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Updated: May 9, 2025
In contriving the electric telegraph, Wheatstone, an Englishman, Oersted, a Dane, and Henry, an American, had each an important part. The most simple and efficient form of the telegraphic instrument is admitted to be due to the inventive sagacity of Morse . His instrument was first put in use in 1844.
Wheatstone's device of the revolving mirror was afterwards employed by Foucault and Fizeau to measure the velocity of light. In 1835, at the Dublin meeting of the British Association, Wheatstone showed that when metals were volatilised in the electric spark, their light, examined through a prism, revealed certain rays which were characteristic of them.
At this point I met the opposition of Messrs. Wheatstone and Cooke, and also of Mr. Davy, and a hearing was ordered before the Attorney-General, Sir John Campbell, on July 12, 1838.
In 1827, Wheatstone introduced his 'kaleidoscope, a device for rendering the vibrations of a sounding body apparent to the eye. It consists of a metal rod, carrying at its end a silvered bead, which reflects a 'spot' of light. As the rod vibrates the spot is seen to describe complicated figures in the air, like a spark whirled about in the darkness.
It was further urged that Wheatstone in England and Steinheil in Germany had invented telegraphs before Morse, and that Professor Henry had invented the relay which made it possible to operate the telegraph over long distances. The suits resulted in a legal victory for Morse, and his patents were maintained.
Cooke, on the other hand, declared that his sole object was to make a fortune from the scheme. In May they agreed to join their forces, Wheatstone contributing the scientific, and Cooke the administrative talent. The deed of partnership was dated November 19, 1837.
"Never," said Wheatstone, "did I feel such a tumultuous sensation before, as when, all alone in the still room, I heard the needles click, and as I spelled the words I felt all the magnitude of the invention pronounced to be practicable without cavil or dispute."
The length of line through which Morse could work his apparatus was an important point to be determined, for it was known that the current grows feebler in proportion to the resistance of the wire it traverses. Morse saw a way out of the difficulty, as Davy, Cooke, and Wheatstone did, by the device known as the relay.
Then he left home to become a teacher of elocution in various British schools, and by the time he was of age he had made several slight discoveries as to the nature of vowel-sounds. Shortly afterwards, he met in London two distinguished men, Alexander J. Ellis and Sir Charles Wheatstone, who did far more than they ever knew to forward Bell in the direction of the telephone.
Together with William Fothergill Cooke, another Englishman, he developed a telegraph line that, while it did not attain commercial success, was the first working telegraph placed at the service of the public. Charles Wheatstone was born near Gloucester in 1802. Having completed his primary schooling, Charles was apprenticed to his uncle, who was a maker and seller of musical instruments.
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