the Central Pennsylvania Telephone Company, one of the most successful corporations in that line in this country, and is still its Vice President.

Richard O'Brien has won respect and admiration for himself by the predominating qualities of his character. Brains, courage, intelligent devotion to duty and unswerving truth and honor always shaped his course. Gifted by nature with a speaking countenance and a voice of pleasant timbre, and having combined throughout life an extraordinary capacity for work, with genial manners and wise helpfulness of others, he presents a rare and admirable character for emulation. Mr. O'Brien has had a great many young men under him both in military and civil life, and it is perfectly safe to say that his influence upon the character of every one of them has been highly beneficial, whether in uplifting the discouraged and unfortunate, or in inspiring and directing honorable ambition in the more fortunate. This beneficent influence has been largely exerted through the example of his honorable and energetic character.

William Bender Wilson, the author of this work, was born in Harrisburg, Pa., April 5, 1839; educated in the public schools of that city, with a term or two in the Harrisburg Academy, served as junior clerk in the dry goods house of James S. Epsy, for two years. At fourteen years of age he entered the service of the Atlantic and Ohio Telegraph Company as messenger, became an operator in 1854, and on the 8th of October, 1855, entered the service of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. Served as operator in Harrisburg station, then transferred to Wilmore, Irwin, Altoona, Huntingdon and Columbia, serving in latter place during 1856 and part of 1857. In August, 1857, he returned to Harrisburg, and was subsequently transferred to Thirteenth and Market streets, President's office, and in Atlantic and Ohio office, Philadelphia, working interchangeably in those offices, with emergency work at Gap, Lancaster and Cresson, until July, 1860, when he went South. He returned on the outbreak of the war, and entered Superintendent Young's office, Harrisburg. From there he was taken by Thomas A. Scott on April 17, 1861, to Governor Curtin's office at Harrisburg, where with a relay magnet and a key placed on a window sill, he opened the first military telegraph office on this continent.

After organizing the telegraphic service at Harrisburg, he joined Colonel Scott in Washington on the 3d of May, and became Manager of the Military Telegraph Office in the War Department, from which vantage ground many of the innermost secrets and actions of the administration of public affairs, both civil and military, became known to him. Mr. Lincoln was a constant visitor to the office both during the hours of the day and night, keeping the finger of one hand on the pulse of the country, whilst with the forefinger of the other he pointed out the roads for the army to take. Mr. Wilson saw him on many occasions when the skies were overcast and many friends of the country were yielding to despair. He was with him at the time the "Harriet Lane" ran the enemy's batteries on the lower Potomac, during the first battle of Bull Run, the disaster at Ball's Bluff, the capture of Mason and Slidell, and other trying periods in those days of blood. One of the most trying was on Sunday, the 9th of March, 1862. News of the rebel ram "Merrimac" having come out of the James River, sunk the "Cumberland," burnt the "Congress," and grounded the "Minnesota," "St. Lawrence" and "Roanoke," reached Washington via boat from Fortress Monroe to Cape Charles, thence by wire. In person he apprised the President and Secretary of the Navy Welles of the disaster. Immediately they came to the War Department Telegraph Office, which was then located on the entresol off the landing separating two flights of stairs between the first and second stories in the old War Department building. It was an anxious morning. The supposition was that the victorious "Merrimac," having nothing to oppose it, would reduce Fortress Monroe, make its way up the Potomac, and bombard Washington. Captain Dahlgren, then Commandant at the Navy Yard, was sent for and brought into consultation. He advised loading canal boats with stone and sinking them in the shallowest part of the Potomac channel, which was at Cuttle Fish Shoals. His suggestions were being carried into execution when the glorious achievement of the "Monitor" was flashed over the wires, relieving the tension and turning gloom into joy. Mr. Wilson says throughout that whole trying day, when the loss of the Capital seemed reasonably sure, Mr. Lincoln lost not a particle of faith in the cause and its ultimate

success, but remained the cool, clear-headed adviser he always was when the clouds were the darkest.

In the summer of 1862 Mr. Wilson returned to Harrisburg and resumed his position on the Pennsylvania Railroad as its General Lost Car Agent, carrying with him a testimonial of his services signed by Mr. Lincoln.

On the defeat of Pope under the walls of Washington, leaving Pennsylvania open to invasion, and the Pennsylvania Railroad liable to attack, Mr. Wilson re-entered the field, and with a pocket relay and a coil of fine helix wire for opening up telegraphic communication whenever convenient and practicable, joined Captain William J. Palmer (also a Pennsylvania Railroad man) in a scouting expedition down the Cumberland Valley, entering the enemy's lines, moving on his flanks, ascertaining his numbers, and reporting frequently to the authorities. His offices, as opened, were improvised from fence rails, tree stumps or crevices in decayed trees; from these, however, he was able to give the government officials the first information relative to the fall of Harper's Ferry, the fight at Boonsboro Pass of the South Mountain, and the evacuation of Hagerstown by Longstreet. The enemy threatened Greencastle, and the few troops there departed, leaving him with two scouts as the sole garrison. Taking position on a hand-car, with instrument in circuit and flying the American flag over the town, he bid defiance to the enemy, and from this unique office kept the authorities advised. The combination of Palmer and Wilson, according to McClure in "Lincoln and Men of War Times," was the medium of information which enabled Governor Curtin to guide McClellan's army in the Antietam campaign. In the Gettysburg campaign, Early's raid, and at the time Chambersburg was burned, he did service of a similar character. Frequently in the valley the enemy passed northward around him whilst he lay concealed in the woods, with instrument in circuit. He kept up communication by apparently tearing down the telegraph line for some distance, being careful, however, to keep it from contact with the ground, and running fine silk-covered wire through the grass to a hiding place among the

trees.

Harrisburg was his headquarters, where he kept himself ready to

respond to all calls made upon him by Mr. Scott. The slightest dust raised by the enemy in the Shenandoah Valley would be met by an order for him to proceed to the Potomac. Many and many a time in the dark hours of the night he was awakened from sleep and ordered "down the valley," and taking a locomotive, made the echoes ring with its speedy run to Hagerstown. From there he would send out trusted scouts, and by daylight have Mr. Scott advised of the situation. Sometimes the enemy would drive him out of the town, and then would ensue an interesting race between an operator on a hand-car and a soldier on a horse, in which bullets, oaths, hopes and fears seemed to mix in great confusion.

Again, the enerny would appear before he could arrange his toilet for leaving, and he would be compelled to remain and enjoy their company as best he could, never forgetting, however, to make notes on his mental tablets of such things as would prove interesting to Colonel Scott. Once General Jenkins' cavalry drove him out of Mechanicsburg, and pursued him as long as the common road was close to the railroad, and whilst the bullets came uncomfortably near and imbedded themselves in the hand-car he passed on unharmed. On another occasion General Fitz Hugh Lee broke up his office, located in a fence corner about a mile north of Carlisle, causing him to withdraw into that ancient borough and enjoy, with General William F. Smith, the sensations of a bombardment. With the ground or a friendly hayrick for a couch, sleep impossible, hunger gnawing, danger of capture always imminent, and death ever present, the service was never an easy or agreeable one, and its performance was only sustained by the consciousness that it was right.

In March, 1865, he was appointed Superintendent Northern Central Railway Telegraph, Baltimore to Canandaigua. On September 1, 1866, appointed Chief Clerk in the Freight Department at Harrisburg; January 1, 1882, Freight Agent at Lancaster; March 24, 1884, Freight Agent of the Kensington District, and on July 7, 1892, Superintendent Mantua Transfer. Served four years in Harrisburg City Council; was candidate in 1873 for the Legislature in Dauphin and Perry Counties; for Congress in 1876 in the Fourteenth Pennsylvania District, and served for three years, 1894 to

1897, as school director in the Thirty-fifth Section, Philadelphia. Was member of the Pennsylvania State Central Committee of the National Democratic Party, Jeffersonian ticket, 1896. Is a member of the Executive Committee of the Philadelphia Car Service Association, and a vestryman in Emmanuel Church, Holmesburg, which he also represents as Lay Deputy in the Diocesan Convention of Pennsylvania and the Convocation of Germantown. He is President of the Telegraphic Historical Society of North America, with office in Washington, D. C., and President of the Society of the United States Military Telegraph Corps; First Vice Chairman of the Pennsylvania Railroad Department Y. M. C. A.; Editor of the "Pennsylvania Railroad Men's News," and Chairman of the Publication Committee having it in charge. Author of "Acts and Actors in the Civil War," "History of Emmanuel Church, Holmesburg," and "The History of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company." Is on the roll of honor and holds a certificate of honorable service in the United States Military Telegraph Corps, United States Army, issued to him by the Secretary of War in compliance with terms of an Act of Congress.