IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS
Year: 1862

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Lord Alfred Spencer Churchill at
the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
20th February 1862..
I, Lord ALFRED SPENCER CHURCHILL, of No.. 16, Rutland. Gate, Hyde.
Park, in the County of Middlesex, do hereby declare the nature of the
Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS," to be as follows:-
This Invention has for its object improvements in electric telegraphs. At
the present time in telegraphing by electricity it is usual to employ but one
wire in the production of an indication or sign on the indicating instrument.
This wire takes the current in one direction, and it is returned through the
earth. This method of constructing telegraphs requires that the wire employed.
should be carefully insulated from the earth; this cannot be done efficiently.
without considerable expense and trouble.
Formerly in constructing electric telegraphs two wires were employed in:
the production of a sign or indication on the indicating instrument; one to
take the outgoing and the other the incoming current.. These wires were,.
however, placed in immediate proximity the one to the other, being carried
by the same supports, or contained in the same protecting trough or passage..
This arrangement also rendered the insulation of the wires necessary, other-
wise, in consequence of the proximity of the wires, the electricity would pass
from the one to the other to such an extent as to prevent the telegraph
working efficiently.

page_text: Now, according to my Invention, I employ two wires to produce a single
sign on the indicating instrument; one to carry the outgoing and the other
the incoming current. These wires are caused to take different routes, so
that the distance between the outgoing and incoming wire may be con-
siderable, and the wires are uninsulated, by which I mean that the contacts
between each wire and the earth, or places where the current may pass from
the wire to the earth, arc so numerous or extensive as to render the wire
unsuitable for telegraphing in the usual manner where the return of the
current takes place through the earth. Stations for receiving and trans-
mitting signals may be introduced at any desired places in the circuit made
by the two wires.
In constructing submarine telegraphs I proceed in a similar manner,
laying both an outgoing and an incoming wire by different routes, or other-
wise, so that they may be at a sufficient distance the one from the other.
These wires are uninsulated in the sense in which I have before used the
term, that is to say, so far as to be unsuited for telegraphing with a return
through the earth or water in the usual manner. I do not, however, consider
it desirable that the wires should be in electric contact with the water from
end to end. I therefore give to them a thin coating of gutta percha or other
insulator; and I prefer, in long lines, to make communications between the
water and the wire at distances apart for the purpose of discharging from the
wire into the water any electricity of high tension which in the course of
signalling may be induced in the wire.
In submarine telegraphing I prefer to employ wires larger in sectional area
than those commonly employed; and I prefer in telegraphing with telegraphs
constructed according to my Invention, and where the line is long, to employ
a number of batteries, each connected separately with the wire, that is to
say, so that each battery pours its electricity separately into the wire, and is
not coupled with the other batteries.
In some cases where the distance to which signals have to be conveyed is
long I introduce batteries at intervals into the circuit, so as to reinforce the
current. These batteries I place at a distance from the communicating
station; the signals are then given by breaking the electric circuit.