History of the Atlantic Cable & Undersea Communications
from the first submarine cable of 1850 to the worldwide fiber optic network

CS Faraday (1)
by Bill Glover

CS FARADAY (1)

Built 1874 by C. Mitchell & Company Ltd., Newcastle on Tyne.

Length 360.38 ft. Breadth 52.25 ft. Depth 39.6 ft. Gross tonnage 5052

The Faraday was purpose-built for Siemens Brothers, incorporating many of William Siemens' ideas, as he had found chartered vessels totally unsuitable for cable laying. Two of these ideas were twin screws and a bow rudder; another was the swivelling bow and stern sheaves which prevented the cable from riding up the side of the sheave when ship and cable were not in a straight line. The two funnels were placed side by side and the bow and stern were of similar design, giving the vessel a unique appearance.

Faraday was launched at the shipyard of C. Mitchell & Company on February 17th 1874, and the event was recorded in a book written and published in 1876 by T. Fordyce of Newcastle, comprehensively titled: Local Records: or, Historical Register of Remarkable Events which have Occurred in Northumberland and Durham, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, and Berwick-Upon-Tweed, with Biographical Sketches of Deceased Persons of Talent, Eccentricity, and Longevity.

February 17.—A new cable ship called the Faraday, a vessel of great strength and ponderous outline, was launched from Messrs. C. Mitchell and Co 's yard, Walker, in the presence of a large concourse of spectators. The occasion seemed to be one of no inconsiderable interest. Lady and gentlemen visitors were present from all parts of the district. Every arrangement had been made, under the direction of the firm, for their comfort. The raised garden in front of the manager's residence—a spot commanding a full length view of the ship—was kindly thrown open for the occasion. Gangways were also erected in convenient positions, so that the whole of the visitors had an opportunity of witnessing the launch to advantage.

Half-past three o'clock was the time fixed, and shortly after that hour the signal was given. Imperceptibly almost the vessel began to slip from the ways, and as her bow left the gangway occupied by Mrs. Siemens, of London, and a party of friends, she was named the “Faraday” by that lady, who completed the ceremony by sacrificing the customary bottle of wine. The giant structure slid gently down the incline, and dipped easily into the water amidst the cheers of the sightseers.

By means of an immense cable chain attached to anchors firmly embedded in the ground, she was brought up in midchannel, and was taken in hand by a number of tugs and towed up the river. The launch was of the most successful character, everything passing off without a hitch. The vessel was built to the order of Messrs. Siemens Brothers, London, for the purpose of laying Atlantic cables

In 50 years of cable work Faraday laid a total of 50,000 nm of cable. The ship was sold in 1924 for scrap, but the 1" thick plates defeated the breakers and so Faraday became a coal hulk, named Analcoal, at Algiers for the Anglo-Algiers Coaling Company. 1931 saw the hulk moved to Gibraltar, still storing coal. In 1941 the vessel became a Naval store ship at Sierra Leone. Towed back to England in 1950, she ended her days at a South Wales breaker's yard.

CABLE WORK

Detail of 1874 stereoview. The flag flying from the middle mast is the Siemens Brothers company flag, a St. George's cross (red on a white ground) bearing the brothers' initials.

On 15 May 1874, the day before the ship's maiden voyage, William Siemens, principal of Siemens Brothers of London, which owned and operated the Faraday, addressed a meeting of the Royal Institution of Great Britain and described his new ship:

Royal Institution of Great Britain.

WEEKLY EVENING MEETING,

Friday, May 15, 1874.

THE EARL OF ROSSE, D.C.L. F.R.S. Vice-President, in the Chair.

C. WILLIAM SIEMENS, D.C.L. F.R.S. M.R.I.

The Steamship ‘Faraday’ and her Appliances for Cable-laying.

THE speaker in his introductory remarks observed that an electric telegraph consisted essentially of three parts, viz. the electro-motor or battery, the conductor, and the receiving instrument. He demonstrated experimentally that the conductor need not necessarily be metallic, but that water or rarefied air might be used as such within moderate limits; at the same time, for long submarine lines, insulated conductors strengthened by an outer sheathing were necessary to ensure perfect transmission and immunity from accident. The first attempts at insulation, which consisted in the use of pitch and resinous matters, failed completely, and in the years 1846 and 1847 the two gums, india-rubber and gutta-percha, were introduced, the former by Prof. Jacobi of St. Petersburg, and the latter by Dr. Werner Siemens of Berlin. This last gum soon became almost indispensable to the cable manufacturer on account of its remarkable plasticity at low temperatures and its insulating property.

The first outer sheathing used was a tube of lead drawn tightly over the insulated wire, and this again was covered with pieces of wrought-iron tubing connected by ball and socket joints; in this way the Elbe and other rivers were crossed successfully in 1848-50. This method was superseded later on by the spiral-wire sheathing, first proposed by Mr. Brett in 1851 for the Dover and Calais cable; since then, with few modifications and exceptions, this form has been universally adopted.

The speaker next enumerated the casualties to which submarine cables are liable, and the precautions employed to obviate them. He showed specimens destroyed by rust and the ravages of a species of teredo. On the Indo-European Cable line a curious case of fracture occurred; a whale, becoming entangled in a portion of cable overhanging a ledge of rock, broke it, and in striving to get free had so wound one end round its flukes that escape became hopeless, and so had fallen an easy prey to sharks, which had half devoured it when the grappling iron brought his remains to the surface. Other enemies to be dreaded are landslips, ships’ anchors, and abrading currents.

The new Atlantic cable consists, for the deep-sea portion, of copper conductors, gutta-percha insulators, and a sheathing of steel wires covered with hemp; the shallow-water part consists of similar conductors and insulators sheathed with hemp, which in turn is covered with iron wire.

In paying out, no catenary is formed, as might be supposed, but the cable passes in a straight line from the ship to the sea-bottom—-a proposition which the speaker demonstrated experimentally by means of a long trough with glass sides filled with water. The retaining force applied by the brake wheel should be equal to the weight of a piece of cable hanging vertically downwards to the bottom of the sea. In picking up, a catenary is formed, but a vertical position is the best, because it produces the least resistance.

From the peculiar nature of the service for which a telegraph-ship is required, it is evident that she must possess properties somewhat different from those of ordinary ocean-going steamers; thus speed is not so important as great manoeuvring powers, which will enable her to turn easily in a small space, or by which she may be maintained in a given position for a considerable time. In the ship about to be described an attempt had been made to meet these requirements.

The ‘Faraday’, of 5000 tons register, was built at Newcastle by the eminent firm of Messrs. Mitchell and Co. She is 360 feet long, 52 feet beam, and 36 feet depth of hold; there are three large watertight cable tanks having a capacity of 110,000 cubic feet; these are each 27 feet deep; two are 45 feet in diameter, and one is 37 feet; they can take in 1700 miles of cable 1¼ inch in diameter. After the cable is coiled in, the tanks are filled up with water to keep it cool; for the speaker had found, when conducting experiments on the Malta and Alexandria cable with his electrical resistance thermometer, that heat was spontaneously generated in the cable itself, whereby its insulation was seriously endangered.

The ‘Faraday’ has stem and stern alike, and is fitted with a rudder at each end; both are worked by steam-steering apparatus placed amidships, and are capable of being rigidly fixed when required. She is propelled by a pair of cast-steel screw propellers 12 feet in diameter, driven by a pair of compound engines constructed with a view to great economy of fuel. The two screws converge somewhat, and the effect of this arrangement is to enable the vessel to turn in her own length when the engines are worked in opposite directions. On the voyage from Newcastle to London a cask was thrown overboard, and from this as a centre the ship turned in her own length in 8 minutes 20 seconds, touching the cask three times during the operation. This manoeuvring power is of great importance in such a case as repairing a fault in the cable, as it enables the engineer to keep her head in position, and, in short, to place her just where necessary, in defiance of side winds or currents.

The testing-room of the electrician in charge is amidships, and so placed as to command the two larger tanks, while the ship’s speed can be at all times noted on the index of a Berthon hydrostatic log.

The deck is fitted with machinery to be used in laying operations, which will be best described by tracing the path of the cable from the tanks to the sea. Let us begin with the bow compartment: the cable, which lies coiled round one of Newall’s cones, begins to be unwound, passes up through an eye carried on a beam placed across the hatch, next over a large pulley fitted with guides, and by a second pulley is gently made to follow a straight wooden trough fitted with friction rollers, which carries it aft to near the funnels; here it passes through the “jockey,” which is a device for regulating the strain, consisting of a wheel riding on the cable, which can be adjusted by a lever, and a drum fitted with a brake. Thence it passes on to a “compound paying-out and picking-up machine,” which consists of a large drum provided with a friction brake, and round it the cable passes three times; it is also furnished with a steam-engine, which by means of a clutch can be geared on to the drum when required. Now, in paying out, the cable causes the drum to revolve as it runs over it, and the brakes regulate the speed as the vessel moves onward; but should a fault or other accident render it necessary to recover a portion, the drum is stopped and geared on to the engine, the ship’s engines are reversed, the stern rudder fixed; and so what was formerly the bow is now the stern, while the little engine hauls in the cable over the same drum which before was used to pay it out; thus it is coiled back into the same tank whence it started. By this means the necessity of passing the cable astern before proceeding to haul it in is avoided. It was during this operation that an accident befell the Atlantic cable in 1865, causing its loss for the time.

The next apparatus is a dynamometer, consisting of three pulleys, one fixed, and the centre one, which rests on the cable, movable in a vertical plane; by this the strain is registered and adjusted. After passing this the cable runs into the sea over a pulley carried on girders and constructed so as to swing freely on an axis parallel to the length of the ship, so that, should the vessel make lee-way, the pulley will follow the direction of the cable, and thus friction and sharp bends are avoided. The bows are also fitted with a similar pulley, compound machine, and dynamometer. We see that by these devices the cable is kept perfectly under control, and should a fault be discovered a simple process of reversal of ship and machinery brings home the faulty portion.

Another great point is to keep the vessel trimmed and steady. For the former requirement nine separate water-tight compartments, including the cone in each tank, which also is hollow, are provided, so that water may be admitted as the tanks are emptied of cable, and thus the ship is kept trimmed. To ensure steadiness and avoid the rolling to which telegraph ships are subject, two bilge keels are set on at an angle of 45 deg; this was done at the suggestion of Mr. Wm. Froude, whom, said the speaker, “I have to thank for valuable advice and assistance on several new points connected with the ‘Faraday.’”

A steam-launch is carried on deck, whence she can be lowered into the water with steam up, ready to land shore ends and perform other useful operations.

Another class of work for which the vessel is fitted is “grappling” for lost or faulty cable. In shallow seas this is a very simple operation, but in deep water it is rather a delicate matter, and requires the co-operation of two or even three vessels, so as to lift the cable without forming an acute angle, and thus to lessen the chance of fracture. A special rope, made of steel wire and hemp and of great strength, is provided for this work. Some specimens shown could bear strains up to 16 tons.

In conclusion, the speaker adverted to the late Professor Faraday, noticing the great services he had rendered to electrical science, his singleness of purpose, and the invariable kindness with which he had encouraged younger labourers in the same field. The friendly encouragement which he himself had experienced from him would ever remain a most pleasing remembrance. He had seized with delight on the present opportunity to pay a tribute to the honoured name of Faraday, and was happy to be able to do this with the full consent of the revered lady who had stood by the philosopher’s side for forty years, while labouring under this very roof for the advancement of knowledge. The name of the vessel and her mission in the service of Science would combine, he thought, to create an interest in her favour in the minds of the members of the Royal Institution, and he hoped that on the morrow she would put to sea accompanied by the earnest wish, “God speed the ‘Faraday.’”

[C.W.S.]

[Excerpt from The Journal of the Royal Institution of Great Britain, Vol VII, 1874, pp. 310-313. Text courtesy of Special Collections, Smithsonian Institution Libraries.]

See also Henry Ash's pencil sketches made on Faraday expeditions from 1879 to 1900, and the Cable Stories page on James Joseph Cope's service on Faraday between 1910 and 1921.

Photographs and details of a model of the Faraday, made by Mr Daniel Aldous, an electrical mechanic who served on the ship in the late 1800s, may be viewed at the website of the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, Australia.

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