The Atlantic cable

 

Greenwich is the home of Communication - after the Enderby’s left their riverside site and the ropewalk.  Successor companies then moved in who were to play a major part in the modern world of global communication.    This is the revolution

The original cable works had been slightly down river at Morden Wharf- and we’ll come to them later.  Glass Elliott were already involved in manufacturing some of the earliest underwater telegraph cables when they bought the old Enderby site in 1854.  At Enderby's they were to dominate the manufacture of these cables worldwide. 

The story of the Atlantic Telegraph is the biggest and most exciting episode in the history of Enderby Wharf – but we must not forget that while it was laid other cables were being laid between countries all around the world, and that cable made at the Greenwich works was used for them too. For many years – before the flats were built – if you stopped at Enderby Wharf to look at the river someone would come along –some old fellow maybe – who would tell you ‘this is where the Atlantic Cable was made and where it was loaded onto great Eastern’.  They were proud of that and we need for new comers to know about it now.

The Atlantic cable was of course primarily a business venture. To do it not only needed a lot of complicated technology to e sorted out, but also a at aunt f money raised.  Governments needed to be persuaded and involved.   The British Government lent warships to help lay the first cable across the Atlantic but the attempt failed when the cable broke after only 280 miles.  Grappling techniques were not capable of recovering it – but each failure meant lessons learnt.

The second cable reached America but soon failed. As a result of that failure large tanks were built at Enderby Wharf where the new cable could be safely held and continuously tested.   Pictures show cable coiled in tanks while men on stools sit looking at it – they are looking for any flaws. In 1864 Glass Elliot merged with the Gutta Percha Company to become the Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Company – Telcon - a name which many will still identify with the site.  It had John Pender as Chairman, Richard Glass as Managing Director and George Elliot and Daniel Gooch as board directors.  They were about to make the third cable.

In order to carry the enormous heavy cable and be able to service it whatever happened in mid-Atlantic, Brunel’s huge, and vilified, ship Great Eastern was used. When you hear people saying Great Eastern was a failure and doomed disaster – tell them, Great Eastern was a wild success and without her the Atlantic cable could not have been laid when it was.  Launched seven years earlier from Millwall and, known as ‘The Leviathan’, she was bigger and more powerful than any ship before her. She had failed as a passenger liner and was bought very cheaply by Daniel Gooch, who promptly joined the Board of the Telegraph Construction Company and offered Great Eastern in return for shares in the Atlantic Telegraph Co 

 

There was great interest in this new, third, cable and the Prince of Wales visited Greenwich to see it being manufactured. He sent a message through the 1,400 miles then being tested in the factory - ‘I wish success to the Atlantic Cable'.  It took two weeks to load the new cable into Great Eastern.  The ship was so big that she could not be brought alongside Morden or Enderby Wharves and every bit of cable had to be ferried out to her and loaded off Sheerness.   She left Greenwich for Foilhummerum Bay, Valentia, the westernmost place in Europe, on 15th July 1865 carrying 21,000 tons of cable.

 

When they were 948 miles from Valentia and 717 miles from Heart's Content in Newfoundland, the cable broke and was lost overboard. Four times it was retrieved from the ocean bottom, and four times it slipped away. Once again, the cable makers went back to Greenwich.

 

The Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Co. made yet another new cable, which was finished in 1866.  Once again they loaded the Great Eastern and as she left the Thames for Valentia bands on shore played 'Goodbye Sweetheart' . On 27th July, she reached Heart's Content and the cable was laid at last.

 

Great Eastern then went back so they could look for the cable lost in the previous attempt and on 2nd September instruments at the Valentia end of the broken cable began to move. Staff on board Great Eastern had found it two miles down, and it was now connected. Within a few moments, both Europe and America knew where Great Eastern was and what had been done.  It is one of the defining moments of the modern world.

 

It is difficult to overstate the importance of the Atlantic cable and the 'profound transformation' to which it led.  The telegraph was a major agent of change and an instrument whose importance was not lost on City business interests, which controlled land on the Greenwich Peninsula.  Within another two years connections were made to Tokyo and Melbourne and world markets were shifting towards globalisation.  At the end of the 20^th century there was much talk about the global communications revolution.  The real revolution came a hundred and sixty eight years ago when wires twisted on Greenwich marsh crackled into life on the sea bed.

 

I’ve been told that for many years one of the Great Eastern's masts stood on Enderby Wharf as a reminder of what had been achieved. Is that true? If it is, what happened to it? Of all the sites involved with the cables only one has an exhibition to show what happened - - and that is at Heart's Content in Newfoundland.  I understand something maybe in place at Valentia and am also aware that Hearts’ Content and Valentia have tried to get themselves as a joint World Heritage Site – a very long and thin one! I'm far from sure what has happened to that now.

 

In Greenwich we – the Enderby Group with a lot of local support – have tried and tried to get some recognition for what was achieved here. On the riverside some cable-loading remains on the jetty and some steps into the river, covering a medieval sluice, have a carving depicting the history of cable manufacture and it is hope that this will remain.  It’s had some narrow scrapes in the past couple of years.  The developers were also required to commission a sculpture to stand outside Enderby House. This is Lay Lines, by Bobby Lloyd, which is designed to display cross sections of cable as tables and chairs. There is also an electronic information system. We are also trying to get this as part of the East London/Peninsula sculpture trail and also make sure that there is some maintenance agreement in place.  We had hoped the developers would take some interest in using Enderby House to commemorate the cables – but it is now to be a pub.

 

But – anyway – a lot more happened at Enderby Wharf before we get to today and what's going on now.

 

 

Further reading:

 

https://enderbywharf.wordpress.com/

 

https://atlantic-cable.com/

This vast web site is all anyone needs who wants to know about the Enderby family and the later cable works.  It is curated by Bill Burns, in New York, and carries anything and everything he can find on the subject.  It includes a series of pictures on the wharf and Enderby House.  There are innumerable books about the Atlantic cable and Bill will have mentioned most them.  They include:

 

 

Stewart Ash. The Cable King, Sir John Pender. 2018 (available through Amazon)

Telcon Story. Telcon

Hill & Jeal Greenwich – Centre For Global Telecommunications Since 1850. Alcatel 2000

W.H. Russell. The Atlantic Telegraph (reproduction of 1866 book with sensational pictures) Nonsuch 2005.