Lightning Man_ The Accursed Life of Samuel F. B. Morse - Kenneth Silverman [194]
The second week in September, after a full month of waiting, Morse at last heard from London. As he had advised, the Atlantic Telegraph Company decided to put off a new expedition about six months, until the spring. For the present, the Niagara would unload the thousand miles of cable still in its hold at a dockyard in Plymouth harbor—a labor, Morse foresaw, that could keep the ship there until November. He had hoped to take the “noble” warship home again, but given the possibly two-month-long wait he settled on the steamer Arabia.
Morse was accompanied on his passage home by Cyrus Field. His feelings about Field had grown more conflicted than ever, a welter of affection, distrust, respect, and dependence permeated with guilt over compromised loyalties and the shame of self-betrayal. He looked forward to soon joining Field on the second cable-laying endeavor. Nevertheless, during the voyage he brought up his “great uneasiness” over the letter from Kendall. He asked blunt questions. At the New York meeting of representatives from the Morse companies, had Field used “defiant language”? Was there some “intrigue” afoot to prevent a union among the companies? Would the cable be open to all the established Morse lines? Field denied the charges and assured him that the negotiations for an alliance were “going on favorably.”
A little relieved, Morse offered to help Field secure government aid for the new cable attempt by composing a public endorsement, explaining why he expected it to succeed. Kendall’s report had an effect, however. Morse said he would write nothing until he had investigated the situation and become “properly posted upon the state of affairs at home.”
Morse’s 140 fellow passengers included a Quaker, an Episcopalian, and members of other Christian denominations, with whom he enjoyed exchanging views on religious subjects. But as he settled in he found the Arabia wet and dirty, a miserable contrast with the formidable Niagara. And heading across the Atlantic the ship battled gales as fierce as he had ever experienced, twisting crosscurrents that made it near impossible to get about. “Our meals are thinly attended, every one complaining of soreness from such incessant tossing,” he recorded, “the sea every now and then breaks over our bows, and deluges every thing from stem to stern.”
SIXTEEN
Forward
(1857–1860)
AFTER ONLY A few days at home, Morse learned that the threat to his business interests was even deadlier than he had thought. Actions had been taken after the date of Kendall’s letter to him that all but ended his control over the future direction and organization of the American telegraph industry. As he lay bedridden in Plymouth harbor, he now learned, five major companies, including Western Union, had made a separate peace with Field’s American Telegraph. Meeting clandestinely, without notifying Amos Kendall, they agreed to purchase the Hughes patent from Field and form an alliance with his group.
The signatories to this so-called Six Nation Treaty, Morse learned, had large ambitions. As mutual owners of the Hughes telegraph they contemplated building a line from New York to Washington rivaling the inaugural Morse line. They also boasted of plans for new lines all the way to California. Each member of the North American Telegraph Association, as the group called itself, would be sovereign of the large area allotted to it. The Western Union Company, for example, would control rights to the Hughes telegraph in every state north of the Ohio River and parts of Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, and Kansas.
Kendall had obtained a copy of the treaty and read its provisions. He informed Morse that the treacherous Field and his new associates had simply parceled out the United States among themselves, monopolizing the country’s telegraph