Forgotten Science-Heroes of the Steam Age: Chapter 23 - "The Human Dreadnought"

[jack_babalon]

Commander Jonathan Scott Cockburn (1868 - 1914), the first "Human Dreadnought" seen here in 1907 with a prototype of the "Iron Jack" Battlesuit - the predecessor to the Victoria Class Tactical Battle Armor employed by the Royal Navy of today.

What child does not know by heart the story of Commander Jonathan Scott Cockburn, more popularly known as "The Human Dreadnought", the burly yet gentle engineer from Essex County who used his unparalled genius for improvised engineering along with an indefatiugable sense of purpose to invent the Iron Jack, the world's first Tactical Battle Armor? The steel willed visionary who used his invention to become the last great science hero of the Steam Age before falling in combat at Jutland and whose legacy lives on today in Her Majesty's Royal Promethean Guard.


Then Lieutenant Cockburn first came to the attention of the public as one of the handful of survivors of the Battle of Blackwater Estuary, now considered to be perhaps the most horrific naval battle in the history of Great Britain (waged during the First Interplanetary Conflict of 1898, more popularly refered to as 'The War of the Worlds' the title coined by the esteemed journalist Sir Herbert George Wells). Commander Cockburn had served as an engineering officer onboard the torpedo ram HMS Thunder Child, which has the distinction of being the only ship in the Royal Navy during the entirety of the conflict to have actually sunk two of the martian attack tripods in Tillingham Bay. He was awarded the Victorian Cross for his unwavering valour during the battle, where as the only remaining officer onboard the ship, he rallied the last of the crew to mount a final attack on the advancing tripods before the integrity of the torpedo ram's hull was damaged beyond repair. As the Thunder Child sank beneath an onslaught of the martian heat rays, Lieutenant Cockburn was the last man to abandon the Thunder Child and somehow had managed to escape the boiling waters of the estuary, where he hid from the tripods probes beneath the scolded corpses of his floating crew.

After the martian invaders were finally beaten by their susceptibility to a pathogen bacteria indigenous to our planet's environment, Johnathan Cockburn found himself recruited immediately into the newly formed 'Hadrian's Wall Initiative'. This was a covert military agency formed shortly after the War, by order of her Majesty Queen Victoria (By the Grace of God, King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of the British Dominions beyond the Seas, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of India)to prepare the Empire in the contingency of a another 'War of the Worlds' attacking the United Kingdom. However the primary objective of the Hadrian's Wall Initiative was the salvaging of martian technology from the husks of the invading tripods for the purpose of converting the alien weaponry onboard for terrestial military use.

It must be kept in mind however that the end of the War of the World's sparked an international arms race unlike any seen before in the course of history. Every major industrial power on the planet began earnest to seek to pry the secrets of the martian technology from the husks of the fallen tripods that littered their cities and countrysides in abundance. It has been postulated by some, that it was a combination of this interplanetary arms race along with the destabilization of the major colonial powers armies that led to the First World War some sixteen years later. Thankfully for our planet a full understanding of the tripod's technology wouldn't be realized by the terrestial governments until 1957... thanks to the work of Doctor Wilhelm Reich of the American Tesla Institute who discovered that the martian 'heat rays' were actually concentrated black orgone energy during the Second Interplanetary Conflict that was concentrated in North America (see Frankmore's Mars Attacks!, Janus Press, 1962).

Though the martian Orgone Cannon and electromagnetic mobile shielding technology would escape the colonial powers, the Hadrian's Wall Initiative did however, thanks to the relentless efforts of Commodore Cockburn, find a way to strip the almost unpenetrable tripod shells of their armor plating. This discovery would allow Cockburn to forge his first prototype suit of armor... 'The Iron Jack', since the armor plating seemed to be immune to the 'heat rays' of the martian's it was thought a series of such suits would prove beneficial in the inevitability of a second invasion (as well as proving resilient to conventional artilery fire should more nearby threats emerge). When the first suit was ready to be test piloted Cockburn insisted that it would be he and he alone who tested the suit. A result that almost killed him when three of the five micro-steam engines collapsed under the mounting pressure during a routine test of the armors enhanced strength features. The commodore, undeterred by this setback (as well as the broken arm, wrist and collar bone) proceeded to hone the 'Iron Jack' with a drive and a dedication, that seemed to his colleagues, as almost inhuman

It wouldn't be long before the world would meet the Human Dreadnought!

Continued on page 158 of Forgotten Science-Heroes of the Steam Age in the Library of Imaginary Books.

Comments

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

What a dashing fellow!

[jackbabalon23.livejournal.com]

He has a sort of gentle wonder in his face that in no way undermines the steely resolve of his eyes. You don't see that much anymore. That and a real man's moustache to compliment the barrel chest doesn't hurt either.

[weishaupt.livejournal.com]

This is great stuff :)

[jackbabalon23.livejournal.com]

Thanks, glad you dig it. Just having some fun really. If I ever find page 158 though you can read about Cockburn's heroic death at the Battle of Jutland against the Kaiser's Gepanzerte Seenwölfe.

[catwalk.livejournal.com]

looks like he could do laundry in that crotch-piece...
and maybe toast in the helmet.
:-)

[jackbabalon23.livejournal.com]

Well Iron-Man & Steel don't even have that option, not bad for the Victorian Age Battlesuit one would say.