Back Reflection Images courtesy of Atlantic-Cable.com
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An Alternative Hero
n our last issue we brought you the story of Thomas Russell Crampton, relating his part in the first successful commercial submarine cable system and his claim to be the inventor of the armoured submarine cable. However, further research on the subject would suggest that, although many contemporary and later publications credit Crampton with the armoured submarine cable design, this may not be accurate and that significantly more credit should be given to a Scotsman, R. S. Newall. Indeed this precise observation was made by G. R. M. Garratt in Errata on page 22 of his 1950 book “One Hundred Years of Submarine Cables.”
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Garratt cites a pamphlet published on 22nd May 1882, entitled “Facts and Observations relating to the Invention of Submarine Cable” in which R. S. Newall refutes many of the claims made by Crampton himself and on his behalf. The pamphlet was
by Stewart Ash & Kaori Shikinaka
published in response to a paper given by a M. Bebe in Paris in October 1881. It covers many aspects of the 1851 project, going on to discuss Newall’s other cable laying inventions and the many infringements of his patents by other companies; however, in this article we will concentrate on R. S. Newall’s counter claim to be the original designer of armoured submarine cable and his role in the 1851 Dover to Calais cable. Robert Stirling Newall was born in 1812, in Dundee, and became the owner of an engineering business in that city. In response to a letter from his friend Lewis Gordon, sent to him in 1838, from the mining region of Clausthal in Germany, Newall began work on designing a machine to manufacture wire rope. In 1839, Lewis, Newall and Charles Liddle formed a partnership and on 17th August 1840, Newall took out a patent for “certain improvements in wire rope and the machinery for making such rope.” Shortly afterward, R. S. Newall and Company was established in Dundee to
make wire rope for the mining, shipping and railway industries. In his pamphlet Newall claims that his interest in submarine cable design was stimulated by the famous Michael Faraday’s letter on gutta percha published in the Philosophical Magazine on 1st March 1848. Shortly afterwards, Newall states he was consulted on the best means of carrying a telegraph wire across the Hudson river and in response wrote a letter, dated 15th March 1848, in which he wrote “We cannot but think that the cheapest plan would be to lay the wire across the river under water. We believe it might be coated so as to insulate it.” This, he claims, to have been the first suggestion of a submarine cable. He also asserts that he made samples of his concept, based on a soft core wire rope design, to prove its practicality. According to Newall, he provided C. J. Woolaston, the engineer of the AngloFrench Telegraph Company, with a sample