346 HENRY AND THE TELEGRAPH. 



deductions di'aTvn from the deposition of Prof. Josepli Henry (in tlie several telegraph 

 suits), with a critical review of said deposition, and an examination of Professor Hen- 

 ry's alleged iliscoveries bearing upon the electro-magnetic telegraph.' The first thing 

 ■which strikes the reader of this article is, that its title is a misnomer. It is simply an 

 assault upon Professor Henry ; an attemiit to disparage his character ; to deprive him 

 of his honors as a scientific discoverer ; to impeach his credibility as a witness, and his 

 integrity as a man. It is a disingenuous piece of sophistical argument, such as an un- 

 scrupulous advocate might employ to pervert the truth, misrepresent the facts, and 

 misinterpret the language in which the facts belonging to the other side of the case 

 are stated. 



"Mr. Morse charges that the deposition of Professor Henry 'contains imputations 

 against his (IMorse's) personal character,' which it does not, and assumes it as a duty ' to 

 expose the utter non-reliability of Professor Henry's testimony;' that testimony being 

 supported by the most competent authorities, and by the history of scientific discov- 

 ery. He asserts that he 'is not indebted to him [Professor Henry] for any discovery 

 in science bearing on the telegraph,' ho having himself acknowledged such indebted- 

 ness in the most unequivocal manner, and the fact being independently substantiated 

 by the testimony of Sears C. Walker, and the statement of Mr. Morse's own associate, 

 Dr. L. D. Gale. Mr. Morse further maintains that all discoveries bearing upon the tele- 

 graph were made not by Professor Henry, but by others, and ^irior to any experimenta 

 of Professor Henry in the science of electro-magnetism ; contradicting in this i^roposi- 

 tion the facts in the history of scientific discovery perfectly established and recognized 

 throughout the scientific world. 



"The essence of the charges against Professor Henry is, that he gave false testimony 

 in his deposition in the telegraph cases, and that he has claimed the credit of discov- 

 eries in the sciences bearing upon the electro-magnetic telegraj)h which were made by 

 previous investigators; in other words, that he has falsely claimed what does not be- 

 long to him, but does belong to others. . . . Your committee do not conceive it to 

 be necessary to follow Mr. Morse through all the details of his elaborate attack. For- 

 tunately, a x>lain statement of a few leading facts will be sutficient to place the essen- 

 tial points of the case in a clear light." . . . 



[After a review of the evidences furnished (unnecessary to be here reproduced), the 

 rejiort proceeds :] 



"It thus appears, both from Mr. Morse's own admission down to 1848, and from the 

 testimony of others most familiar with the facts, that Professor Henry discovered the 

 law, or 'principle,' as Mr. Morse designates it, which was necessary to make the prac- 

 tical working of the electro-magnetic telegraph at considerable distances possible ; that 

 Mr. Morse was first informed of this discovery by Dr. Gale; that he availed himself of 

 it at once, and that it never occiured to Mr. Morse to deny this fact until after 1848. 

 He had steadily and fully acknowledged the merits and genius of Mr. Henry, as the 

 discoverer of facts and laws in science of the highest imj)ortance in the success of his 

 long-cherished invention of a magnetic telegraph. Mr. Henry was the discoverer of a 

 principle, Mr. Morse was the inventor of a machine, the object of which was to record 

 characters at a dist<aiice, to convey intelligence; in other words to carry into execu- 

 tion the idea of an electric telegraph. But there were obstacles in the way which he 

 could not overcome until he learned the discoveries of Professor Henry, and applied 

 them to his machine. These facts are undeniable. They constitute a part of the his- 

 tory of science and invention. They were true in 1848, they were equally true in 1855, 

 when Professor Morse's article was published. . . . 



"What changed Mi*. Morse's opinion of Professor Henry, not only as a scientific in- 

 vestigator, but as a man of integrity, after the admissions of his indebtedness to his 

 researches, and the oft-rej)eated expressions of warm jjersonal regard ? It appears 

 that Mr. Morse was involved in a number of lawsuits, growing out of contested claims 

 to the right of using electricity for telegraphic purposes. The circumstances under 

 which Professor Henry, as a well-known investigator in this department of physics, 

 was summoned by one of the parties to testify have akeady been stated. The testi- 



