Some years ago one of his biographers wrote: 'He entertains the great institutes of England when they visit his native city on royal lines, in regal splendour. His works at Elswick enjoy all modern improvements. His home at Jesmond is the abode of art, literature, and luxury. When his health complained under its heavy load, he cultivated agriculture, botany, and forestry for recreation; bought an estate at Rothbury, where the kindly invigorating air had healed him in days gone by; converted the barren hills into an earthly paradise; lighted his Cragside mansion with Swan's lamp and his own hydraulic power; applied water-power to his conservatory, that his plants might secure the sun. But amid all the luxuries which surround him, his life is as simple as nature; and now, at the ripe age of seventy-three, he maintains the freshness and elasticity of youth. He was wont to run like a deer along the moors of Allenheads to examine the target fired at by the original Armstrong gun.'
Lord Armstrong has been honoured both at home and abroad, and has done much for the amenity of Newcastle; and Jesmond Dene, part of his Jesmond estate, was thrown open to the public by the Prince of Wales while his guest at Cragside. The high-level bridge, giving easy access to the park for the town, cost £20,000. Other benefactions have been £12,500 towards a museum; a hall for the literary society, a mechanics' institute, schools at Elswick, &c.
A recent purchase was at Bamborough, the ancient capital of the Northumbrian kings, where, nearer our own time, Grace Darling was born and died. Already great improvements are in progress there in the shape of workmen's houses; and the parish church is being restored. Bamborough Castle, which is also included in the purchase, is an imposing mass of masonry, standing on a pile of columnar basalt, which is mentioned early in history; there was a castle here as early as the fifth century. By the will of Lord Crewe it had been devoted as far back as 1721 to charitable purposes.
In the autumn of 1893, Lord Armstrong told the Elswick shareholders that he believed the time was coming when armoured ships would be as obsolete as mail-clad men. 'Do what we will,' he said, 'I believe that the means of attack will always overtake the means of defence, and that sooner or later armour will be abandoned.' His reason for this statement was the use of high explosives and quick-firing guns. In the future, light vessels of great speed, armed with quick-firing guns, are likely to be the order of the day. The life of a battleship, he also said, was far too valuable to be staked on the use of its ram; special ships should therefore be built for ramming. On another occasion he discussed the improvements in the manufacture of cordite which had made it possible to secure enormous power even with moderate-sized guns. With a 6-inch gun of 45 calibre, and a 100 lb. projectile, a velocity of nearly 3000 feet per second has been reached, giving an energy of 5884 tons, as against the 5254 tons of the 8-inch gun of ten years ago. This last gun could only fire four rounds in five minutes; now we hear of ten and eighteen rounds in three minutes. As to speed, some warships built for the Argentine Republic and for Japan had reached a speed of 26-1/4 miles an hour, and were at the time the fastest war-vessels afloat.