About.com 19th Century History

Coded Message Sent to Thomas Jefferson Finally Cracked

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 15:39:06 +0000

A coded message sent to President Thomas Jefferson in 1801 as a challenge between friends has finally been cracked by a scientist using educated guesses and a bit of computing power.

The message was sent to Jefferson by Robert Patterson, a mathematics professor in Philadelphia. The two men shared a keen interest in codes and ciphers, and Patterson's message, in a code he had devised, was never deciphered by Jefferson.

Patterson deemed his new code nearly flawless, but a mathematician at Princeton eventually found a way to read what Patterson wrote to his friend. And the message, it turns out, was a passage that Jefferson, along with most history lovers, would have recognized.

Image: Thomas Jefferson/courtesy Library of Congress

Lincoln Preserved the Wilderness

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:43:57 +0000

On June 30, 1864, President Abraham Lincoln signed a piece of legislation that may have seemed trifling, especially against the backdrop of the Civil War. But by signing the Yosemite Valley Grant Act, Lincoln protected the magnificent wilderness that is Yosemite National Park.

The 1864 law is considered the first legislation designed to protect a wilderness area in the United States and it eventually led to the creation of the National Parks. The example was also followed by other countries, and resulted in wilderness preserves around the world.

Having spent most of last week in Yosemite, I'm deeply appreciative of Lincoln taking the time, 145 years ago today, to sign the legislation that helped begin the conservation movement.

Photograph: Abraham Lincoln by Alexander Gardner, November 1863/courtesy Library of Congress

Frederick Douglass and the Fourth of July

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 09:55:13 +0000

The American abolitionist Frederick Douglass rose to national prominence after publishing his autobiography in 1845, but perhaps his greatest single short piece of writing was a speech he delivered on July 5, 1852.

Douglass, who was living in Rochester, New York at the time, participated in a local program commemorating the signing of the Declaration of Independence. He delivered an address titled "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?," a sharp commentary on the promise of freedom in America and how it was being withheld from African Americans.

Historian David Blight, an expert on slave narratives and Douglass, has called the July 5, 1852 speech "abolition's rhetorical masterpiece."

Incidentally, the date of the speech was purposeful. Douglass insisted on not speaking on July 4.

Image: Frederick Douglass, courtesy of New York Public Library Digital Collections

Sad Footnote to Darwin's Voyage on HMS Beagle

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 15:26:08 +0000

The State Library of New South Wales, Australia, has just paid $200,000 (about $160,00 US) at a London auction for the journal of Pringle Stokes, a captain of the Royal Navy who committed suicide in 1828.

The unfortunate Capt. Stokes died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds off the coast of Patagonia while commanding HMS Beagle, which was exploring the South American coast. The loss of the captain, which was attributed to melancholy of the long voyage, enabled Lt. Robert FitzRoy to take command of the ship.

FitzRoy would later invite a young naturalist, Charles Darwin, to sail aboard the Beagle on its next voyage.

The ostensible reason Darwin was invited along was so that he could hold intelligent conversations with the captain, thereby lessening the sense of isolation. Darwin did wind up becoming friends with FitzRoy, and of course his research during the voyage formed a foundation for his later work.

The journal of Capt. Stokes will be displayed at the library's Darwin Down Under exhibition.

Newspapers From the 19th Century

Wed, 24 Jun 2009 06:00:43 +0000

The British Library has been working on a commendable project to digitize a vast archive of 19th century newspapers, and a web site for the project has received some glowing news coverage.

Some of the material available requires a subscription, but a lot of material can be accessed for free. I tested the search function, and was able to read, for free, some articles about the newly constructed Brooklyn Bridge in The Graphic, a London newspaper of the late 1800s.

Another great source for 19th century news is the archives of the New York Times. Entering queries at the archive search page brings up some wonderful old stories, and articles from 1851 to the end of the 19th century are available for free.

The US Library of Congress has also been working on an enormous newspaper archive project, and recently announced that its millionth page has been posted.

Custer's Last Stand

Fri, 19 Jun 2009 06:00:45 +0000

George Armstrong Custer, a soldier who'd become famous leading cavalry charges in the Civil War, was searching for Indians on the frontier in late June 1876. He found them.

In the blazing summer heat Custer's scouts spotted a large Indian village. Custer decided to attack, using daring, if not reckless, tactics he'd employed successfully years earlier.

The outcome, of course, became a legend. The loss of Custer and the entire Seventh Cavalry shocked the nation. And images of Custer and his final fight became icons that held influence for decades.

Image: Illustration of Custer fighting to the end/courtesy of New York Public Library Digital Collections

The Statue of Liberty

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 11:37:06 +0000

The crown of the Statue of Liberty will be reopened to the public on July 4th, and people are clamoring to reserve tickets to climb the spiral staircase inside the enormous sculpture in New York harbor.

In 1865 a French writer first came up with the idea of a statue celebrating liberty which would be a gift from France to the United States. And a French sculptor stubbornly pushed the idea, visiting America, selecting the perfect site, and then spending years raising money and building the statue in a workshop in Paris.

The Statue of Liberty was like nothing anyone had ever seen. And by the time it rose above Bedloe's Island in New York in 1886, it was already a legend. Vintage images of the statue's construction tell the story.

Photo: Torch of the Statue of Liberty at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibit, 1876/courtesy Library of Congress

Federal Authorities Tackle 19th Century Murder Mystery

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 23:12:58 +0000

The US government is stepping into a murder case from the 1800s in which a cavalry trooper, one of the fabled African-American "Buffalo Soldiers" serving at a western outpost, died from an axe wound inflicted by another soldier.

The story is related to a long-abandoned military cemetery that was discovered a few years ago near a historic site, Fort Craig in New Mexico. The bodies of soldiers buried near the fort were exhumed and reburied at a veteran's cemetery, and as part of the project the authorities tried to identify individual soldiers.

The skeleton of one soldier bore distinctive wounds, and Army records showed that he must be Private Levi Morris, who died in 1877 after being attacked by another soldier. As he was dying, Morris told those tending his wounds the name of a relative he had in Akron, Ohio.

The government's efforts at finding a living relative of the long-dead soldier extended to placing classified ads in the Akron newspaper in late May. And the Akron Beacon-Journal has been doing its own research, and has published an article about the unusual, and fascinating, case.

Isambard Kingdom Brunel's Great Steamships

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 12:00:12 +0000

The brilliant British engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel was lured to the sea, or specifically to the challenge of designing steamships that could cross the treacherous North Atlantic. Beginning in the late 1830s, he designed a series of three ships, each an innovative marvel, and yet each saddled with serious problems.

Having learned bitter lessons from his first two steamships, the Great Western and the Great Britain, Brunel turned his back to the Atlantic. But then he came up with the idea of building the greatest ship afloat, which he dubbed the Great Eastern.

Brunel's third ship was made of iron, and was more than twice as long as anything else afloat. Everything about the Great Eastern was enormous, including the stress it inflicted on its designer. Brunel suffered a fatal stroke before the ship began service, and for decades the sad history of the Great Eastern was both an inspiration and a warning to shipbuilders.

Image: The Arrival of the Great Eastern in New York City/Courtesy New York Public Library Digital Collections

State Cashes In on Confederate Money

Thu, 04 Jun 2009 23:10:18 +0000

Archivists for the state of South Carolina have been raising money in these tough economic times by selling off cash. It turns out that boxes of new bills issued during the Civil War turned up in storage boxes, and the Confederate bills are being sold on Ebay.

So far the state has made about $200,000 by selling the old money, which, of course, had been declared worthless at the end of the Civil War. The Confederate states were supposed to destroy all their currency, and they did. But somehow about 40 boxes of South Carolina bills were stashed in a statehouse basement, discovered decades ago, and moved to the state archives.

A retired professor now has the job of going through the stacks of bills and picking out those to be auctioned off. So far he's only gotten through one of the 40 boxes. So the proceeds from the currency auctions, which is being used to buy much-needed equipment for state archivists, will probably continue for quite some time.