Daily tobacco leaf-chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1890-1895, 1892-07-13


gested For n time there was much talk OF
a line through Alaska and ACROSS Behring
straits.
Mr.. Field studied the matter carefully,
then called in consultation Messrs. Peter
Cooper, Moses Taylor, Marshall o, Roberts
and Chandler White, and soon had them
aflame equally with himself. They agreed
to lay down 5000 each, and the organiza
tion was at once formed under the title of
the New York, Newfoundland aud London
Telegraph company David Dudley Field
was made its attorney and proceeded at
once to Newfoundland, where he secured
from the provincial legislature the ex
elusive right for fifty years to lay and
operate telegraph from the continent of
America to Newfoundland and thence to
England" And then-well, everything
seemed to come to dead standstill. The
matter became huge national joke All
the photographers took it up, and the
funny columns of the newspapers were
spotted with little gems like this
Bold Cyrus Field, he says, says he,
I've got pretty notion
That | can lay telegraph
Across the Atlantic ocean.
1t would be wearisome task to go over
:
Fields many journeys across the Atlantic
and his final success in getting the needed
funds. Suffice it that on the Goth of June,
1857, the United States steamship Niagara
and the British steamer Agamemnon took
each its half of the cable>in midocean and
commenced laying toward it's own coast.
The wire soon broke, and broke again, and
yet again, and so that plan was a failure.
In moi 1Cf fha NioYc OF Tod .
Valentia bay, and had paid out 1856 miles
when the cable broke again. Then the fun
grew loud and furious. The illustrted press
gave cartoons of the submarine monsters
playing with the cable.
In 1853 the cable was actually laid, the
vessels arriving at their destinations July
20 and Aug. g. A few messages passed and
there was an international hurrah. Then
all communication ceased and for seven
years nothing was done. The civil war alb
sorbed the energies of the people But all
that time Mr.. Field and his subordinates
were experimenting, and at last cable was
devised which, in the opinion of experts,
might lie under salt water thousand years
without injury. The famous leviathan
steamer, the Great Eastern, was then EN-
ployed, and this time, in 1865, the cable
broke
Still the indefatigable Cyrus kept the
field. And now a system of tanks troll
legs, drums and regulating wheels was
established on the steamer so complicated
that description would fill two columns
The effect was that no matter how rough
the weather might be the cable could be
paid out with perfect regularity and with
out slack and strain. The rest is known.
,f T,,1, ~
started from the Irish coast and on the
9th grounded the American end of the
cable at Hearts Content Newfoundland
Its operation was perfect
Then all Europe and America broke
forth in glad acclaim and Cyrus w. Field
was overwhelmed. There were dispatches
of congratulation from Gladstone and
| from Bismarck, from the queen, the presi
| dent and the French emperor, and last
but most wonderful perhaps, one from
| Ferdinand de Lesseps, at Alexandria
| Egypt, which was sent at 1870 p. m. anC
reached Newfoundland at 10 a. m. the
same day.
For weeks thereafter Mr.. Fields life was
continuous ovation. Old readers recall
with enthusiasm the banquets, the songs
the professions and still more the cartoons
and the jokes. Congress voted him a golt
medal and the national thanks. England
and France followed with votes, thanks
and medals John Bright in the British
parliament expressed his profound regret
that the constitutions of the two nation.
stood in the way of comforting on Mr.. Field
the highest honors in the power of tn,
queen Mr. Fright called him 'the Colum
bus of modern times"
Nc
priser has been one of honor and dignity
In 1869 he Represented the New Yorl
chamber of commerce at the opening of tn,
Suez canal. In 1876 he began his work o.
developing the elevated railway system o
New York. In 1880 he started on his toul
around the world.
The elevated railroads nearly proved tn,
ruin of Mr.. Field. He had had large holds
of Manhattan ~ stock in conjunction
with Samuel j. Tilden, and the latter solo
to Jay Gould. At that time Mr.. Field
wealth was estimated at "a 500, coo, Will
Goulds was probably twenty times a
much, and the latter organized an i'm
mense squeeze" Mr.. Field had "cor
ner" and held his stock at 40. In June
1887 Mr.. Gould managed to call in all hi
loans, and money became so scarce tina
| MT. Tlell llUu PICK up
on the immense amount of stock he wa
holding.
The result was that Mr.. Field turnet
over 10000 shares of Manhattan to Mr.
Gould At 100, it's price before it wa
forced up, these shares were worth 81
5000, and the story goes that Mr.. Goulc
got the whole block at 1870, which meant
loss of 81, sec, 900 to Mr. Field At one tim
it was rumored that he was utterly ruinet
and would even lose his residence, but h
authorized the assertion that he had saveC
half his fortune. He had to sell The Mai
and Express, and it twas bought for 500, 0O
by Colonel Elliott f. Shepard.
A very queer episode in Mr.. Fiel1s lif
was his erection of monument to Majo
John Andre, which furnished material TO
many good jokes to the newspaper mel
and target for patriots to practice OIL
with missile stones. The first monumen
was soon destroyed (by Irish patriots in tn
vicinity, it is said, and the second was bat
tered to pieces by expert stone throwers.
Recent events are painfully familiar t.
the general reader. Mr.. Fields wife die,
Nov %, 1891, and soon after the firm il
which his son, Edward NJ, was leading
, member went to wreck. Much of tn
fathers fortune was swept away.
: He Murdered His Father.
BRISTOL, Tenn, July 13.-Jonn M
Young, of Grayson county, Va, ha