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Transatlantic telegraph cables were
undersea cable Submarine cable is any electrical cable that is laid on the seabed, although the term is often extended to encompass cables laid on the bottom of large freshwater bodies of water. Examples include: *Submarine communications cable *Submarine power ...
s running under the
Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...
for
telegraph Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas ...
communications. Telegraphy is now an obsolete form of communication, and the cables have long since been decommissioned, but telephone and data are still carried on other transatlantic telecommunications cables. The first cable was laid in the 1850s from
Valentia Island Valentia Island () is one of Ireland's most westerly points. It lies off the Iveragh Peninsula in the southwest of County Kerry. It is linked to the mainland by the Maurice O'Neill Memorial Bridge at Portmagee. A car ferry also departs from ...
off the west coast of
Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...
to Bay of Bulls, Trinity Bay,
Newfoundland Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
. The first communications occurred on 16 August 1858, but the line speed was poor, and efforts to improve it caused the cable to fail after three weeks. The
Atlantic Telegraph Company The Atlantic Telegraph Company was a company formed on 6 November 1856 to undertake and exploit a commercial telegraph cable across the Atlantic ocean, the first such telecommunications link. History Cyrus Field, American businessman and finan ...
led by
Cyrus West Field Cyrus West Field (November 30, 1819July 12, 1892) was an American businessman and financier who, along with other entrepreneurs, created the Atlantic Telegraph Company and laid the first telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean in 1858. Early ...
constructed the first transatlantic telegraph cable. The project began in 1854 and was completed in 1858. The cable functioned for only three weeks, but was the first such project to yield practical results. The first official telegram to pass between two continents was a letter of congratulations from Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom to
President of the United States The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States of America. The president directs the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive branch of the Federal gove ...
James Buchanan James Buchanan Jr. ( ; April 23, 1791June 1, 1868) was an American lawyer, diplomat and politician who served as the 15th president of the United States from 1857 to 1861. He previously served as secretary of state from 1845 to 1849 and repr ...
on 16 August. Signal quality declined rapidly, slowing transmission to an almost unusable speed. The cable was destroyed the following month when
Wildman Whitehouse Edward Orange Wildman Whitehouse (1 October 1816 – 26 January 1890) was an English surgeon by profession and an electrical experimenter by avocation. He was recruited by entrepreneur Cyrus West Field as Chief Electrician to work on the pi ...
applied excessive voltage to it while trying to achieve faster operation. It has been argued that the cable's faulty manufacture, storage and handling would have caused its premature failure in any case. Its short life undermined public and investor confidence and delayed efforts to restore a connection. The second cable was laid in 1865 with much improved material. It was laid from the ship SS ''Great Eastern'', built by John Scott Russell and
Isambard Kingdom Brunel Isambard Kingdom Brunel (; 9 April 1806 – 15 September 1859) was a British civil engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history," "one of the 19th-century engineering giants," and "on ...
and skippered by
Sir James Anderson Sir James Anderson (1824–1893) captained SS ''Great Eastern'' on the laying of the Transatlantic telegraph cable in 1865 and 1866. Anderson was born in Dumfries in south west Scotland and educated at the academy there. Anderson captained ''G ...
. More than halfway across, the cable broke, and after many rescue attempts, it was abandoned. In July 1866 a third cable was laid from The Anglo-American Cable house on the Telegraph Field, Foilhomurrum. On 13 July, ''Great Eastern'' steamed westward to Heart's Content, Newfoundland, and on 27 July the successful connection was put into service. The 1865 cable was also retrieved and spliced, so two cables were in service. These cables proved more durable. Line speed was very good, and the slogan "Two weeks to two minutes" was coined to emphasize the great improvement over ship-borne dispatches. The cable altered for all time personal, commercial and political relations between people across the Atlantic. Since 1866 there has been a permanent cable connection between the continents. In the 1870s duplex and quadruplex transmission and receiving systems were set up that could relay multiple messages over the cable. Before the first transatlantic cable, communications between Europe and the Americas took place only by ship and could be delayed for weeks by severe winter storms. By contrast, the transatlantic cable allowed a message and a response in the same day.


Early history

In the 1840s and 1850s several people proposed or advocated construction of a telegraph cable across the Atlantic, including Edward Thornton and
Alonzo Jackman Alonzo Jackman (March 20, 1809 – February 24, 1879) was a Vermont educator and military officer. He is prominent for developing and implementing a system for receiving and training troops for the Union Army during the American Civil War, and fo ...
. As early as 1840 Samuel F. B. Morse proclaimed his faith in the idea of a submarine line across the
Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...
. By 1850 a cable was run between England and France. That year, Bishop John T. Mullock, head of the
Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...
in
Newfoundland Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
, proposed a telegraph line through the forest from St. John's to Cape Ray and cables across the Gulf of St. Lawrence from Cape Ray to
Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...
across the Cabot Strait. Around the same time, a similar plan occurred to
Frederic Newton Gisborne Frederic Newton Gisborne (8 March 1824 – 30 August 1892) was a British inventor and electrician. Born in Broughton, Preston, Lancashire, England, he left England in 1842 for a trip around the world, finally settling in Canada in 1845. By c ...
, a telegraph engineer in Nova Scotia. In the spring of 1851 he procured a grant from the Newfoundland legislature and, having formed a company, began building the landline. In 1853 his company collapsed, he was arrested for debt and lost everything.


A plan takes shape

In 1854, businessman and financier
Cyrus West Field Cyrus West Field (November 30, 1819July 12, 1892) was an American businessman and financier who, along with other entrepreneurs, created the Atlantic Telegraph Company and laid the first telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean in 1858. Early ...
invited Gisborne to his house to discuss the project. From his visitor, Field considered the idea that the cable to Newfoundland might be extended across the Atlantic Ocean. Field was ignorant of submarine cables and the deep sea. He consulted Morse and Lieutenant Matthew Maury, an authority on
oceanography Oceanography (), also known as oceanology and ocean science, is the scientific study of the oceans. It is an Earth science, which covers a wide range of topics, including ecosystem dynamics; ocean currents, waves, and geophysical fluid dynami ...
. The charts Maury constructed from soundings in the logs of multiple ships indicated that there was a feasible route across the Atlantic. It seemed so ideal for cable laying that Maury named it Telegraph Plateau. Maury's charts also indicated that a route directly to the US was too rugged to be tenable and considerably longer. Field adopted Gisborne's scheme as a preliminary step to the bigger undertaking and promoted the New York, Newfoundland and London Telegraph Company to establish a telegraph line between America and Europe. The first step was to finish the line between St. John's and Nova Scotia, which was undertaken by Gisborne and Field's brother, Matthew.Lindley, p. 128. In 1855 an attempt was made to lay a cable across the Cabot Strait in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. It was laid out from a barque in tow of a steamer. When half the cable was laid, a gale rose, and the line was cut to keep the barque from sinking. In 1856 a steamboat was fitted out for the purpose, and the link from Cape Ray, Newfoundland to Aspy Bay, Nova Scotia was successfully laid. The project's final cost exceeded $1 million, and the transatlantic segment would cost much more.Lindley, p. 129. In 1855, Field crossed the Atlantic, the first of 56 crossings in the course of the project, to consult with John Watkins Brett, the greatest authority on submarine cables at the time. Brett's Submarine Telegraph Company laid the first ocean cable in 1850 across the
English Channel The English Channel, "The Sleeve"; nrf, la Maunche, "The Sleeve" ( Cotentinais) or ( Jèrriais), ( Guernésiais), "The Channel"; br, Mor Breizh, "Sea of Brittany"; cy, Môr Udd, "Lord's Sea"; kw, Mor Bretannek, "British Sea"; nl, Het Ka ...
, and his English and Irish Magnetic Telegraph Company had laid a cable to Ireland in 1853, the deepest cable to that date. Further reasons for the trip were that all the commercial manufacturers of submarine cable were in Britain, and Field had failed to raise significant funds for the project in New York. Field pushed the project ahead with tremendous energy and speed. Even before forming a company to carry it out, he ordered of cable from the
Gutta Percha Company The Gutta Percha Company was an English company formed in 1845 to make a variety of products from the recently introduced natural rubber gutta-percha. Unlike other natural rubbers, this material was thermoplastic allowing it to be easily mou ...
. The
Atlantic Telegraph Company The Atlantic Telegraph Company was a company formed on 6 November 1856 to undertake and exploit a commercial telegraph cable across the Atlantic ocean, the first such telecommunications link. History Cyrus Field, American businessman and finan ...
was formed in October 1856, with Brett as president and Field as vice president. Charles Tilston Bright, who already worked for Brett, was made chief engineer, and
Wildman Whitehouse Edward Orange Wildman Whitehouse (1 October 1816 – 26 January 1890) was an English surgeon by profession and an electrical experimenter by avocation. He was recruited by entrepreneur Cyrus West Field as Chief Electrician to work on the pi ...
, a medical doctor self-educated in electrical engineering, was appointed chief electrician. Field provided a quarter of the capital himself. After the remaining shares were sold, largely to existing investors in Brett's company, an unpaid board of directors was formed, which included William Thomson (the future Lord Kelvin), a respected scientist. Thomson also acted as a scientific advisor. Morse, a shareholder in the Nova Scotia project and acting as the electrical advisor, was also on the board.


First transatlantic cable

The cable consisted of 7 copper wires, each weighing 26 kg/km (107  pounds per
nautical mile A nautical mile is a unit of length used in air, marine, and space navigation, and for the definition of territorial waters. Historically, it was defined as the meridian arc length corresponding to one minute ( of a degree) of latitude. Tod ...
), covered with three coats of
gutta-percha Gutta-percha is a tree of the genus '' Palaquium'' in the family Sapotaceae. The name also refers to the rigid, naturally biologically inert, resilient, electrically nonconductive, thermoplastic latex derived from the tree, particularly fr ...
(as suggested by Jonathan Nash Hearder), weighing 64 kg/km (261 pounds per nautical mile), and wound with tarred
hemp Hemp, or industrial hemp, is a botanical class of '' Cannabis sativa'' cultivars grown specifically for industrial or medicinal use. It can be used to make a wide range of products. Along with bamboo, hemp is among the fastest growing plants ...
, over which a sheath of 18 strands, each of 7 iron wires, was laid in a close helix. It weighed nearly 550 kg/km (1.1 tons per nautical mile), was relatively flexible, and could withstand tension of several tens of kilonewtons (several tons). The cable from the Gutta Percha Company was armoured separately by wire-rope manufacturers, the standard practice at the time. In the rush to proceed, only four months were allowed for the cable's completion. As no wire-rope maker had the capacity to make so much cable in such a short period, the task was shared by two English firms: Glass, Elliot & Co. of Greenwich and
R.S. Newall and Company Robert Stirling Newall FRS FRAS (27 May 1812 – 21 April 1889) was a Scottish engineer and astronomer. Life and work Born at Dundee on 27 May 1812, Newall began work in a local mercantile office before leaving for London, where, in the emplo ...
of
Birkenhead Birkenhead (; cy, Penbedw) is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, Merseyside, England; historically, it was part of Cheshire until 1974. The town is on the Wirral Peninsula, along the south bank of the River Mersey, opposite Liv ...
. Late in manufacturing, it was discovered that the two batches had been made with strands twisted in opposite directions.Cookson, p. 73. This meant that they could not be directly spliced wire-to-wire, as the iron wire on both cables would unwind when it was put under tension during laying.Lindley, pp. 134–135. The problem was solved by splicing through an improvised wooden bracket to hold the wires in place,Lindley, p. 135. but the mistake created negative publicity for the project. The British government gave Field a subsidy of £1,400 a year (£ today) and loaned ships for cable laying and support. Field also solicited aid from the U.S. government, and a bill authorizing a subsidy was submitted in
Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...
. It passed the Senate by only a single vote, due to opposition from protectionist senators. It passed in the House of Representatives despite similar resistance and was signed by President
Franklin Pierce Franklin Pierce (November 23, 1804October 8, 1869) was the 14th president of the United States, serving from 1853 to 1857. He was a northern Democrat who believed that the abolitionist movement was a fundamental threat to the nation's unity ...
. The first attempt, in 1857, was a failure. The cable-laying vessels were the converted warships HMS ''Agamemnon'' and USS ''Niagara'', borrowed from their respective governments. Both were needed as neither could hold 2,500 nautical miles of cable alone.Lindley, p. 130. The cable was started at the white strand near Ballycarbery Castle in
County Kerry County Kerry ( gle, Contae Chiarraí) is a county in Ireland. It is located in the South-West Region and forms part of the province of Munster. It is named after the Ciarraige who lived in part of the present county. The population of the co ...
, on the southwest coast of
Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...
, on August 5, 1857. It broke on the first day, but was grappled and repaired. It broke again over Telegraph Plateau, nearly deep, and the operation was abandoned for the year. 300 miles of cable were lost, but the remaining 1,800 miles were sufficient to complete the task. During this period, Morse clashed with Field, was removed from the board, and took no further part in the enterprise. The problems with breakage were due largely to difficulty controlling the cable tensions with the braking mechanism as the cable was payed out. A new mechanism was designed and successfully tested in the Bay of Biscay with ''Agamemnon'' in May 1858. On 10 June, ''Agamemnon'' and ''Niagara'' set sail to try again. Ten days out they encountered a severe storm, and the enterprise was nearly brought to a premature end. The ships were top-heavy with cable, which could not all fit in the holds, and the ships struggled to stay upright. Ten sailors were hurt, and Thomson's electrical cabin was flooded.Lindley, p. 134. The vessels arrived at the middle of the Atlantic on June 25 and spliced cable from the two ships together. ''Agamemnon'' payed out eastwards towards Valentia Island, and ''Niagara'' westward towards
Newfoundland Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
. The cable broke after less than , again after about , and for a third time when about had been run out of each vessel. The expedition returned to Queenstown, County Cork, Ireland. Some directors were in favour of abandoning the project and selling off the cable, but Field persuaded them to keep going. The ships set out again on 17 July, and the middle splice was finished on 29 July 1858. The cable ran easily this time. ''Niagara'' arrived in Trinity Bay, Newfoundland on 4 August, and the next morning the shore end was landed. ''Agamemnon'' arrived at Valentia Island on 5 August; the shore end was landed at Knightstown and laid to the nearby cable house.


First contact

Test messages were sent from Newfoundland beginning 10 August 1858. The first was successfully read at Valentia on 12 August and in Newfoundland on 13 August. Further test and configuration messages followed until 16 August, when the first official message was sent via the cable: Next was the text of a congratulatory telegram from
Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days was longer than that of any previ ...
to President
James Buchanan James Buchanan Jr. ( ; April 23, 1791June 1, 1868) was an American lawyer, diplomat and politician who served as the 15th president of the United States from 1857 to 1861. He previously served as secretary of state from 1845 to 1849 and repr ...
at his summer residence in the Bedford Springs Hotel in
Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
, expressing hope that the cable would prove "an additional link between the nations whose friendship is founded on their common interest and reciprocal esteem". The President responded: "It is a triumph more glorious, because far more useful to mankind, than was ever won by conqueror on the field of battle. May the Atlantic telegraph, under the blessing of Heaven, prove to be a bond of perpetual peace and friendship between the kindred nations, and an instrument destined by Divine Providence to diffuse religion, civilization, liberty, and law throughout the world." The messages were hard to decipher; Queen Victoria's message of 98 words took 16 hours to send.Jim Al-Khalili. '' Shock and Awe: The Story of Electricity'', Ep. 2
The Age of Invention
. October 13, 2011, BBC TV, Using Chief Engineer Bright's original notebook. Retrieved 12 June 2014.
Nonetheless, they engendered an outburst of enthusiasm. The next morning a grand salute of 100 guns resounded in
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
, streets were hung with flags, bells of the churches were rung, and at night the city was illuminated. On 1 September there was a parade, followed by an evening torchlight procession and a fireworks display that caused a fire in the Town Hall. Bright was
knight A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the Christian denomination, church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood ...
ed for his part, the first such honour to the telegraph industry.Kieve, p. 109.


Failure of the first cable

Operation of the 1858 cable was plagued by conflict between two of the project's senior members Thomson and Whitehouse. Whitehouse was a medical doctor by training, but had taken an enthusiastic interest in the new electrical technology and given up his medical practice to follow a new career. He had no formal training in physics; all his knowledge was gained through practical experience. The two clashed even before the project began, when Whitehouse disputed Thomson's law of squares when the latter presented it to a British Association meeting in 1855. Thomson's law predicted that transmission speed on the cable would be very slow due to an effect called retardation. To test the theory, Bright gave Whitehouse overnight access to the Magnetic Telegraph Company's long underground lines. Whitehouse joined several lines together to a distance similar to the transatlantic route and declared that there would be no problem. Morse was also present at this test and supported Whitehouse. Thomson believed that Whitehouse's measurements were flawed and that underground and underwater cables were not fully comparable. Thomson believed that a larger cable was needed to mitigate the retardation problem. In mid-1857, on his own initiative, he examined samples of copper core of allegedly identical specification and found variations in resistance up to a factor of two. But cable manufacture was already underway, and Whitehouse supported use of a thinner cable, so Field went with the cheaper option. Another point of contention was the itinerary for deployment. Thomson favoured starting mid-Atlantic and the two ships heading in opposite directions, which would halve the time required. Whitehouse wanted both ships to travel together from Ireland so that progress could be reported back to the base in Valentia through the cable. Whitehouse overruled Thomson's suggestion on the 1857 voyage, but Bright convinced the directors to approve a mid-ocean start on the subsequent 1858 voyage. Whitehouse, as chief electrician, was supposed to be on board the cable-laying vessel, but repeatedly found excuses for the 1857 attempt, the trials in the Bay of Biscay,Lindley, p. 133. and the two attempts in 1858. In 1857, Thomson was sent in his place, and in 1858 Field diplomatically assigned the two to different ships to avoid conflict—but as Whitehouse continued to evade the voyage, Thomson went alone.


Thomson's mirror galvanometer

After his experience on the 1857 voyage, Thomson realised that a better method of detecting the telegraph signal was required. While waiting for the next voyage, he developed his mirror galvanometer, an extremely sensitive instrument, much better than any till then. He requested £2,000 from the board to build several, but was given only £500 for a prototype and permission to try it on the next voyage. It was extremely good at detecting the positive and negative edges of telegraph pulses that represented a Morse "dash" and "dot" respectively (the standard system on submarine cables—as, unlike overland telegraphy, both pulses were of the same length). Thomson believed that he could use the instrument with the low voltages from regular telegraph equipment even over the vast length of the Atlantic cable. He successfully tested it on of cable in underwater storage at
Plymouth Plymouth () is a port city status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in South West England. It is located on the south coast of Devon, approximately south-west of Exeter and south-west of London. It is bordered by Cornwall to ...
. The mirror galvanometer proved yet another point of contention. Whitehouse wanted to work the cable with a very different scheme, driving it with a massive high-voltage
induction coil An induction coil or "spark coil" ( archaically known as an inductorium or Ruhmkorff coil after Heinrich Rühmkorff) is a type of electrical transformer used to produce high-voltage pulses from a low-voltage direct current (DC) supply. p.98 ...
producing several thousand volts, so enough current would be available to drive standard electromechanical printing telegraphs used on inland telegraphs.Lindley, p. 139. Thomson's instrument had to be read by eye and was not capable of printing. Nine years later, he invented the syphon recorder for the second transatlantic attempt in 1866. The decision to start mid-Atlantic, combined with Whitehouse dropping out of another voyage, left Thomson on board ''Agamemnon'' sailing towards Ireland, with a free hand to use his equipment without Whitehouse's interference. Although Thomson had the status of a mere advisor to engineer C. W. de Sauty, it was not long before all electrical decisions were deferred to him. Whitehouse, staying behind in Valentia, remained out of contact until the ship reached Ireland and landed the cable. Around this time, the board started having doubts over Whitehouse's generally negative attitude. Not only did he repeatedly clash with Thomson, but was also critical of Field, and his repeated refusals to carry out his primary duty as chief electrician onboard ship made a very bad impression. With the removal of Morse, Whitehouse had lost his only ally on the board, but at this time no action was taken.


Cable is damaged and Whitehouse dismissed

When ''Agamemnon'' reached Valentia on 5 August, Thomson handed over to Whitehouse, and the project was declared a success to the press. Thomson received clear signals throughout the voyage using the mirror galvanometer, but Whitehouse immediately connected his own equipment. The effects of the cable's poor handling and design, and Whitehouse's repeated attempts to drive up to 2,000 volts through the cable, compromised the cable's insulation. Whitehouse attempted to hide the poor performance and was vague in his communications. The expected inaugural message from Queen Victoria had been widely publicised, and when it was not forthcoming, the press speculated that there were problems. Whitehouse announced that five or six weeks would be required for "adjustments". The Queen's message had been received in Newfoundland, but Whitehouse was unable to read the confirmation copy sent back the other way. Finally, on 17 August, he announced receipt. What he did not announce was that the message had been received on the mirror galvanometer when he finally gave up trying with his own equipment. Whitehouse had the message reentered into his printing telegraph locally so he could send on the printed tape and pretend that it had been received that way. In September 1858, after several days of progressive deterioration of the insulation, the cable failed altogether. The reaction to the news was tremendous. Some writers even hinted that the line was a mere hoax; others pronounced it a stock-exchange speculation. Whitehouse was recalled for the board's investigation, and Thomson took over in Valentia, tasked with reconstructing the events that Whitehouse had obfuscated. Whitehouse was held responsible for the failure and dismissed. The cable might have failed eventually anyway, but Whitehouse certainly brought it about much sooner. The cable was particularly vulnerable in the first hundred miles from Ireland, consisting of the old 1857 cable that was spliced into the new lay and known to be poorly manufactured. Samples showed that in places the conductor was badly off-centre and could easily break through the insulation due to mechanical strains during laying. Tests were conducted on samples of cable submerged in seawater. When perfectly insulated, there was no problem applying thousands of volts. However, a sample with a pinprick hole "lit up like a lantern" when tested, and a large hole was burned in the insulation. Although the cable was never put in service for public use and never worked well, there was time for a few messages to be passed that went beyond testing. The collision between the
Cunard Line Cunard () is a British shipping and cruise line based at Carnival House at Southampton, England, operated by Carnival Corporation & plc#Carnival United Kingdom, Carnival UK and owned by Carnival Corporation & plc. Since 2011, Cunard and its ...
ships ''Europa'' and ''Arabia'' was reported on 17 August. The British Government used the cable to countermand an order for two regiments in Canada to embark for England, saving £50,000. A total of 732 messages were passed before the cable failed.


Preparing a new attempt

Field was undaunted by the failure. He was eager to renew the work, but the public had lost confidence in the scheme, and his efforts to revive the company were futile. It was not until 1864 that, with the assistance of
Thomas Brassey Thomas Brassey (7 November 18058 December 1870) was an English civil engineering contractor and manufacturer of building materials who was responsible for building much of the world's railways in the 19th century. By 1847, he had built about o ...
and John Pender, he succeeded in raising the necessary capital. The Glass, Elliot, and Gutta-Percha Companies were united to form the Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Company (Telcon, later part of BICC), which undertook to manufacture and lay the new cable. C. F. Varley replaced Whitehouse as chief electrician. In the meantime, long cables had been submerged in the
Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on ...
and the
Red Sea The Red Sea ( ar, البحر الأحمر - بحر القلزم, translit=Modern: al-Baḥr al-ʾAḥmar, Medieval: Baḥr al-Qulzum; or ; Coptic: ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϩⲁϩ ''Phiom Enhah'' or ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϣⲁⲣⲓ ''Phiom ǹšari''; ...
. With this experience, an improved cable was designed. The core consisted of seven twisted strands of very pure copper weighing 300 pounds per nautical mile (73 kg/km), coated with Chatterton's compound, then covered with four layers of
gutta-percha Gutta-percha is a tree of the genus '' Palaquium'' in the family Sapotaceae. The name also refers to the rigid, naturally biologically inert, resilient, electrically nonconductive, thermoplastic latex derived from the tree, particularly fr ...
, alternating with four thin layers of the compound cementing the whole, and bringing the weight of the insulator to 400 lb/nmi (98 kg/km). This core was covered with
hemp Hemp, or industrial hemp, is a botanical class of '' Cannabis sativa'' cultivars grown specifically for industrial or medicinal use. It can be used to make a wide range of products. Along with bamboo, hemp is among the fastest growing plants ...
saturated in a preservative solution, and on the hemp were helically wound eighteen single strands of high tensile steel wire produced by Webster & Horsfall Ltd of Hay Mills
Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...
, each covered with fine strands of
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yarn steeped in the preservative. The weight of the new cable was 35.75 long
hundredweight The hundredweight (abbreviation: cwt), formerly also known as the centum weight or quintal, is a British imperial and US customary unit of weight or mass. Its value differs between the US and British imperial systems. The two values are disti ...
(4000 lb) per nautical mile (980 kg/km), or nearly twice the weight of the old. The Haymills site successfully manufactured of wire (1,600 tons), made by 250 workers over eleven months.


''Great Eastern'' and the second cable

The new cable was laid by the ship SS ''Great Eastern'' captained by
Sir James Anderson Sir James Anderson (1824–1893) captained SS ''Great Eastern'' on the laying of the Transatlantic telegraph cable in 1865 and 1866. Anderson was born in Dumfries in south west Scotland and educated at the academy there. Anderson captained ''G ...
. Her immense hull was fitted with three iron tanks for the reception of of cable, and her decks furnished with the paying-out gear. At noon on 15 July 1865, ''Great Eastern'' left the Nore for Foilhommerum Bay, Valentia Island, where the shore end was laid by ''Caroline''. This attempt failed on 2 August when, after 1,062 miles (1968 km) had been payed out, the cable snapped near the stern of the ship, and the end was lost. ''Great Eastern'' steamed back to England, where Field issued another prospectus and formed the Anglo-American Telegraph Company, to lay a new cable and complete the broken one. On 13 July 1866, ''Great Eastern'' started paying out once more. Despite problems with the weather on the evening of Friday, 27 July, the expedition reached the port of Heart's Content in a thick fog. The next morning at 9 a.m. a message from England cited these words from the
leader Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group or organization to "lead", influence or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. The word "leadership" often gets v ...
in ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ( ...
'': "It is a great work, a glory to our age and nation, and the men who have achieved it deserve to be honoured among the benefactors of their race." The shore end was landed at
Heart's Content Cable Station Heart's Content Cable Station is a former cable landing station located in Heart's Content, Newfoundland and Labrador. It served as the western terminus of the first permanent trans-oceanic submarine telegraph cable, while a sister cable statio ...
during the day by ''Medway''. Congratulations poured in, and friendly telegrams were again exchanged between Queen Victoria and the United States. In August 1866, several ships, including ''Great Eastern'', put to sea again in order to grapple the lost cable of 1865. Their goal was to find the end of the lost cable, splice it to new cable, and complete the run to Newfoundland. They were determined to find it, and their search was based solely upon positions recorded "principally by Captain Moriarty, R. N.", who placed the end of the lost cable at longitude There were some who thought it hopeless to try, declaring that to locate a cable down would be like looking for a small needle in a large haystack. However,
Robert Halpin Robert Charles Halpin , Master Mariner, born 16 February 1836 at the Bridge Tavern Wicklow, Ireland, died 20 January 1894 at ''Tinakilly'', Wicklow. He captained the Brunel-designed steamship SS ''Great Eastern'' which laid transoceanic telegrap ...
, first officer of ''Great Eastern'', navigated HMS ''Terrible'' and grappling ship ''Albany'' to the correct location. ''Albany'' moved slowly here and there, "fishing" for the lost cable with a five-pronged
grappling hook A grappling hook or grapnel is a device that typically has multiple hooks (known as ''claws'' or ''flukes'') attached to a rope; it is thrown, dropped, sunk, projected, or fastened directly by hand to where at least one hook may catch and ho ...
at the end of a stout rope. Suddenly, on 10 August, ''Albany'' "caught" the cable and brought it to the surface. It seemed to be an unrealistically easy success. During the night, the cable slipped from the buoy to which it had been secured, and the process had to start all over again. This happened several more times, with the cable slipping after being secured in a frustrating battle against rough seas. One time, a sailor even was flung across the deck when the grapnel rope snapped and recoiled around him. ''Great Eastern'' and another grappling ship, ''Medway'', arrived to join the search on 12 August. It was not until over a fortnight later, in early September 1866, that the cable was finally retrieved so that it could be worked on; it took 26 hours to get it safely on board ''Great Eastern''. The cable was carried to the electrician's room, where it was determined that the cable was connected. All on the ship cheered or wept as rockets were sent up into the sky to light the sea. The recovered cable was then spliced to a fresh cable in her hold and payed out to Heart's Content, Newfoundland, where she arrived on Saturday, 7 September. There were now two working telegraph lines.


Repairing the cable

Broken cables required an elaborate repair procedure. The approximate distance to the break was determined by measuring the resistance of the broken cable. The repair ship navigated to the location. The cable was hooked with a grapple and brought on board to test for electrical continuity. Buoys were deployed to mark the ends of good cable, and a splice was made between the two ends.


Communication speeds

Initially messages were sent by an operator using
Morse code Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one ...
. The reception was very bad on the 1858 cable, and it took two minutes to transmit just one character (a single letter or a single number), a rate of about 0.1 
words per minute Words per minute, commonly abbreviated wpm (sometimes uppercased WPM), is a measure of words processed in a minute, often used as a measurement of the speed of typing, reading or Morse code sending and receiving. Alphanumeric entry Since words ...
. This was despite the use of the highly sensitive mirror galvanometer. The inaugural message from Queen Victoria took 67 minutes to transmit to Newfoundland, but it took 16 hours for the confirmation copy to be transmitted back to Whitehouse in Valentia. For the 1866 cable, the methods of cable manufacture, as well as sending messages, had been vastly improved. The 1866 cable could transmit 8 words a minute80 times faster than the 1858 cable.
Oliver Heaviside Oliver Heaviside FRS (; 18 May 1850 – 3 February 1925) was an English self-taught mathematician and physicist who invented a new technique for solving differential equations (equivalent to the Laplace transform), independently develope ...
and
Mihajlo Idvorski Pupin Mihajlo Idvorski Pupin ( sr-Cyrl, Михајло Идворски Пупин, ; 4 October 1858Although Pupin's birth year is sometimes given as 1854 (and Serbia and Montenegro issued a postage stamp in 2004 to commemorate the 150th anniversary o ...
in later decades understood that the bandwidth of a cable is hindered by an imbalance between capacitive and inductive reactance, which causes a severe
dispersion Dispersion may refer to: Economics and finance *Dispersion (finance), a measure for the statistical distribution of portfolio returns *Price dispersion, a variation in prices across sellers of the same item *Wage dispersion, the amount of variatio ...
and hence a signal distortion; see telegrapher's equations. This has to be solved by iron tape or by load coils. It was not until the 20th century that message transmission speeds over transatlantic cables would reach even 120 words per minute. London became the world centre in telecommunications. Eventually, no fewer than eleven cables radiated from
Porthcurno Porthcurno ( kw, Porthkornow, Porthcornow, meaning ''"pinnacle cove"'', see below) is a small village covering a small valley and beach on the south coast of Cornwall, England in the United Kingdom. It is the main settlement in a civil and an e ...
Cable Station near Land's End and formed with their Commonwealth links a "live" girdle around the world; the All Red Line.


Later cables

Additional cables were laid between Foilhommerum and Heart's Content in 1873, 1874, 1880, and 1894. By the end of the 19th century, British-, French-, German-, and American-owned cables linked Europe and North America in a sophisticated web of telegraphic communications. The original cables were not fitted with repeaters, which potentially could completely solve the retardation problem and consequently speed up operation. Repeaters amplify the signal periodically along the line. On telegraph lines this is done with
relay A relay Electromechanical relay schematic showing a control coil, four pairs of normally open and one pair of normally closed contacts An automotive-style miniature relay with the dust cover taken off A relay is an electrically operated switch ...
s, but there was no practical way to power them in a submarine cable. The first transatlantic cable with repeaters was TAT-1 in 1956. This was a telephone cable and used a different technology for its repeaters.


Impact

A 2018 study in the '' American Economic Review'' found that the transatlantic telegraph substantially increased trade over the Atlantic and reduced prices. The study estimates that "the efficiency gains of the telegraph to be equivalent to 8 percent of export value".


See also

* 1929 Grand Banks earthquake *
Commercial Cable Company The Commercial Cable Company was founded in New York in 1884 by John William Mackay and James Gordon Bennett, Jr. Their motivation was to break the then virtual monopoly of Jay Gould on transatlantic telegraphy and bring down prices (particular ...
* Transatlantic telephone cable *
Western Union Telegraph Expedition Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...
– overland alternative via Russia


Notes


References and further reading

* Bright, Charles Tilston
''Submarine Telegraphs''
London: Crosby Lockwood, 1898 . * Burns, Russell W., ''Communications: An International History of the Formative Years'', IET, 2004 . * Clarke, Arthur C. ''Voice Across the Sea'' (1958) and ''How the World was One'' (1992); the two books include some of the same material. * Clayton, Howard, ''Atlantic Bridgehead: The Story of Transatlantic Communications'', Garnstone Press, 1968 . * Cookson, Gillian
''The Cable''
Tempus Publishing, 2006 . * Cowan, Mary Morton, ''Cyrus Field's Big Dream: The Daring Effort to Lay the First Transatlantic Telegraph Cable'', Boyds Mills Press, 2018 . * Gordon, John Steele. ''A Thread across the Ocean: The Heroic Story of the Transatlantic Cable''. New York: Walker & Co, 2002. . * * Hearn, Chester G., ''Circuits in the Sea: The Men, the Ships, and the Atlantic Cable'', Westport, Connecticut: Prager, 2004 . * Huurdeman, Anton A., ''The Worldwide History of Telecommunications'', Wiley, 2003 . * Kieve, Jeffrey L., ''The Electric Telegraph: A Social and Economic History'', David and Charles, 1973 . * Lindley, David, ''Degrees Kelvin: A Tale of Genius, Invention, and Tragedy'', Joseph Henry Press, 2004 . * * Rozwadowski, Helen M. ''Fathoming the Ocean: The Discovery and Exploration of the Deep Sea'', Harvard University Press, 2009 . * Standage, Tom. ''The Victorian Internet'' (1998). . The story of the men and women who were the earliest pioneers of the on-line frontier, and the global network they created – a network that was, in effect, the Victorian Internet.


External links


The Atlantic Cable by Bern Dibner (1959)
– Complete free electronic version of '' The Atlantic Cable'' by Bern Dibner (1959), hosted by the Smithsonian Institution Libraries
History of the Atlantic Cable & Undersea Communications
– Comprehensive history of submarine telegraphy with much original material, including photographs of cable manufacturers samples
PBS, American Experience: The Great Transatlantic Cable
* ttp://collections.ic.gc.ca/cable/htelegr.htm A collection of articles on the history of telegraphybr>Cabot Strait Telegraph Cable 1856
between Newfoundland and Nova Scotia
American Heritage: The Cable Under the SeaAlan Hall – First Transatlantic Cable and First message sent to USA 1856 Memorial
* ttp://www.ieeeghn.org/wiki/index.php/Milestones:County_Kerry_Transatlantic_Cable_Stations,_1866 IEEE History Centre: County Kerry Transatlantic Cable Stations, 1866br>IEEE History Centre: Landing of the Transatlantic Cable, 1866
*
The Great Eastern – Robert Dudley Lithographs 1865–66
Reconstructed and digitized by Cynthia McFarland and Richard Mammana, 2011 {{DEFAULTSORT:Transatlantic Telegraph Cable 19th century in Ireland 19th century in the United States Mass media in Newfoundland and Labrador Submarine communications cables in the North Atlantic Ocean Telegraphy History of the Atlantic Ocean 19th century in technology it:Cavo sottomarino