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Story of the Atlantic Cable

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<h3>CHAPTER XVIII SUBSEQUENT ATLANTIC LINES</h3> As a natural sequence other Atlantic cables followed in course of time. Thus in 1869 France was put into direct telegraphic communication with America by means of a cable from Brest to the island of St. Pierre,{213} and another from St. Pierre to Sydney, U.S.A.[70] The former length was manufactured by the Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Company, and the latter by Mr. W. T. Henley. The Telegraph Construction Company were the contractors for laying the whole cable on behalf of the French Atlantic Cable Company (Société du Câble Trans-Atlantique Français).[71] This work was successfully accomplished from the Great Eastern (Captain Robert Halpin) by the same staff as had laid the 1866 cable. Owing to the route, this line was materially longer than the previous Atlantic cables, its length (from Brest to St. Pierre) being as much as 2,685 nautical miles. The working-speed attained on the French Atlantic cable was ten and a half words per minute. The conductor of the Brest-St. Pierre section was composed of seven copper wires stranded together, weighing 400 pounds per nautical mile, covered with a gutta-percha insulator of the same weight. The core of the St. Pierre-Sydney section was made up as follows: Copper = 107 pounds per nautical mile; gutta-percha = 150 pounds per nautical mile. Like the previous lines, this cable has been “down,” electrically speaking, for some years. It proved a very costly one in repairs, one expedition alone having run into as much as £95,000. In 1873 the Direct United States Cable Company{214} was formed, being the first competitor—from this country—with the “Anglo-American” Company.[72] Messrs. Siemens Brothers, who had taken an active part in the promotion of the scheme, were the contractors, both for manufacture and for submersion. It was, indeed, the first really important length with which this firm had been concerned as manufacturers. The laying was attended with complete success, and the line opened to the public in 1875. Later on, in 1877, the “Direct United States” Company was reconstructed, their system entering into the “pool” or “joint purse.” The latter was established shortly after the 1869 Atlantic cable had been laid, constituting one great financial combination. In 1879 another French company was formed to establish independent communication between France and the rest of the European Continent on the one hand, and the United States of America on the other. The, to English ears and lips, somewhat cumbersome title of this concern was La Compagnie Française du Télégraphe de Paris à{215} New York, but it soon became styled in England the “P. Q. Company,” after M. Pouyer-Quertier, its presiding genius. The cable was made and laid in the same year by Messrs. Siemens Brothers, though the scheme had taken three years to reach contract point. The “P. Q.” Company in 1894 amalgamated with La Société Française des Télégraphes Sous-marins, under the title of La Compagnie Française des Câbles Télégraphiques. In 1881 an American company was formed, under the guidance of the late Mr. Jay Gould, entitled The American Telegraph and Cable Company, with a view to partaking in the profits of transatlantic telegraphy by establishing another line of communication between the United States and Great Britain, and thence to the rest of Europe. This cable was also constructed and laid (in the course of that year) by Messrs. Siemens Brothers, who were part promoters of the enterprise, as well as another cable for the same system in the following year, 1882. This company’s cables are leased by the Western Union Telegraph Company, which was practically Jay Gould’s property, and remained so up to close on the time of his death, a few years ago. In 1883 the above system entered the “Pool”—the happy destination for which, maybe, it was originally launched into existence. A fresh competitor arrived in 1884 in the person of the Commercial Cable Company. Two cables were laid across the Atlantic for this company in the same year, its promoters wisely foreseeing that, in view of the continual chance of a breakdown, this was the only way in which they could safely attempt to compete with their more{216} firmly established rivals. The “Commercial” Company was mainly promoted by two American millionaires, Mr. J. W. Mackay, the celebrated New York financier, and Mr. Gordon Bennett, the proprietor of the New York Herald; with them were associated Messrs. Siemens Brothers, who afterward became the contractors for the enterprise. These cables, like the Jay Gould lines, stretch from the extreme southwest point of Ireland (which is connected by special cable with England) to Nova Scotia, and thence to the United States, one of them direct to New York. The system is directly connected with that of the Canadian Pacific Railroad Company, thus affording ready communication with the Dominion. Neither the “Commercial” Company’s system nor that of the Compagnie Française des Câbles Télégraphiques is at present in the “Atlantic Pool.” In 1894 yet two more additions were made to the list of Atlantic cables—one on behalf of the Commercial Cable Company, and the other for the “Anglo-American” Company. The new “Commercial” line was constructed and laid by Messrs. Siemens Brothers, and the “Anglo” cable by the Telegraph Construction Company. Fig. 43 shows the type adopted for the deepest water of the latter, and Fig. 44 that for the shore ends. Here the wires, besides being of a very large gauge, are applied with an extremely short lay (hence the elliptic appearance, though circular in reality), in order to increase the weight of iron, and thereby avoid shifting and abrasion. This type is now in constant use where rocks, ice-floes, strong currents, or rough weather are experienced. Special{217} arrangements were made in the design of both these cables to meet the requirements of increased speed. Since the successful application to submarine cables of various modifications of Wheatstone’s automatic transmitter, the limit to the speed attainable only depends, practically speaking, upon the type of cable employed. On these principles the core of the new “Commercial” cable was composed of a copper conductor weighing 500 pounds per nautical mile, covered with a gutta-percha insulating-sheath weighing 320 pounds per nautical mile, while the new “Anglo” has a core with conductor weighing 650 pounds per nautical mile, and gutta-percha insulator 400 pounds per nautical mile, involving a completed cable (main type) nearly double the weight of previous corresponding lines. <ANTIMG class="enlargeimage" src="images/enlarge-image.jpg" alt="" width-obs="18" height-obs="14" /> <ANTIMG src="images/ill_pg_217a_sml.jpg" width-obs="95" height-obs="99" alt="Fig. 43.—Anglo-American Atlantic Cable (1894): deep-sea type." /> Fig. 43.—Anglo-American Atlantic Cable (1894): deep-sea type. <ANTIMG class="enlargeimage" src="images/enlarge-image.jpg" alt="" width-obs="18" height-obs="14" /> <ANTIMG src="images/ill_pg_217b_sml.jpg" width-obs="94" height-obs="92" alt="Fig. 44.—Shore-end of the 1894 “Anglo” Cable. Reduced size." /> Fig. 44.—Shore-end of the 1894 “Anglo” Cable. Reduced size. The actual speed obtained by automatic transmission with the latter cable is as high as forty-seven (or even up to fifty) five-letter words per minute. On the previous, lighter, Atlantic cores twenty-five to twenty-eight words per minute was the usual maximum speed attainable; the former,{218} say, by average transmission and average receiving, and the latter by automatic transmission—other circumstances corresponding. Practically all submarine cables between important points—and certainly all those across the Atlantic—are now “duplexed”—a system of electrical working (instituted by Messrs. Muirhead in 1875) which enables messages to be sent in both directions at the same time. The result of this is nowadays to practically double the carrying capacity and earning power of the line, the effective speed in either direction remaining virtually the same as in “simplex” working, provided the cable is in good condition.[73] The armor of this cable (Fig. 43) is also a good example of present-day practise, each wire (usually covered with compounded tape) butting against the next; this is found to be the most durable form for a deep-sea cable. In 1898 another French Atlantic line of a similar type to the above was laid. This involved the longest Atlantic cable-section in existence, i.e., 3,174 nautical miles, from Brest to Cape Cod, and was the first Atlantic line made and laid by Frenchmen, with the active assistance, as regards laying, of the Silvertown Company. Recently, too, a German Atlantic cable has been laid by the Telegraph Construction Company from Emden to the Azores, and hence to New York.   The various proprietary companies here named have had duplicating lines laid for them from{219} time to time, but these it is not necessary to further allude to. Neither has it been thought necessary to give particulars regarding the methods of construction, laying, testing or working of any of these later lines following on the pioneer undertakings, except where special novelties were introduced. For similar reasons—and seeing that the responsibility of these later lines rested with contractors—the names of their permanent staff acting for them have not been introduced. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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