Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals Volume II Part 21

While many of those upon whom he had looked as friends turned against him in the mad scramble for power and wealth engendered by the extension of the telegraph lines, it is gratifying to turn to those who remained true to him through all, and among these none was more loyal than Alfred Vail.

Their correspondence, which was voluminous, is always characterized by the deepest confidence and affection. In a long letter of March 24, Vail shows his solicitude for Morse's peace of mind: "I think I would not be bothered with a directors.h.i.+p in the New York and Buffalo line, nor in any other. I should wish to keep clear of them. It will only tend to hara.s.s and vex when you should be left quiet and undisturbed to pursue your improvements and the enjoyment of what is most gratifying to you."

And Morse, writing to Vail somewhat later in this same year, exclaims: "You say you hope I shall not forget that we have spent many hours together. You might have added 'happy hours.' I have tried you, dear Vail, as a friend, and think I know you as a zealous and honest one."

Still earlier, on March 18, 1845, in one of his reports to the Postmaster-General, Cave Johnson, he adds: "In regard to the salary of the 'one clerk at Was.h.i.+ngton--$1200,' Mr. Vail, who would from the necessity of the case take that post, is my right-hand man in the whole enterprise. He has been with me from the year 1837, and is as familiar with all the mechanism and scientific arrangements of the Telegraph as I am myself.... His time and talent are more essential to the success of the Telegraph than [those of] any two persons that could be named."

Returning now to the letters to his brother Sidney, I shall give the following extracts:--

"_March 29, 1847._ I am now in New York permanently; that is I have no longer any official connection with Was.h.i.+ngton, and am thinking of _fixing_ somewhere so soon as I can get my telegraphic matters into such a state as to warrant it; but my patience is still much tried. Although the enterprise looks well and is prospering, yet somehow I do not command the cash as some business men would if they were in the same situation.

The property is doubtless good and is increasing, but I cannot use it as I could the money, for, while everybody seems to think I have the wealth of John Jacob, the only sum I have actually realized is my first dividend on one line, about fourteen hundred dollars, and with this I cannot purchase a house. But time will, perhaps, enable me to do so, if it is well that I should have one.... I have had some pretty threatening obstacles, but they as yet are summer clouds which seem to be dissipating through the smiles of our Heavenly Father. House's affair I think is dead. I believe it has been held up by speculators to drive a better bargain with me, thinking to scare me; but they don't find me so easily frightened. In Virginia I had to oppose a most bigoted, narrow, illiberal clique in a railroad company, which had the address to get a bill through the House of Delegates giving them actually the monopoly of telegraphs, and ventured to halloo before they were out of the woods. Mr. Kendall went post-haste to Richmond, met the bill and its supporters before the Committee of the Senate, and, after a sharp contest, procured its rejection in the Senate, and the adoption, by a vote of 13 to 7, of a subst.i.tute granting me _right of way_ and _corporate powers_, which bill, after violent opposition in the House, was finally pa.s.sed, 44 to 27. So a mean intrigue was defeated most signally, and I came off triumphant."

"_April 27._ This you will recognize by the date is my birthday; 36 years old. Only think, I shall never be 26 again. Don't you wish you were as young as I am? Well, if _feelings_ determined age I should be in reality what I have above stated, but that leaf in the family Bible, those boys and that daughter, those nieces and nephews of younger brothers, and especially that _grandson_, they all concur in putting twenty years more to those 36. I cannot get them off; there they are 56!...

"There is an underhand intrigue against my telegraph interests in Virginia, fostered by a friend turned enemy in the hope to better his own interests, a man whom I have ever treated as a friend while I had the governmental patronage to bestow, and gave him office in Baltimore.

Having no more of patronage to give I have no more friends.h.i.+p from him.

Mr. R. has proved himself false, notwithstanding his naming his son after me as a proof of friends.h.i.+p."

The Mr. R. referred to was Henry J. Rogers, and, writing of him to Vail on April 26, Morse says: "I am truly grieved at Rogers's conduct. He must be conscious of doing great injustice; for a man that has wronged another is sure to invent some cause for his act if there has been none given. In this case he endeavors to excuse his selfish and injurious acts by the false a.s.sertion that 'I had cast him overboard.' Why, what does he mean?

Was I not overboard myself? Does he or anyone else suppose I have nothing else to do than to find them places, and not only intercede for them, which in Rogers's case and Zantziger's I have constantly and perseveringly done to the present hour, but I am bound to force the companies, over which I have no control, to take them at any rate, on the penalty of being traduced and injured by them if they do not get the office they seek? As to Rogers, you know my feelings towards him and his.

I had received him as a _friend_, not as a mere employee, and let no opportunity pa.s.s without urging forward his interests. I recollected his naming his son for me, and had determined, if the wealth actually came which has been predicted to me, that that child should be remembered."

Always desirous of being just and merciful, Morse writes to Vail on May 1: "Rogers is here. I have had a good deal of conversation with him, and the result is that I think that some circ.u.mstances which seemed to inculpate him are explicable on other grounds than intention to injure us."

But he was finally forced to give him up, for on August 7 he writes: "You cannot tell how pained I am at being compelled to change my opinion of R.

Your feelings correspond entirely with my own. I was hoping to do something gratifying to him and his family, and soon should have done it if he would permit it; but no! The mask of friends.h.i.+p covered a deep selfishness that scrupled not to sacrifice a real friends.h.i.+p to a shortsighted and overreaching ambition. Let him go. I wished to befriend him and his, and would have done so from the heart, but as he cannot trust me I have enough who can and do."

The case of Rogers was typical, and I have, therefore, given it in some detail. It was always a source of grief to Morse when men, whom in his large-hearted way he had admitted to his intimacy, turned against him; and he was called upon to suffer many such blows. He has been accused of having quarrelled with all his a.s.sociates. This, of course, is not true, for we have only to name Vail, and Gale, and Kendall, and Reid, and a host of others to prove the contrary. But, like all men who have achieved great things, he made bitter enemies, some of whom at first professed sincere friends.h.i.+p for him and were implicitly trusted by him. However, a dispa.s.sionate study of all the circ.u.mstances leading up to the rupture of these friendly ties will prove that, in practically every case he was sinned against, not sinning.

A letter to James D. Reid, written on December 21, will show that the quality of his mercy was not strained: "You may recollect when I met you in Philadelphia, on the unpleasant business of attending in a court to witness the contest of two parties for their rights, you informed me of the dest.i.tute condition of O'Reilly's family. At that moment I was led to believe, from consultation with the counsel for the Patentees, that the case would undoubtedly go in their (the Patentees') favor. Your statement touched me, and I could not bear to think that an innocent wife and inoffensive children should suffer, even from the wrong-doing of their proper protector, should this prove to be the case. You remember I authorized you to draw on me for twenty dollars to be remitted to Mr.

O'Reilly's family, and to keep the source from whence it was derived secret. My object in writing is to ask if this was done, and, in case it was, to request you to draw on me for that amount."

In an earlier letter to his brother he remarks philosophically: "Smith is Smith yet and so likely to be, but I have become used to him and you would be surprised to find how well oil and water appear to agree. There must be crosses and the aim should be rather to bear them gracefully, graciously, and patiently, than to have them removed."

While thus hara.s.sed on all sides by those who would filch from him his good name as well as his purse, his reward was coming to him for the patience and equanimity with which he was bearing his crosses. The longing for a home of his own had been intense all through his life and now, in the evening of his years, this dream was to be realized. He thus announces to his brother the glorious news:--

POUGHKEEPSIE, NORTH RIVER, July 30, 1847.

In my last I wrote you that I had been looking out for a farm in this region, and gave you a diagram of a place which I fancied. Since then I was informed of a place for sale south of this village 2 miles, on the bank of the river, part of the old Livingston Manor, and far superior. _I have this day concluded a bargain for it._ There are about one hundred acres. I pay for it $17,500.

I am almost afraid to tell you of its beauties and advantages. It is just such a place as in England could not be purchased for double the number of pounds sterling. Its "capabilities," as the landscape gardeners would say, are unequalled. There is every variety of surface, plain, hill, dale, glens, running streams and fine forest, and every variety of different prospect; the Fishkill Mountains towards the south and the Catskills towards the north; the Hudson with its varieties of river craft, steamboats of all kinds, sloops, etc., constantly showing a varied scene.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HOUSE AT LOCUST GROVE, POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y.]

I will not enlarge. I am congratulated by all in having made an excellent purchase, and I find a most delightful neighborhood. Within a few miles around, approached by excellent roads, are Mr. Lenox, General Talmadge, Philip Van Rensselaer, etc., on one side; on the other, Harry Livingston, Mrs. Smith Thomson (Judge Thomson's widow, and sister to the first Mrs.

Arthur Breese), Mr. Crosby, Mr. Boorman, etc., etc. The new railroad will run at the foot of the grounds (probably) on the river, and bring New York within two hours of us. There is every faculty for residence--good markets, churches, schools. Take it all in all I think it just the place _for us all_. If you should fancy a spot on it for building, I can accommodate you, and Richard wants twenty acres reserved for him.

Singularly enough this was the very spot where Uncle Arthur found his wife. The old trees are pointed out where he and she used to ramble during their courts.h.i.+p.

On September 12, after again expatiating on the beauties and advantages of his home, he adds: "I have some clouds and mutterings of thunder on the horizon (the necessary attendants, I suppose, of a lightning project) which I trust will give no more of storm than will suffice, under Him who directs the elements, to clear the air and make a serener and calmer sunset."

On October 12, he announces the name which he has given to his country place, and a singular coincidence:--

"_Locust Grove._ You see by the date where I am. Locust Grove, it seems, was the original name given to this place by Judge Livingston, and, without knowing this fact, I had given the same name to it, so that there is a natural appropriateness in the designation of my home. The wind is howling mournfully this evening, a second edition, I fear, of the late destructive equinoctial, but, dreary as it is out-of-doors, I have comfortable quarters within."

In the world of affairs the wind was howling, too, and the storm was gathering which culminated in the series of lawsuits brought by Morse and his a.s.sociates against the infringers on his patents. The letters to his brother are full of the details of these piratical attacks, but throughout all the turmoil he maintained his poise and his faith in the triumph of justice and truth. In the letter just quoted from he says: "These matters do not annoy me as formerly. I have seen so many dark storms which threatened, and particularly in relation to the Telegraph, and I have seen them so often hushed at the 'Peace, be still' of our covenant G.o.d, that now the fears and anxieties on any fresh gathering soon subside into perfect calm."

And on November 27, he writes: "The most annoying part of the matter to me is that, notwithstanding my matters are all in the hands of agents and I have nothing to do with any of the arrangements, I am held up by name to the odium of the public. Lawsuits are commenced against them at Cincinnati and will be in Indiana and Illinois as well as here, and so, notwithstanding all my efforts to get along peaceably, I find the fate of Whitney before me. I think I may be able to secure my farm, and so have a place to retire to for the evening of my days, but even this may be denied me. A few months will decide.... You have before you the fate of an inventor, and, take as much pains as you will to secure to yourself your valuable invention, make up your mind from my experience now, in addition to others, that you will be robbed of it and abused into the bargain. This is the lot of a successful inventor or discoverer, and no precaution, I believe, will save him from it. He will meet with a mixed estimate; the enlightened, the liberal, the good, will applaud him and respect him; the sordid, the unprincipled will hate him and detract from his reputation to compa.s.s their own contemptible and selfish ends."

While events in the business world were rapidly converging towards the great lawsuits which should either confirm the inventor's rights to the offspring of his brain, or deprive him of all the benefits to which he was justly and morally ent.i.tled, he continued to find solace from all his cares and anxieties in his new home, with his children and friends around him. He touches on the lights and shadows in a letter to his brother, who was still in England, dated New York, April 19, 1848:--

"I s.n.a.t.c.h a moment by the Was.h.i.+ngton, which goes to-morrow, to redeem my character in not having written of late so often as I could wish. I have been so constantly under the necessity of watching the movements of the most unprincipled set of pirates I have ever known, that all my time has been occupied in defense, in putting evidence into something like legal shape that I am the inventor of the Electro-Magnetic Telegraph!! Would you have believed it ten years ago that a question could be raised on that subject? Yet this very morning in the 'Journal of Commerce' is an article from a New Orleans paper giving an account of a public meeting convened by O'Reilly, at which he boldly stated that I had '_pirated my invention from a German invention_' a great deal better than mine. And the 'Journal of Commerce' has a sort of halfway defense of me which implies there is some doubt on the subject. I have written a note which may appear in to-morrow's 'Journal,' quite short, but which I think, will stop that game here.

"A trial in court is the only event now which will put public opinion right, so indefatigable have these unprincipled men been in manufacturing a spurious public opinion.

"Although these events embarra.s.s me, and I do not receive, and may not receive, my rightful dues, yet I have been so favored by a kind Providence as to have sufficient collected to free my farm from mortgage on the 1st of May, and so find a home, a beautiful home, for me and mine, unenc.u.mbered, and sufficient over to make some improvements....

"I do not wish to raise too many expectations, but every day I am more and more charmed with my purchase. I can truly say I have never before so completely realized my wishes in regard to situation, never before found so many pleasant circ.u.mstances a.s.sociated together to make a home agreeable, and, so far as earth is concerned, I only wish now to have you and the rest of the family partic.i.p.ate in the advantages with which a kind G.o.d has been pleased to indulge me.

"Strange, indeed, would it be if clouds were not in the sky, but the Sun of Righteousness will dissipate as many and as much of them as shall be right and good, and this is all that should be required. I look not for freedom from trials; they must needs be; but the number, the kind, the form, the degree of them, I can safely leave to Him who has ordered and will still order all things well."

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

JANUARY 9, 1848--DECEMBER 19, 1849

Preparation for lawsuits.--Letter from Colonel Shaffner.--Morse's reply deprecating bloodshed.--Shaffner allays his fears.--Morse attends his son's wedding at Utica.--His own second marriage.--First of great lawsuits.--Almost all suits in Morse's favor.--Decision of Supreme Court of United States.--Extract from an earlier opinion.--Alfred Vail leaves the telegraph business.--Remarks on this by James D. Reid.--Morse receives decoration from Sultan of Turkey.--Letter to organizers of Printers' Festival.--Letter concerning aviation.--Optimistic letter from Mr. Kendall.--Humorous letter from George Wood.--Thomas R. Walker.-- Letter to Fenimore Cooper.--Dr. Jackson again.--Unfairness of the press.

--Letter from Charles C. Ingham on art matters.--Letter from George Vail.--F.O.J. Smith continues to embarra.s.s.--Letter from Morse to Smith.

The year 1848 was a momentous one to Morse in more ways than one. The first of the historic lawsuits was to be begun at Frankfort, Kentucky,-- lawsuits which were not only to establish this inventor's claims, but were to be used as a precedent in all future patent litigation. In his peaceful retreat on the banks of the Hudson he carefully and systematically prepared the evidence which should confound his enemies, and calmly awaited the verdict, firm in his faith that, however lowering the clouds, the sun would yet break through. Finding relaxation from his cares and worries in the problems of his farm, he devoted every spare moment to the life out-of-doors, and drank in new strength and inspiration with every breath of the pure country air. Although soon to pa.s.s the fifty-seventh milestone, his sane, temperate habits had kept him young in heart and vigorous in body, and in this same year he was to be rewarded for his long and lonely vigil during the dark decades of his middle life, and to enter upon an Indian Summer of happy family life.

While spending as much time as possible at his beloved Locust Grove, he was yet compelled, in the interests of his approaching legal contests, to consult with his lawyers in New York and Was.h.i.+ngton, and it was while in the latter city that he received a letter from Colonel Tal. P. Shaffner, one of the most energetic of the telegraph pioneers, and a devoted, if sometimes injudicious, friend. It was he who, more than any one else, was responsible for the publication of Morse's "Defense" against Professor Henry.

The letter was written from Louisville on January 9, 1848, and contains the following sentences: "We are going ahead with the line to New Orleans. I have twenty-five hands on the road to Nashville, and will put on more next week. I have ten on the road to Frankfort, and my a.s.sociate has gangs at other parts. O'Reilly has fifteen hands on the Nashville route and I confidently expect a few fights. My men are well armed and I think they can do their duty. I shall be with them when the parties get together, and, if anything does occur, the use of Dupont's best will be appreciated by me. This is to be lamented, but, if it comes, we shall not back out."

Deeply exercised, Morse answers him post-haste: "It gives me real pain to learn that there is any prospect of physical collision between the O'Reilly party and ours, and I trust that this may arrive in time to prevent any movement of those friendly to me which shall provoke so sad a result. I emphatically say that, if _the law_ cannot protect me and my rights in your region, I shall never sanction the appeal to force to sustain myself, however conscious of being in the right. I infinitely prefer to suffer still more from the gross injustice of unprincipled men than to gain my rights by a single illegal step.... I hope you will do all in your power to prevent collision. If the parties meet in putting up posts or wires, let our opponents have their way unmolested. I have no patent for putting up posts or wires. They as well as we have a right to put them up. It is the use made of them afterwards which may require legal adjustment. The men employed by each party are not to blame. Let no ill-feeling be fomented between the two, no rivalry but that of doing their work the best; let friendly feeling as between them be cherished, and teach them to refer all disputes to the princ.i.p.als. I wish no one to fight for me physically. He may 'speak daggers but use none.' However much I might appreciate his friends.h.i.+p and his motive, it would give me the deepest sorrow if I should learn that a single individual, friend or foe, has been injured in life or limb by any professing friends.h.i.+p for me."

He was rea.s.sured by the following from Colonel Shaffner:--

_"January 27._ Your favor of the 21st was received yesterday. I was sorry that you allowed your feelings to be so much aroused in the case of contemplated difficulties between our hands and those of O'Reilly. They held out the threats that we should not pa.s.s them, and we were determined to do it. I had them notified that we were prepared to meet them under any circ.u.mstances. We were prepared to have a real 'hug,' but, when our hands overtook them, they only 'yelled' a little and mine followed, and for fifteen miles they were side by side, and when a man finished his hole, he ran with all his might to get ahead. But finally, on the 24th, we pa.s.sed them about eighty miles from here, and now we are about twenty-five miles ahead of them without the loss of a drop of blood, and we shall be able to beat them to Nashville, if we can get the wire in time, which is doubtful."

There were many such stirring incidents in the early history of the telegraph, and the half of them has not been told, thus leaving much material for the future historian.

But, while so much that was exciting was taking place in the outside world, the cause of it all was turning his thoughts towards matters more domestic. On June 13, he writes to his brother: "Charles left me for Utica last evening, and Finley and I go this evening to be present at his marriage on Thursday the 15th."

It was at his son's wedding that he was again strongly attracted to his young second cousin (or, to be more exact, his first cousin once removed), the first cousin of his son's bride, and the result is announced to his brother in a letter of August 7: "Before your return I shall be again married. I leave to-morrow for Utica where cousin (second cousin) Sarah Elizabeth Griswold now is. On Thursday morning the 10th we shall (G.o.d willing) be married, and I shall immediately proceed to Louisville and Frankfort in Kentucky to be present at my first suit against O'Reilly, the pirate of my invention. It comes off on the 23d inst. So far as the justice of the case is concerned I am confident of final success, but there are so many crooks in the law that I ought to be prepared for disappointment."

Continuing, he tells his brother that he has been secretly in love with his future wife for some years: "But, reflecting on it, I found I was in no situation to indulge in any plans of marrying. She had nothing, I had nothing, and the more I loved her the more I was determined to stifle my feelings without hinting to her anything of the matter, or letting her know that I was at all interested in her."