Charles Tilston Bright
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| Charles Tilston Bright | |
 Charles Tilston Bright c. 1858
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| Born | June 8, 1832 Wanstead, Essex |
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| Died | May 3, 1888 Abbey Wood |
| Nationality | United Kingdom |
| Known for | transatlantic telegraph cable |
Sir Charles Tilston Bright (1832 – 3 May 1888), was a British electrical engineer who oversaw the laying of the first transatlantic telegraph cable, for which work he was knighted.
Born on June 8, 1832 in Wanstead, Essex. At fifteen he became a clerk under the Electric Telegraph Company and his talent for electrical engineering was obvious such that he was appointed engineer to the Magnetic Telegraph Company in 1852. In that role he supervised the laying of lines in the British Isles, including in 1853 the first cable between Scotland and Ireland, from Portpatrick to Donaghadee, when he was just 21. It was this work that showed the feasibility of an electric undersea cable connection between Ireland and North America.
Joining with Cyrus West Field and J. W. Brett, who controlled the Newfoundland Telegraph Company Bright organized the Atlantic Telegraph Company in 1856 to develop a transatlantic cable with himself as engineer-in-chief. After two disappointments, in 1858, Bright successfully accomplished what to many had seemed an impossible feat. Within a few days of landing the Irish end of the line at Valentia he was knighted in Dublin. Sir Charles Bright then supervised the laying of submarine cables in various regions of the world including in the Mediterranean and in India. He was also a consulting engineer for two following transatlantic cables, after the first cable broke after several months.
In conjunction with Josiah Latimer Clark, with whom he entered into partnership in 1861, he invented improved methods of insulating undersea cables. A paper on electrical standards read before the British Association led to the establishment of the British Association committee on that subject, which in turn formed the foundations of the system still in use.
From 1865 to 1868 he was Liberal MP for Greenwich and was president of the Institution of Electrical Engineers in 1887. He died on the May 3, 1888, at Abbey Wood, near London.
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| Parliament of the United Kingdom | ||
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| Preceded by David Salomons William Angerstein |
Member of Parliament for Greenwich 2-seat constituency (with David Salomons) 1865–1868 |
Succeeded by David Salomons William Ewart Gladstone |
