Charles Alexander Gerhardi
Charles Alexander Gerhardi (1837-1905)
1905 Obituary [1]
CHARLES ALEXANDER GERHARDI, who died on April 2, 1905, was born in 1837, and had been connected with telegraphy since 1853, when he entered the Belgian Telegraph Service.
In 1856 he entered the Service of the Electric and International Telegraph Company, which he left in 1857 to join the Atlantic Telegraph Company.
He was present on board the U.S. steam frigate Niagara at the attempts to lay the first Atlantic cable in 1857 and 1858, and also at the final laying of that cable in 1858, when he was attached to the Newfoundland station of the Company till 1859, the cable being then abandoned as unworkable.
In 1860 Mr. Gerhardi was appointed by the Submarine Telegraph Company as superintendent of their Channel Islands cable, and later he was put in charge, at London, of the Belgian, Dutch, and German cables.
In 1872 he was appointed manager of the Direct Spanish Telegraph Company, which he continued to manage until his retirement in 1902.
In 1898 the Queen Regent of Spain conferred on Mr. Gerhardi the Commandership of the Order of Isabel la Catolica.
Mr. Gerhardi had been a member of the Institution since 1874.