3-017-190 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Atlantic Telegraph Expedition: the second buoy, marking the exact place where the cable was grappled, Aug. 8, 1865. 'Our Special Artist has furnished sketches of the two buoys, one launched on the 4th, and the other on the 8th of August...These two buoys are about ten miles apart...The [second] buoy was moored on the 8th of August, and marks the spot where the wire hawser used for the grapnel broke on the second occasion of the attempt at grappling the cable. As the buoy first put down had been found to sink low in the water, though based upon three tiers of timber logs, on the occasion of launching the second buoy, the raft was made larger; and four barrels, securely bunged, were lashed to the angles of the raft, giving thereby greatly-increased buoyancy and height out of the water...The flag of the second buoy has three bars - scarlet, white, and scarlet - and the ball is over the flag'. From "Illustrated London News", 1865.