“The capital of the Atlantic Telegraph Company has once more been filled up, and a new cable is now in course of shipment, on board of the Great Eastern, and will be wholly embarked on or before the 1st of June next. During that month we have every reason to think it will be successfully laid, seven years of experience, with the added teaching of science, affording very ample grounds for this conclusion.
“Regarding this as an enterprise of great international importance, we invite the attention of the government of the United States to this new effort of the Atlantic Telegraph Company, and respectfully request the Honorable the Secretary of the Navy once more to detail a ship of war to act with such vessel of the British navy as her Britannic Majesty may appoint to accompany the Great Eastern on her projected mission.
“The lapse of time since the first attempt was made to unite the continents by a system of telegraphic communication has not tended to abate the interest which originally centred upon this bold undertaking. On the contrary, four years of civil war, prolific of events demanding immediate and mutual explanations between Great Britain and the United States, have contributed to strengthen and deepen the interest with which at first it was so universally regarded. May we not reasonably indulge the hope that, as the old cable first conveyed to the Western World the news of restored peace in China, one of the first messages through the wires about to be immersed may convey to the Old World from the New tidings of peace re-established in the West, of the States reunited, and slavery everywhere abolished, and that henceforward all causes of misunderstanding between Great Britain and the United States may be instantaneously removed?
“We have the honor to be,
“Very respectfully,
“Your obedient servants,
| “Peter Cooper, | Wm. E. Dodge, |
| “A. A. Low, | Wilson G. Hunt, |
| “Cyrus W. Field, | E. M. Archibald, |
| “Honorary Directors in America. | |
“To Hon. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy, Washington, D. C.
The only explanation ever vouchsafed of the failure of this application was the suggestion, published in a New York paper, that it was “because England had not withdrawn her proclamation excluding our vessels from her ports under what is termed her ‘twenty-four hours’ rule.’ ”
The Great Eastern left Medway on June 24th, and removed to the Nore, and on July the 15th left that anchorage. The progress of the great ship is chronicled in the following extracts from the London papers:
“Portsmouth, July 16th.
“The Great Eastern passed Newton at 2 P.M., five miles off land, under steam and sail; wind light, southerly.”