IMPROVE. MENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS
Year: 1857

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Edward Highton, of the Regent's Park, in the
County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer, for the Invention of "IMPROVE.
MENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS,"
Sealed the 26th March 1858, and dated the 17th December, 1857.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Edward Highton at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition on the
17th December 185.
1. EDWARD HIGHTON, of the Regent's Park, in the County of Middlesex,
Civil Engineer, do hereby declare the nature of the Invention for "IMPROVE-
MENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS," to be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object improvements in electric telegraphs. For
these purposes when giving motion by currents of electricity to strips of gold
leaf or other thin metallic conductors of electric telegraphs, electro magnets,
in place of a permanent magnet are used in combination therewith. In order
to record signs or indications made by telegraphicinstruments, photography is
employed in place of the means now used for obtaining marks by mechanical
or chemical action. In laying down telegraphic wires in the earth, troughs
or channels are used as heretofore, but in place of the ordinary covers or
upper surfaces being used, the covers or upper surfaces of iron are 'inade to
incline in such manner that in picking up the earth the points of the picks
will be deflected, and I render it unnecessary to transinit the name and
CD 077

page_text: address of either the sender or receiver of a telegraphic communication by
means of a code table, the communication itself showing by whom and to
whom the communication is sent.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Edward Highton in the Great Seal Patent Office on the
17th June 1858.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME. I, EDWARD
HIGHTON, of the Regent's Park, in the County of Middlesex, Civil Engineer,
send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Seventeenth day of December, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven, in the twenty-first year
of Her reign did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant
unto me, the said Edward Highton, Her special licence that I, the said
Edward Eighton, my executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others
as 1, the said Edward Highton, my executors, administrators, and assigns,
should at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at
all times thereafter during the term therein expressed, should and lawfully
might make, use, exercise, and vend, within the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS," upon the condition (amongst
others) that I, the said Edward Highton, my executors or administrators,
by an instrument in writing under my, or their, or one of their hands
and seals, should particularly describe and ascertuin the nature of the said
Invention, and in what manner the same was to be performed, and cause
the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent Office, within six calendar
months next and immediately after the date of the said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said Edward Highton, do hereby declare the
nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be per-
formned, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement thereof, that is to say:-
My first improvement is applicable to the gold leaf telegraph, for which a
Patent was granted to my brother the Revd Henry Highton, then of Rugby,
in the County of Warwick, dated February the 3rd 1846, and consists in
the use of an electro-magnet instead of a permanent magnet as therein
described.

page_text: The electro-maguet may be produced by galvanic battery, or other means
of producing magnetism in an electro-magnet, and motion of the gold leaf
will thus ensue, and signals may thereby be obtained. The electro-magnets
are applied in the same manner as if permanent magnets were used, their
poles being brought in proximity to the gold leaf as described in the Specifica-
tion above referred to. The advantage of using the electro-magnet consists
in the ability of producing any required amount of magnetism to cause
motion in the gold leaf,and thus enabling the motion of the gold leaf through
which electricity is passing from the line circuit to be magnified or increased
to any desirable extent as the power of the electro-magnet is increased
additional sensibility is given to the gold leaf. The size of the electro-
magnet and the wires surrounding it, and the battery power to be applied to
such electro-magnets should, according to the amount of electricity passing
through the gold leaf, vary, but all persons conversant with the laws of
electricity, or the working of the electric telegraph, will be enabled at once
to select the proper power of the electro-magnet to be used for such purpose
according to circumstances.
My next improvement consists in recording sigus or indications made by
telegraphic instruments, by means of photography. Hitherto paper has been
mechanically marked, or marked by means of chemical decomposition, or the
motion of a pointer either oscillating between two stops or revolving round a
dial.
My improvement consists in recording photographically the signals thus
produced. When great speed is required, of course the most sensitive photo-
graphic apparatus must be used; the following is the arrangement of
appa-
ratus which I prefer to employ:-A strip of paper rendered as sensitive as
possible, I cause to move uniformly forward by suitable apparatus, as is well
understood, & in front of this travelling strip of sensitive paper a magnetic
needle or bar is mounted, and this is caused by a suitable arrangement of
coils to move in one or other direction, when a current is passing in the line
wire. In the magnetic needle or bar a hole is formed, and by suitable optical
apparatus light is concentrated at and around this hole, and a portion of it
passes through on to the paper, and marks it, so that the position of the
needle is constantly registered on the paper. In place of perforating the
needle or bar itself it may, if preferred, be caused to actuate a perforated
screen.
My next improvement consists in a method of protecting telegraphic wires
when buried in the ground. Hitherto it has been customary to use tubes or
boxes of various forms. In practice it has been found that these tubes or

page_text: boxes, as hitherto constructed and laid, are liable to injury by pickaxes, and
other tools during the repairs of roads, gas pipes, water pipos, &c.
According to my Invention I employ tubes or boxes made of cast iron, and
of a triangular form, such as is shown at Figure 1, of the annexed Drawing,
and in laying the same 1 place them with the apex upwards. The advantage
of this arrangement is, that the pickaxe or other tool on coming in contact
with the inclined sides of the tube or box glances off, and fracture is thus
avoided.
Another improvement consists in a peculiar form of code table, sce
Dingram No. A, which is capable of producing upwards of two million
different numbers for each inhabitant of the world, reckoning the number at
five hundred inillions. The table is applied in the following manuer :-
When any two persons A and B, have frequent occasion to communicate by
telegraph certain numbers are by the managers of the telegraph assigned to
these persons. To the number so assigned to A and B, which may amount
to one thousand or more, they between themselves attach cortain significa-
tions, and when A for example wishes to send a message to B, he takes a
printed sheet like the DiagramA, and he marks on one side of the line A, B, a
certain number of the lines of figures,so that when all the lines so marked are
added together they make up the number which he desires to transmit; he
then sends this sheet to the telegraph office with instructions as to the station,
to which the message is to be sent,aud certain signals are transmitted which
enables those at the receiving station to mark another similar printed sheet
to correspond with that presented at the sending station (it will be seen that
as there are but fifty lines of figures, this can never require more than fifty
signals), at the receiving station the marked figures are added, and the result-
ing number is forwarded to B, it being shown by books kept at the receiving
station that the message is intended to be so delivered.
In witness whereof, I, the said Edward Highton, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, the Seventeenth day of June, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight.
Witness,
JNO. ALCOCK.
EDW. HIGHTON. (L.E.)