Ships Ahoy

weighed one fifty tons. With a complement of eighty six officers, Her armament consisted of sixteen nine pounder guns as well as two four pounder guns, allowing her to protect herself and the ship she escorted from the Delaware River to England and everywhere in between. Their first mission had been to accompany the male ship Mercury from Philadelphia to Europe. However, the Sarasota's crew had been untrained and the ship proved

unstable on the high seas. As a result, it was relieved of its duties so it's captain, John Young could whip his men into shape while awaiting further orders. He taught them how to run the ship as a team and operate the guns, turning the Saratoga into a formidable

vessel despite her size. They spent the next year sailing in pursuit of enemies along the Eastern Seaboard, capturing British cargo ships and escorting them back home to have their contents sold, bringing much needed funding to the Continental Army. After several successful missions, including a recent recapture of a British brig named Providence, it was time for the U. S. S. Saratoga to return to Philadelphia for some minor repairs, and then it would begin the biggest mission of its career.

In December of seventeen eighty, Captain Young and his crew set out for the Caribbean, their destination the Isle of Hispaniola, where they'd received word that a cash of French military supplies were awaiting transportation back to America. Once the ship reached the tropical waters off the coast of the island, one of the merchant men aboard spotted a British sale not far from their position. The Saratoga went to investigate, and when they got close enough, they fired a four

pound shot across the ship's bow. Now identified as the Resolution, the enemy ship turned to attack. The return fire didn't do much damage to the Saratoga, but Captain Young's crew managed to seriously injure the other vessel, forcing them to surrender. He sent a small prize crew to take the Resolution up to Delaware for processing, an auction escorted by the Saratoga. They reached their destination on New Year's Day of seventy one, dropped off the Resolution and set sail once again for

the Caribbean. Hours later, as they reached Florida, the Saratoga caught another enemy ship, the Tonian. After an intense struggle, towards the end of January, the Saratoga arrived on the coast of Haiti with a Tonian in tow. The prize ship was handed over to the French Admiralty Court, while the Saratoga awaited the French military supplies that it had

originally come for. The governor of a local French colony asked the Saratoga to accompany the other Continental frigates in the harbor on their way to Jamaica, which Captain Young was only too happy to oblige. After all, his job wasn't just to capture enemy ships, but to escort allies to safety as well. A full month passed before the convoy of frigates and merchant ships left the coast of

Haiti one last time, bound for the Cabbean. Three days into their journey, however, they spotted two sails off to the west. The Saratoga took off in pursuit of the rogue ships, one of which surrendered right away. Captain Young tasked a crew headed by his midships men, a man named Pinfield, with commandering the latest prize. Young and the Saratoga planned on going after the other ship. Penfield watched as the Saratoga pursued the second ship when high winds

nearly capsized his newly acquired vessel. Correcting the ship only took a few minutes, but by the time he had studied it and glanced back up at the ocean, the Saratoga was gone. It hadn't faded off into the horizon or sailed out of view behind something larger. It had simply disappeared utterly and completely, and the Saratoga, along with its crew and Captain Young, we're never seen again. Curious. When the first commercial electrical telegraph debuted in eighteen thirty seven,

it heralded a new era of long range communication. Everyone knows about Samuel Morse and his system of dots and dashes, but it was the device created by William Cook and Charles Wheatstone that really put the telegraph on the map. Their telegraph consisted of a series of needles that pointed to letters on a board with the help of electromagnetic coils. For early operators who didn't want to bother learning a whole new language, the Cook and wheat Stone telegraph proved

easy to use, and thus it was widely adopted. In fact, it's use in catching the murderer John tay well In probably helped the public and other organizations accept the telegraph in their daily lives. But no invention, no matter how useful, stays the same forever it is iterated upon. To increase efficiency and reduce cost, The Cook and Wheatstone system was easy to use, but it was expensive to maintain. It

also took longer to send simple messages. The Morse code system, while appearing more difficult to learn at first, was eventually adopted and understood by skilled technicians who could distinguish letters by the length of intervals between clicks. Then they would write out the messages longhand on a piece of paper. Of course, the technology still had a room to grow, and in eighteen fifty one one man had a theory about how to transmit messages all over the world even faster.

It required no special code or training. His idea let mother nature do the work. Jacques Toussain Benois was a French occultist with a fascination for how animals communicated. For example, he suggested that when snails made it, they secreted a special fluid that allowed them to talk to one another telepathically. He called it sympathetic communication, and he believed the connection worked immediately anywhere in the world, no matter how far

apart the snails were. Benois, however, had no money to construct his snail telegraph, so he convinced a Paris gym owner named Monsieur Tree to provide him a place to stay and a small allowance. After having convinced him how important it was that he brought his work to fruition. A year went by and Tria demanded to see what his hospitality had earned him. Ben Wat showed him what he had been working on. He'd built a scaffold using

wooden beams about ten ft long. Atop the beams were twenty four bulls made of zinc which had been lined with cloth drenched in copper sulfate. Glued to the bottom of each bowl was a snail linked to a different letter of the alphabet. It also constructed an identical machine, except in each of its bowls were the mates of the snails in the first machine. Whenever he tapped a snail on one device, the corresponding snail on the other

device would react. At least that was the idea. Benois demonstrated his contraption to Tria as well as to a journalist from a popular conservative publication at the time. He instructed each of the men to stand behind one of the device is and tap out a word, one snail at a time, while ben Wah would await the message at the other device and repeat it back to them when they finished. The journalist was floored by what he witnessed. He called it a revelation. Tria, however, wasn't convinced to

him it didn't work as advertised. Tria had spelled out the word jim nas, which ben Wat transcribed as jim No eight. The inventor also had a habit of strolling up and down the aisle formed between the two devices to monitor how the men were operating it, which didn't sit well with his skeptical investor. Tria figured the whole operation to be a sham. He ordered a second demonstration to be conducted in the coming days, which Ben Wah

happily agreed to. Except the demonstration never happened. You see, when the big day finally arrived, Ben Wat was nowhere to be found. He'd slipped away, leaving Tria and the journalist high and dry with a bunch of snails to clean up. In hindsight, the whole idea it turned out to be too good to be true, if only a Tria had gotten the message. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by

visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can learn all about it over at the World of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious,