The Story of the Atlantic Telegraph Part 2

But the charter of the New York, Newfoundland, and London Telegraph Company, which was now to be obtained, began by declaring, in its very first sentence: "Whereas it is deemed advisable to establish a line of telegraphic communication between America and Europe by way of Newfoundland." Not a word is said of fast ships, of communications in less than six days, but every thing points to a line across the ocean.

Thus one section gives authority to establish a submarine telegraph across the ocean, from Newfoundland to Ireland; another section prohibits any other company or person from touching the coast of Newfoundland or its dependencies [which includes Labrador] with a telegraphic cable or wire, from any point whatever, for fifty years; and a third section grants the Company fifty square miles of land upon the completion of the submarine line across the Atlantic.

In other respects the charter was equally liberal. It incorporated the a.s.sociates for fifty years, established perfect equality, in respect to corporators and officers, between citizens of the United States and British subjects, and allowed the meetings of the stockholders and directors to be held in New York, in Newfoundland, or in London.

To obtain such concessions was a work of some difficulty and delay. The Legislature of the province were naturally anxious to scan carefully conditions that were to bind them and their children for half a century.

I have now before me the papers of St. John's of that day, containing the discussions in the Legislature; and while all testify to the deep public interest in the project, they show a due care for the interests of their own colony, which they were bound to protect. At length all difficulties were removed, and the charter was pa.s.sed unanimously by the a.s.sembly, and confirmed by the Council.

This happy result was duly celebrated, in the manner which all Englishmen approve, by a grand dinner given by the commissioners of the new Company, to the members of the a.s.sembly and other dignitaries of the colony, at which there were eloquent prophecies of the good time coming, showing how heartily the enterprise was welcomed by all cla.s.ses; and how fond were the antic.i.p.ations of the increased intercourse it would bring, and the manifold benefits it would confer on their long-neglected island.

No sooner were the papers signed, than the wheels, so long blocked, were unloosed, and the machinery began to move. Mr. White at once drew on New York for fifty thousand dollars, and paid off all the debts of the old company. A St. John's newspaper of April 8th, 1854, amid a great deal on the subject, contains this paragraph, which is very significant of the dead state of the old company, and of the life of the new:

"The office of the new Electric Telegraph Company has been surrounded the last two or three days by the men who had been engaged the last year on the line, and who are being paid all debts, dues, and demands against the old a.s.sociation. We look upon the readiness with which these claims are liquidated as a substantial indication on the part of the new Company that they will complete to the letter all that they have declared to accomplish in this important undertaking."

In the early part of May, the two gentlemen who had remained behind in Newfoundland rejoined their a.s.sociates in New York, and there the charter was formally accepted and the Company organized. As all the a.s.sociates had not arrived till Sat.u.r.day evening, the 6th of May, and as one of them was to leave town on Monday morning, it was agreed that they should meet for organization at six o'clock of that day. At that hour they came to the house of Mr. Field's brother Dudley, and as the first rays of the morning sun streamed into the windows, the formal organization took place. The charter was accepted, the stock subscribed, and the officers chosen. Mr. Cooper, Mr. Taylor, Mr. Field, Mr. Roberts, and Mr. White were the first directors. Mr. Cooper was chosen President, Mr. White, Vice-President, and Mr. Taylor, Treasurer.

This is a short story, and soon told. It seemed a light affair, for half a dozen men to meet in the early morning and toss off such a business before breakfast. But what a work was that to which they thus put their hands! A capital of a million and a half of dollars was subscribed in those few minutes, and a company put in operation that was to carry a line of telegraph to St. John's, more than a thousand miles from New York, and then to span the wild sea. Well was it that they who undertook the work did not then fully realize its magnitude, or they would have shrunk from the attempt. Well was it for them that the veil was not lifted, which shut from their eyes the long delay, the immense toil, and the heavy burdens of many wearisome years. Such a prospect might have chilled the most sanguine spirit. But a kind Providence gives men strength for their day, imposes burdens as they are able to bear them, and thus leads them on to greater achievements than they knew.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] Although it is antic.i.p.ating a year in time, I cannot resist the pleasure of adding here the name of another eminent merchant, who afterward joined this little Company, Mr. Wilson G. Hunt. Mr. Hunt is one of the old merchants of New York who, through his whole career, has maintained the highest reputation for commercial integrity, and whose fortune is the reward of a long life of honorable industry. He joined the Company in 1855, and was a strong and steady friend through all its troubles till the final success.

CHAPTER IV.

CROSSING NEWFOUNDLAND.

There is nothing in the world easier than to build a line of railroad, or of telegraph, _on paper_. You have only to take the map, and mark the points to be connected, and then with a single sweep of the pencil to draw the line along which the iron track is to run. In this airy flight of the imagination, distances are nothing. A thousand leagues vanish at a stroke. All obstacles disappear. The valleys are exalted, and the hills are made low, soaring arches span the mountain streams, and the chasms are leaped in safety by the fire-drawn cars.

Very different is it to construct a line of railroad or of telegraph in reality; to come with an army of laborers, with axes on their shoulders to cut down the forests, and with spades in their hands to cast up the highway. Then poetry sinks to prose, and instead of flying over the s.p.a.ce on wings, one must traverse it on foot, slowly and with painful steps. Nature a.s.serts her power; and, as if resentful of the disdain with which man in his pride affected to leap over her, she piles up new barriers in his way. The mountains with their rugged sides cannot be moved out of their place, the rocks must be cleft in twain, to open a pa.s.sage for the conqueror, before he can begin his triumphal march. The woods thicken into an impa.s.sable jungle; and the mora.s.s sinks deeper, threatening to swallow up the horse and his rider; until the rash projector is startled at his own audacity. Then it becomes a contest of forces between man and nature, in which, if he would be victorious, he must fight his way. The barriers of nature cannot be lightly pushed aside, but must yield at last only to time and toil, and "man's unconquerable will."

Seldom have all these obstacles been combined in a more formidable manner to obstruct any public work, than against the attempt to build a telegraph line across the island of Newfoundland. The distance, by the route to be traversed, was over four hundred miles, and the country was a wilderness, an utter desolation. Yet through such a country, over mountain and moor, through tangled brake and rocky gorge, over rivers and through mora.s.ses, they were to build a road--not merely a line of telegraph stuck on poles, but "a good and traversable bridle-road, eight feet wide, with bridges of the same width," from end to end of the island.

But nothing daunted, the new Company undertook the great work with spirit and resolution. Gisborne had made a beginning, and got some thirty or forty miles out of St. John's. This was the easiest part of the whole route, being in the most inhabited region of the island. But here he broke down, just where it was necessary to leave civilization behind, and to plunge into the wilderness.

Intending to resume the work on a much larger scale, Mr. White, the Vice-President, was sent down to St. John's to be the General Agent of the Company; while Mr. Matthew D. Field, as a practical engineer, was to have charge of the construction of the line. The latter soon organized a force of six hundred men, which he pushed forward in detachments to the scene of operations.

And now began to appear still more the difficulties of the way. To provide subsistence for man and beast, it was necessary to keep near the coast, for all supplies had to be sent round by sea. Yet in following the coast line, they had to wind around bays, or to climb over headlands. If they struck into the interior, they had to cut their way through the dense and tangled wood. There was not a path to guide them, not even an Indian trail. When lost in the forest, they had to follow the compa.s.s, as much as the mariner at sea.

To keep such a force in the field, that, like an army, produced nothing, but consumed fearfully, required constant attention to the commissary department. The little steamer Victoria, which belonged to the Company, was kept plying along the coast, carrying barrels of pork and potatoes, kegs of powder, pickaxes and spades and shovels, and all the implements of labor. These were taken up to the heads of the bays, and thence carried, chiefly on men's backs, over the hills to the line of the road.

In many respects, it had the features of a military expedition. It moved forward in a great camp. The men were sheltered in tents, when sheltered at all, or in small huts which they built along the road. But more often they slept on the ground. It was a wild and picturesque sight to come upon their camp in the woods, to see their fires blazing at night while hundreds of stalwart sleepers lay stretched on the ground. Sometimes, when encamped on the hills, they could be seen afar off at sea. It made a pretty picture then. But the hardy pioneers thought little of the figure they were making, when they were exposed to the fury of the elements. Often the rain fell in torrents, and the men, crouching under their slight shelter, listened sadly to the sighing of the wind among the trees, answered by the desolate moaning of the sea.

Yet in spite of all obstacles, the work went on. All through the long days of summer, and through the months of autumn, every cove and creek along that southern coast heard the plashing of their oars, and the steady stroke of their axes resounded through the forest.

But as the season advanced, all these difficulties increased. For nearly half the year, the island is buried in snow. Blinding drifts sweep over the moors, and choke up the paths of the forest. How at such times the expedition lay floundering in the woods, still struggling to force its way onward; what hardships and sufferings the men endured--all this is a chapter in the History of the Telegraph which has not been written, and which can never be fully told. The

Gentlemen of England, Who dwell at home at ease,

and who are justly proud of the extent of their dominions, and the life and power which pervade the whole, may here find another example of the way in which great works are borne forward in distant parts of their empire.

But to carry out such an enterprise, requires head-work as well as hand-work. Engineering in the field must be supported by financiering at home. It was here the former enterprise broke down, and now it needed constant watching to keep the wheels in steady motion. The directors in New York found the demand increasing day by day. The minds which had grasped the large design must now descend to an infinity of detail. They had to keep an army of men at work, at a point a thousand miles away, far beyond their immediate oversight. Drafts for money came thick and fast. To provide for all these required constant attention. How faithfully they gave to this enterprise, not only their money, but their time and thought, few will know; but those who have seen can testify. In the autumn of that year, 1854, the writer removed to the city of New York, and was almost daily at the house of Mr. Field. Yet for months it was hardly possible to go there of an evening without finding the library occupied by the Company. Indeed, so uniformly was this the case, that "The Telegraph" began to be regarded by the family as an unwelcome intruder, since it put an interdict on the former social evenings and quiet domestic enjoyment. The circ.u.mstance shows the ceaseless care on the part of the directors which the enterprise involved. As a witness of their incessant labor, it is due to them to bear this testimony to their patience and their fidelity.

When they began the work, they hoped to carry the line across Newfoundland in one year, completing it in the summer of 1855. In antic.i.p.ation of this, Mr. Field was sent by the Company to England at the close of 1854, to order a cable to span the Gulf of St. Lawrence, to connect Cape Ray with the island of Cape Breton. This was his first voyage across the ocean on the business of the Telegraph--to be followed by more than forty others. In London he met for the first time Mr. John W. Brett, with whom he was to be afterward connected in the larger enterprise of the Atlantic Telegraph. Mr. Brett was the father of submarine telegraphy in Europe, though in carrying out his first projects he was largely indebted to Mr. Crampton, a well-known engineer of London, who aided him both with advice and capital. With this invaluable a.s.sistance, he had stretched two lines across the British channel. From his success in pa.s.sing these waters, he believed a line might yet be stretched from continent to continent. The scientific men of England were not generally educated up to that point. The bare suggestion was received with a smile of incredulity.[A] But Mr. Brett had faith, even at that early day, and entered heartily into the schemes of Mr. Field. To show his interest, he afterward took a few shares in the Newfoundland line--the only Englishman who had any part in this preliminary work.

The summer came, and the work in Newfoundland, though not complete, was advancing; and the cable in England was finished and shipped on board the bark Sarah L. Bryant to cross the sea. Antic.i.p.ating its arrival, the Company chartered a steamer to go down to Newfoundland to a.s.sist in its submersion across the Gulf of St. Lawrence. As yet they had no experience in the business of laying a submarine telegraph, and did not doubt that the work could be accomplished with the greatest ease. It was therefore to be an excursion of pleasure as well as of business, and accordingly they invited a large party to go with them to witness the unaccustomed spectacle.

As we chanced to be among the guests, we have the best reason to remember it. Seldom has a more pleasant party been gathered for any expedition. Representing the Company were Mr. Field, Mr. Peter Cooper, Mr. Robert W. Lowber, and Professor Morse; while among the invited guests were gentlemen of all professions--clergymen, doctors and lawyers, artists and editors. In the groups on the deck were the venerable Dr. Gardiner Spring and Rev. J. M. Sherwood; Dr. Lewis A.

Sayre, Bayard Taylor, the well-known traveller, Mr. Fitz-James...o...b..ien, and Mr. John Mullaly--the three latter gentlemen representing leading papers of New York.[B] Besides these, the party included a large number of ladies, who gave life and animation to the company.

Well does the writer recall the morning of departure--the seventh day of August, 1855. Never did a voyage begin with fairer omens. It was a bright summer day. The sky was clear, and the water smooth. We were on the deck of the good ship James Adger, long known as one of the fine steamers belonging to the Charleston line. She was a swift ship, and cut the water like an arrow. Thus we sped down the bay, and turning into the ocean, skimmed along the sh.o.r.es of Long Island. The sea was tranquil as a lake. The whole party were on deck, scattered in groups here and there, watching the sails and the sh.o.r.e. A rude telegraph instrument furnished entertainment and instruction, especially as we had Professor Morse to explain his marvellous invention, which some who listened then for the first time understood.

At Halifax, several of us left the ship, and came across Nova Scotia, pa.s.sing through that lovely region of Acadia which Longfellow has invested with such tender interest in his poem of Evangeline. Thence we crossed the Bay of Fundy to St. John in New Brunswick, and returned by way of Portland.

The James Adger went on to Newfoundland, steering first for Port au Basque, near Cape Ray, where they hoped to meet the bark which was to come from England with the cable on board. To their disappointment, it had not arrived. Mr. Canning, the engineer who was to lay the cable, had come out by steamer, and was on hand, but the bark was not to be seen.

Having to wait several days, and wishing to make the most of their time, they sailed for St. John's, where they were received by the Provincial Government and the people with unbounded hospitality, after which they returned to Port au Basque, and were now rejoiced to discover the little bark hidden behind the rocks. It was decided to land the cable in Cape Ray Cove. After a day or two's delay in getting the end to the sh.o.r.e, they started to cross the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the Adger towing the bark. The sea was calm, and though they were obliged to move slowly, yet all promised well, till they were about half-way across, when a gale arose, which pitched the bark so violently, that with its unwieldy bulk it was in great danger of sinking. After holding on for hours in the vain hope that it would abate, the captain cut the cable to save the bark; and thus, after they had paid out forty miles, it was hopelessly lost, and the Adger returned to New York.

This loss was owing partly to the severity of the gale, and partly to the fact that the bark which had the cable on board was wholly unfitted for the purpose. It was a sailing-vessel, and had to be towed by another ship. In this way it was impossible to regulate its motion. It was too fast or too slow. It was liable to be swayed by the sea, now giving a lurch ahead, and now dragging behind. Experience showed that a cable should always be laid from a steam vessel which could regulate its own motion, running out freely when all went smoothly, and checking its speed instantly when it was necessary to ease up the strain, or to pay out more slack to fill up the hollows of the sea.

This first loss of a submarine cable was a severe disappointment to the Company. It postponed the enterprise for a whole year. To make a new cable would require several months, and the season was so far advanced that it could not be laid before another summer. Was it strange if some of the little band began to ask if they had not lost enough, and to reason that it was better to stop where they were, than to go on still farther, casting their treasures into the sea?

But there was in that little company a spirit of hope and determination that could not be subdued; that ever cried: "Once more unto the breach, good friends!" After some deliberation, it was resolved to renew the attempt. Mr. Field again sailed for England to order another cable, which was duly made and sent out the following summer. This time, warned by experience, the Company invited no party and made no display. The cable was placed on board a steamer fitted for the purpose; from which it was laid without accident, and remained in perfect working order for nine years.

Meanwhile the work on land had been pushed forward without ceasing.

After incredible labor, the Company had built a road and a telegraph from one end of Newfoundland to the other, four hundred miles; and, as if that were not enough, had built also another line, one hundred and forty miles in length, in the island of Cape Breton. The first part of their work was now done. The telegraph had been carried beyond the United States through the British Provinces to St. John's in Newfoundland, a distance from New York of over one thousand miles.

The cost of the line, thus far, had been about a million of dollars, and of this the whole burden, with but trifling exceptions, had fallen upon the original projectors--Mr. Field having put in over two hundred thousand dollars in money--and Mr. Cooper, Mr. Taylor, and Mr. Roberts each a little less. No other contributors beyond the six original subscribers had come, except Professor Morse, Mr. Robert W. Lowber, Mr.

Wilson G. Hunt, and Mr. John W. Brett. The list of directors and officers remained as it was at first, except that this year, 1856, Mr.

White died, and his place as director was filled by Mr. Hunt, and that Mr. Field was chosen Vice-President, and Mr. Lowber Secretary. In all the operations of the Company thus far, the various negotiations, the plan of the work, the oversight of its execution, and the correspondence with the officers and others, mainly devolved upon Mr. Field.

And so at length, after two long and weary years, these bold projectors had accomplished half their work. They had pa.s.sed over the land, and under the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and having reached the farthest point of the American coast, they now stood upon the cliffs of Newfoundland, looking off upon the wide sea.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] One or two exceptions there were, not to be forgotten. Professor William Thomson, of the University of Glasgow, then a young man, but full of the enthusiasm of science, was already prepared to welcome such a project, with confidence of success. As early as October and November, 1854, he wrote to the Secretary of the Royal Society of London, declaring his belief in its practicability. The letters are published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society for 1855. Such faith was not visionary, for it was based on clearer knowledge and more thorough investigation, and gave promise of those eminent services which this gentleman was afterwards to render to the cause of electrical science.

Mr. C. F. Varley, also, was one of the first to perceive the possibility of an ocean telegraph, as he was to contribute greatly to its final success.

[B] The letters of Mr. Taylor, which first appeared in The New York Tribune have been since collected in one of his volumes of travel. Mr.

O'Brien, a very brilliant writer, who afterward fell in our civil war, fighting bravely for his adopted country, furnished some spirited letters to The Times. But Mr. Mullaly, who appeared for The Herald, was the most persevering attendant on the Telegraph, and the most indefatigable correspondent. He accompanied not only this expedition, but several others. He was on board the Niagara in 1857, and again in both the expeditions of 1858; and on the final success of the cable, prepared a volume, which was published by the Appletons, giving a history of the enterprise. This contains the fullest account of all those expeditions which has been given to the public. I have had frequent occasion to refer to his book, and can bear witness to the interest of the narrative. It is written with spirit, and doubtless would have had a longer life, if the cable itself had not come to an untimely end.

CHAPTER V.

THE DEEP-SEA SOUNDINGS.