IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS
Year: 1858

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Stanislas Hoga, of No. 14, Nassau Street, Middlesex
Hospital, William Peter Piggott, of No. 16, Argyll Street, Regent
Street, and Septimus Beardmore, of No. 37, Upper Berkeley Street West,
Sealed the 25th February 1859, and dated the 17th November 1858.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Stanislas Hoga, William
Peter Piggott, and Septimus Beardmore at the Office of the Commis-
sioners of Patents, with their Petition, on the 17th November 1858.
We, STANISLAS HOGA, of No 14, Nassau Street, Middlesex Hospital,
WILLIAM PETER PIGGOTT, of No. 16, Argyll Street, Regent Street, and
SEPTIMUS BEARDMORE, of No. 37, Upper Berkeley Street West, do hereby
declare the nature of the said Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN ELECTRIC
TELEGRAPHS," to be as follows, viz. :—
It is well known that all existing telegraphs have been worked by local
batteries at either end, that is to say, the signals have been made by means of
a current flowing from positive and negative metals in juxtaposition, such
current making its return by means of the earth, and reverse signals where
required, being obtained by changing the poles of such local batteries.
Our improvement on this method of obtaining signals consists in this, that
we use no local batteries, but use the currents and reverse currents of electricity,
which we produce by placing in the earth or body of natural water, near each
of the stations between which communication is to be made, three elements or
metals, viz., zinc, iron, and platinum (or such other substances as stand in
similar relation to each other) so that the first is positive to the second, whilst

page_text: the second is positive to the third, and we use an insulated wire between the
stations for the return current.
These elements or metals are not connected with each other, but are con-
nected, each at pleasure, with the telegraph wire or wires, and by the alternate
action of the zinc and platinum or similar extreme positive and negative
elements at one station with the iron or similar element at the opposite station,
we cause signals by means of currents and reverse currents.
It is not new to produce a current of electricity from one positive metal
placed in the earth or body of natural water to another negative metal
similarly placed, and connected together by an insulated wire, but we claim as
new the production of signals on a telegraphic instrument by means of currents
and reverse currents made by the alternate use of two elements or metals
(unconnected with each other) at one station, and one element or metal at the
opposite station when connected together by an insulated wire or wires.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Stanislas Hoga, William Peter Piggott, and Septimus
Beardmoro in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 18th May 1859.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, STANISLAS
HOGA, of No. 14, Nassau Street, Middlesex Hospital, WILLIAM PETER
PIGGOTT, of No. 16, Argyll Street, Regent Street, and SEPTIMUS BEARDMORE,
of No. 37, Upper Berkeley Street West, London, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Seventeenth day of November, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight, in the twenty-second year of
Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto us,
the said Stanislas Hoga, William Peter Piggott, and Septimus Beardmore, Her
special licence that we, the said Stanislas Hoga, William Peter Piggott, and
Septimus Beardmore, our executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others
as we, the said Stanislas Hoga, William Peter Piggott, and Septimus Beardmorg,
our 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 we, the said Stanislas Hoga, William
Peter Piggott, and Septimus Beardmore, or one of us, our executors or ad-

page_text: ministrators, by an instrument in writing under our, or one of our or their, or
one of their hands and seals, should particularly describe and ascertain 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 we, the said Stanislas Hoga, William Peter.
Piggott, and Septimus Beardmore, do hereby declare the nature of our said
Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be par-
ticularly described and ascertained in and by the following statement:-
Electric telegraphs have hitherto been worked by local batteries at either.
end, that is to say, by the juxtaposition of the negative and positive elements
placed in a cell or cells, and thereby producing a current of intense electricity
in the wire between the two stations; the current returning by the earth, and
the reverse current being obtained by changing the poles of the local batteries.
Our improvement on this method of working electric telegraphs consists in
this, that in the place of sending currents along the line wire, we in every
case send the currents by the earth, and use the line wire only for the return
current, which system, for the purpose of distinction, we call the "globe
telegraph."
Our manner of performing. the Invention is as follows:-We use the
currents obtained by placing in the earth or a natural body of water, near
each of the stations between which communication is to be made, three metals.
or substances, viz., zinc, iron and platinum (or such other substances as stand
in similar relation to each other) so that the first is positive to the second,
whilst the second is positive to the third, and we use an insulated wire between
the stations for the return current.
These metals or substances are not connected with each other, but are con-
nected, each at pleasure, with the telegraphic wire or wires; and by the
alternate action of the zinc and platinum or similar positive and negative
substances at one station with the iron or similar substance at the opposite.
station we cause signals by means of currents of electricity, as shown in the
Drawings hereunto annexed.
In the Drawing, Figure No. 1, K, K, show a plan of the earth or
natural body of water. A, D, are plates of zinc or other positive metals placed
in the earth or natural body of water; B, E, are plates of iron or other metals
which are negative to zinc, but positive to C, F, plates of platinum or other
metal negative to both A and D, and B, E. (According to the authorities,
iron is negative to zinc, and such is generally the case, but we have met with
iron, which, when much oxidized has become positive to zinc.) H, a con-

page_text: ducting wire, which when connecting A or C at the one end with E at the
other, or D or F at one end with B at the other, give rise to currents, the
direction of which through the earth or water is shown by the arrows, such
currents returning along the conducting wire.
The above example presents the simple form by which the currents
are produced; but in Figure No. 2 is exhibited more particularly the mode
of working an electric telegraph instrument. A, B, represent land on
either side of C, D, which represent water. Nos. 1 and 10 represent tele-
graphic instruments or simple galvanometers at each station, whence or to
which the messages are carried or sent. Nos. 2 and 9 represent levers or
handles insulated in two separate places. No. 3 represents zinc or other
positive metal placed in the earth or water near No. 1. No. 4 represents iron
or other metal negative to No. 3, but positive to No. 5, and placed like them
near No. 1. No. 5 represents platinum or other metal negative to both No. 3
and No. 4; and like them placed near No. 1. Nos. 11, 12, 13 represent
wires connecting the metals, Nos. 3, 4, and 5, with handle No. 2. Nos. 6,
7, 8, represent similar metals, as Nos. 3, 4, and 5, and placed in a similar
manner, and like them connected by wires Nos. 14, 15, 16, with the handle
No. 9. No. 17 represents the conducting wire between the stations.
If by a conventional arrangement the parts of the handles 2 and 9, marked
b, e, are placed in contact the one or the other with the telegraphic instru-
ments Nos. 1 or 10, the sender of a message from the side marked B will, in
order to act on the instruments, break contact with d (handle No. 9,) and the
telegraphic instrument No. 10, and a current will thereby flow from No. 6 to
No. 4, and from thence through the telegraphic instrument No. 1 by the wire
back to No. 6. After that, in order to produce a reverse current, the sender
from B will place f (handle No. 9) in contact with his instrument (No. 10,)
and a current will then flow from No. 4 to No. 8, and back through No. 10
by the wire to No. 4, or vice versa. The sender of a message from the side
marked A will break contact with a (handle No. 2), and thereby cause a
current to flow from No. 3 to No. 7 (that part being, as agreed, in contact
when at rest with telegraphic instrument No. 10); and to obtain a reverse
current, he will break contact with c (handle No. 2), and thereby cause a
current to flow from No. 7 to No. 5, the currents returning along the wire
No. 17, as above described.
A very important part of the Invention herein described consists in the
adjustment and size of the plate surface in relation to the distance of trans-
mission of signals, and which is regulated as follows:-The surface increases
as the square root of the distance, so that having ascertained the amount of

page_text: surface of plates at a certain distance apart required to work any given tele-
graphic instrument, it will be only necessary to increase or diminish that
surface in accordance with the square root of the distance to be traversed, in
order to work the same instrument. Thus for instance, if two square feet of
zinc at one end of an insulated wire fifty miles long, at the other end of which is
a piece of copper of the same size, produces sufficient electro-motive force to'
work a "Siemen's" instrument of the usual kind, then four square feet of the
same metals at each end of a line two hundred miles long will work an'
instrument of the same character.
To facilitate the generation of a current, we chemically excite these metals'
or substances in the manner of existing batteries, as is well understood. We'
also place them in separate porous cells, and excite them in a similar manner.
Where it is necessary to have a large amount of surface, we use several plates
or cells of the same metal connected together by a wire so as to form one
plate. Where we require a large amount of electric force, or what is under-
stood by the word tension, we use two, three, or more insulated wires causing
electric action along each of the same by means of the separate dissimilar
metals or substances, as above described; but obtaining the increased force on
the telegraphic instrument by connecting such twe, three, or more wires with
two, three, or more coils unconnected with each other, but round the same
helix.
Where we use an instrument like "Morse's," or "Siemen's," or "Hughes","
-being printing instruments, which require a current in one direction only,-
either for the purpose of forming a temporary magnet, or altering the con-
dition of the magnetism in a permanent one already attached to the instru-
ment, we need only apply so much of our arrangement of the metals or
substances in the earth as will be necessary to generate a current in one
direction only from the positive to the negative substance through the earth,
and using this when necessary to set a local battery at work by which to act.
on the instrument.
We are aware that the production of electric currents by means of positive
and negative substances placed in the earth or in natural bodies of water,
when connected together by an insulated wire, has been suggested, and made
the subject of experiment, and published in the Specification of Letters Patent
granted to Alexander Bain, on the 27th day of May, 1843; but the production
of such currents, and the applications then suggested failed to lead to any
practical or useful result, and was abandoned.
We prefer to use between stations an insulated connecting wire or cable of
iron, or galvanized iron or copper, but the circumstances which make such

page_text: insulation necessary differ from those which necessitate a perfect insulation in
the case of existing telegraphs. The lines of these latter conduct currents of
electricity from batteries, and such intense currents will, by the contact of
such line wire with the moisture of the earth or water, tend to run back to the
batteries which produced them; but in our arrangements the currents pro-
duced have a tendency to pass from the positive to the negative metal or
substance through the earth or water, and the line wire for the return current.
completes the circuit. But the necessity of such insulation in our Invention
exists, because where a line wire is in contact for some distance with the
earth or water, it becomes, according to its positive or negative quality, an
opposite metal to some of the metals or substances at the different stations
which may be in contact with it, and thus the currents which we require for
telegraphic purposes would be expended and returned along the line wire to
the station where either of the three metals or substances (negative or positive
to the substance of which the line wire is composed) is in contact.
Insulation of the line wire, that is protection from free electric contact with
the earth or water, therefore is required; but for the above reasons it can be
more readily made and maintained than under the present system, and where.
a large portion of the wire becomes uninsulated by wear or other circum-
stances, the surface of the metals or substances may be increased, and thus
compensate for the loss or change of relation. We also cause by our method
the formation of a temporary magnet, or alter the condition of a permanent
magnet at pleasure in the usual way.
Having now described the nature of our Invention, and in what manner
the same is to be performed, we hereby declare, that what we claim as the
Invention intended to be protected by the said Letters Patent is, the appli-
cation to telegraphic instruments of the currents produced from metals
arranged in the earth or in natural bodies of water in the manner and of the
properties and relations above described.
In witness whereof, I, the said Septimus Beardmore, on behalf of
myself and the said Stanislas Hoga and William Peter Pigott, have
hereunto set my hand and seal, this Thirteenth day of May, in the
year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-nine.
SEPTIMUS BEARDMORE, C.E. (L.S.)