On the vessels being fully loaded ready for the start, “send-off” festivities occurred, in which all classes of those engaged on the work took part. The Times recounted the function on board the Agamemnon as follows:
The three central tables were occupied by the crew of the Agamemnon, a fine, active body of men, who paid the greatest attention to the speeches, and drank all the toasts with an admirable punctuality—at least, so long as their three pints of beer per man lasted. But we regret to add that with the heat of the day and the enthusiasm of Jack in the cause of science, the mugs were all empty long before the chairman’s list of toasts had been gone through. Next in interest to the sailors were the workmen and their wives and babies, all being permitted to assist. The latter, it is true, sometimes squalled at an affecting peroration, but that rather improved the effect than otherwise, and the presence of their little ones only marked the genuine good feeling of the employers, who had thus invited not only their workmen, but their workmen’s families to the feast. It was a momentary return to the old patriarchal times.
This function having come to an end, the Agamemnon set out for Sheerness. When leaving her moorings, opposite Glass & Elliot’s works, the scene was one of considerable interest.{60} It is recorded that many thousands of persons thronged the riverside as far as Greenwich Hospital. In the immediate neighborhood of the factory a salute was fired as the proud vessel moved away, and a deafening cheer was raised by the assembled crowds. The crew of H.M.S. Agamemnon manned the gunwales, and returned the cheer with lusty lungs, while from the stern gallery, ladies waved their handkerchiefs, and savants forgot for a while the mysteries of electricity and submarine-cable work, as they returned the hearty cheers which reached them from the shore.
Similar proceedings took place on board the Niagara, and the two ships met at Queenstown, County Cork, on July 30, 1857. They were moored about three-quarters of a mile apart, and a piece of cable run between the two to enable the entire length of line (2,500 N.M.) to be tested and worked through. The result was all that could be desired, and the Wire Squadron set sail for the rendezvous at Valentia Bay on Monday, August 3d.
Besides the vessels already named, there were H.M. tender Advice and the steam-tug Willing Mind to assist in landing the cable at Valentia, as well as the U.S. screw-steamer Arctic and the paddle-steamer Victoria (Newfoundland Telegraph Company) on duty in Trinity Bay, Newfoundland, to await the arrival of the fleet and assist in landing the cable at that end.
On arrival in harbor the following day, the ships were hospitably welcomed by his Excellency the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland (the Earl of Carlisle), who had journeyed from Dublin{61} Castle for the purpose. A déjeuner banquet was given by the Knight of Kerry (Sir Peter Fitzgerald), the lord of the manor for many miles round, and this little corner of Ireland—“the next parish to America”—was quite en fête for the occasion.