Chappe, C
ACHIEVEMENT(S): Invented the semaphore visual telegraph
NICKNAME/ALIAS: None
DATE AND PLACE OF BIRTH: December 25, 1763, Brulon, France
DATE/PLACE OF DEATH/AGE AT DEATH: January 23, 1805, Paris, France.
Aged 41 (suicide)
DISCIPLINE: Optic telegrapher
FIELD: Communications
LANGUAGE: French
PARENTS: Ignace Chappe d'Auteroche; Marie-Renee de Vernay de Vert
SIBLINGS: Ignace Urbain Jean; Marie Marthe (twin to Claude); Pierre Francois; Sophie Francois; Rene; Abraham
SPOUSE: None
CHILDREN: None
EDUCATION: College de Joyeuse, Rouen; La Fleche Seminary
MAJOR WORK: None
LIFE AND TIMES:
In 1790, Chappe, a priest who had lost his stipend during the French Revolution, took an interest in the plight of Napoleon’s* army, surrounded by the allied forces of Britain, Holland, Prussia, Austria and Spain and desperately in need of an adequate system of communication.
With the help of his brothers, Chappe developed a "semaphore telegraph" (the semaphore*) which he unveiled in 1793. It consisted of a 12-foot horizontal beam mounted on an 18-foot mast, with two three-foot vertical arms placed at the ends of the beam. The angles of the arms and, independently, the position of the large beam, could be varied in increments of 45 degrees by ropes and pulleys.
Chappe’s idea was that each tower would be equipped with two telescopes, one pointing in either direction, so that messages could be read and passed on to the next tower by means of the two-arm "semaphore" -- a word coined by Chappe from the Greek for "bearing a sign". Each arm of the semaphore could take seven clearly-visible angular positions, making possible 49 combinations that related to the alphabet, plus a number of other symbols. Each sign was expected to take four seconds to set and 16 seconds to note and confirm, amounting to a communication speed of about two words a minute.
On July 12, 1793, the system was successfully tested and two weeks later work began for a first line of 15 stations from Paris to Lille, about 120 miles north of Paris. In July, 1794, the connection was formally declared open.
In August, the system brought Parisians the news of the capture of Conde-sur-l'Escaut from the Austrians in less than an hour. The feat established the reputation of both the optical telegraph and Chappe, who was soon hailed as a "benefactor of the motherland". In October, the government authorized a second 50-station line, between Paris and Strasbourg, which took four years to build.
Despite the praise, Chappe was dissatisfied with the performance of his invention, and with Monge* devised a seven-indicator semaphore, but it was never built. He did, however, vastly improve the coding system. In 1798 the French Navy commissioned a new line, from Paris to Brest, which was built in seven months. The beginnings of a country-wide network were in place by 1800, with telegraph stations built roughly 6 miles apart. New lines were added, notably one between Paris and Toulon on the Mediterranean. In 1804, construction began on the line to Milan explicitly requested by Napoleon.
Between 1800 and 1804, Chappe became increasingly despondent, depressed not only by attacks on his design but also by claims that others had invented the telegraph first. At the end of 1804, he fell ill during an inspection of new lines and sank into a deep depression. In January, 1805 he committed suicide by jumping into a well in Paris.
ASSESSMENT: Greatly influenced research in communications around the world, including that of Kempenfelt* in the English navy and Gamble* in the English army.
His coastal towers were blown up by Cochrane*
EXTRA CONNECTIONS: None
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
EB
Dictionnaire biographique francais
Kent, Captain Barrie, Signal! A History of Signalling in the Royal Navy,Hyden House: Clanfield, Hampshire, 1993.