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Joseph Henry's Letter to Alexander Bache (August 21, 1864)

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Summary

Letter from Joseph Henry, first Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, to his close friend Alexander Bache, a physicist, head of the United States Coast Survey, and Smithsonian Institution Regent, August 21, 1864. In the letter, Henry describes a telegraph experiment carried out by himself and members of the War Department. The communications technique was tested for use by the Union Army during the Civil War. Henry states that he would later be demonstrating the technique for President Abraham Lincoln. Henry served as a scientific advisor to Lincoln during the war.

Subject

  • Bache, A. D (Alexander Dallas) 1806-1867
  • Lincoln, Abraham 1809-1865
  • Regents Smithsonian Institution
  • Board of Regents
  • United States Coast Survey
  • United States War Dept

Category

Historic Images of the Smithsonian

Notes

The accompanying PDF contains SIA2012-0019, SIA2012-0020, SIA2012-0021, and SIA2012-0022, which are pages scanned from the edited transcript of the original version and notes in the Joseph Henry Papers Volume 10, pages 403-406 (Document 224).

Contained within

  • Smithsonian Institution Archives, Record Unit 7053, Box 4, Folder: 9 - Incoming Correspondence 1821-1866
  • Rothenberg, Marc, et al, eds., The Papers of Joseph Henry, Volume 10, The Smithsonian Years: January 1858-December 1865 (Smithsonian Institution in association with Science History Publications/USA, 2004), 403-406

Contact information

Institutional History Division, Smithsonian Archives, 600 Maryland Avenue, SW, Washington, D.C. 20024-2520, SIHistory@si.edu

Date

  • August 21, 1864
  • Civil War, 1861-1865

Restrictions & Rights

No restrictions

Topic

  • Signals and signaling
  • Telegraph
  • Secretaries
  • Letters
  • Communications
  • Communications, Military
  • Physicists
  • History
  • Experiments

Place

United States

Form/Genre

  • Document
  • Paper

ID Number

SIA2012-1972 and SIA2012-1973 and SIA2012-1974 and SIA2012-1975 and SIA2012-1976 and SIA2012-1977

Physical description

Number of Images: 6 ; Color: Color ; Size: 5w x 8h ; Type of Image: Document ; Medium: Paper

Full Record

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