed. The particular page of that date in the diary was found marked cross (X). His disappearance might be connected to a few possibilities:

Firstly, he might have slipped from the deck of the ship.

Second possibility was that he might have jumped into water, and committed suicide, and

third possibility, more intriguing, he might have been murdered and thrown overboard.

To find the answer of the mysterious vanishing of the person, whether it was a suicide or a murder, we shall explore a bit, little later.

On 10 October 1913, the crew of a Dutch North Sea steamer noticed a floating bloated human corpse on the water, in the vicinity of the route of SS Dresden. It was so badly decomposed that it could not be retrieved from water. So, they decided that it should have a watery grave. But wisely they recovered a few belongings from the highly decomposed body - a wallet, one paper knife and a few small items. Later, the son of the person confirmed that those items belonged to his missing father.

(Source: Internet)

The name of the missing person was Rudolf Christian Karl Diesel, the famous German mechanical engineer and inventor. He was the man behind the invention of the Diesel engine, that runs on Diesel oil and has subsequently revolutionised the world. Both the engine and fuel carry his name, even today.

The diesel engine, created by Diesel at that time, was very bulky in size and was fit for static industry or large ships. Application of diesel engine in automobile sector dawned a little later, by mid-1920s, when a comparatively compact diesel engine for road transport sector was developed by Clessie Cummins. Mercedes-Benz introduced diesel driven automobile in 1936.

(Source: Internet)

He was born on 18 March 1858.

(Source: Internet)

On 18 March 1958, on his 100th birthday, the German Post issued a blue-green commemorate postage stamp on the personality.

(Source: Internet)

It was designed by Prof. Hermann Schardt who had included an image of Diesel and a sketch of his diesel engine.

(Source: Internet)

Germany issued another commemorative stamp on 28 August 1977, featuring him while commemorating the centenary of invention of diesel engine. Besides Germany, several countries have honored the inventor by issuing postage stamps on him. Some of them are:

Central African Republic - 21 December 1986

Maldives - 26 December 1989 and 04 October 2018

Cuba - 20 January 1993

Gibraltar - 01 March 1994

Uruguay - 08 December 1997

North Macedonia - 18 June 2008

Guinea - 20 October 2008

Vietnam - 29 September 2013

Sierra Leone - 30 August 2018

(Source: Internet)

There was an interesting twist for stamps issued on 01 February 1993 by Western Sahara on Diesel and his diesel engine. Morocco Postal Services vide their circular number 414 of 2002, number 69 of 2004, and number 71 of 2008, has declared those stamps of Rudolf Diesel were illegal issues.

(Source: Internet)

They have clarified that there was no operational post office under the control of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic when those stamps were released.

(Vietnam Post, Source: Internet)

Let us examine the possibilities of mysterious disappearance of Rudolf Diesel.

He was insomniac so it may fit well that after dinner he might be taking a stroll on the deck. But the idea of his accidental slippage from the deck into water does not hold water because on that night there was no rough or stormy weather.

(Source: Internet)

The suicide theory was propagated based on his financial status. It was said that he was getting nearly broke. To examine the suicide angle, his possible financial stress was analyzed. It was found that before boarding the ship, he had left a bag with his wife, with a strict instruction that it was to be opened after one week of his departure. Later, on opening the bag, a reasonable amount of cash and financial statements indicating debts were found. The criticality of financial conditions was debated as previously he had generated great wealth through his new innovations.

(Source: Internet)

The cross-mark (X) on the page of diary remained shrouded with mystery. Several possibilities are there. Whether he was contemplating to commit suicide or had a hunch that he would be attacked by someone during the voyage remained unanswered. Another unanswered question is that was it marked by himself or someone else put the mark, in order to divert the attention towards suicide theory.

Now the third angle of possibility of his murder. Who would be interested to kill an inventor like him? For the analysis purposes, there are two different approaches. Firstly, the time of his disappearance was a period of tension between Germany and UK which ultimately followed by full-scale World War I (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918). Was he travelling from Germany to London to sign a secret deal for technology transfer of his diesel engine to British Navy?

Alternatively, whether his continuous research to use vegetable oil (like peanut oil) as fuel had raised red flag among the petroleum oil magnets of that era?

There are only endless questions but no answer.

Today, the well-oiled wheels of twenty first century are driven by diesel oil. Concerned with global warming caused by diesel engines, countries are progressively working on bio-diesel. The oils extracted from various plant seeds are being tried in lieu of diesel in vehicle engines to reduce emission of green house gases (GHGs). Is the civilisation completing a full circle, in fuel front, as Diesel had progressed considerably in his research work to use peanut oil and other seed oils as fuel?

If bio-diesel become reality on a large scale across the world, then it will put a break on the reckless process of dieselisation of industry and that may be a fitting tribute to the researches of Diesel which he could not complete due to unfortunate untimely demise.

Bibliography:

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-38302874

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLzMvbqMVQE

https://the-line-up.com/rudolf-diesel

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/inventor-rudolf-diesel-vanishes

https://www.websleuths.com/forums/threads/international-rudolph-diesel-inventor-55-ss-dresden-english-channel-29-sep-1913.692462/

https://colnect.com/en/search/list/collectibles/stamps/q/Rudolf+Diesel

Disclaimer:

The noble objective of this blog, is to promote the hobby of philately through images of stamps, a few pictures and related narration. The scans of a few stamps, featured in this blogpost are mine while others (sourced from internet) are properties of their respective owners. No intention to infringe any type of copyright.

The information provided in the article is for general informational purposes only. All information is provided in good faith. This is only for sharing of knowledge of philately with philatelist fraternity of the world. No commercial or political angle, whatsoever, is involved. This is not a historical document. Under no circumstances, I shall have any liability for reliance on any information provided in the story.

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The story was published in the February 2024 issue of the popular philatelic digital magazine, Ananthapuri Stamp Bulletin.