Page:Hamel Telegraph history 1859.djvu/62

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60

After all that had been accomplished before the month of September, 1837, in Europe by Baron Schilling, by Weber and Gauss, by Steinheil, and by Cooke and Wheatstone, it is offensive to observe that in America the painter Morse, who made, cm the 4th September, 1837, a poor experiment which he considered "successful," is held out as having made an electro-magnetic telegraph before anybody in Europe.

Samuel Finley Breese Morse,[1] born 1791, the eldest of three sons of the late Rev. Jedediah Morse, known for his geographical publications, having a taste for painting, and wishing to study this art, had for that purpose, from 1811 to 1815, been in England (at London and Bristol). At the close of 1829 he came again to Europe, and went by London and Paris to Rome and Naples, thence back to Paris, where he remained about a year to copy paintings in the Louvre. In the autumn of 1832 he returned from Havre to America.

On board the packet ship, the Sully, there was, among other passengers, Dr. Charles T. Jackson, of Boston, who had attended in Paris, besides other lectures, those of Pouillet,


  1. Breese is the family name of his mother, whose grandfather was the Rev. Samuel Finley.