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Collection Reference Number GLC03479.32
From Archive Folder Documents Relating to the 1860s 
Title Alexander Dallas Bache to Clarence Fendall instructing him to proceed to Cairo
Date 4 November 1863
Author Bache, Alexander Dallas (1806-1867)  
Recipient Fendall, Clarence  
Document Type Correspondence
Content Description Bache, of the coastal survey, tells Fendall to proceed to Cairo and report to Admiral Porter. Stamp on verso "Exchanged by order Secretary Navy."
Subjects Military History  Navy  Union Forces  Civil War  Union General  Surveying  
People Bache, Alexander Dallas (1806-1867)  Fendall, Clarence (fl. 1863)  
Place written Chattanooga, Tennessee
Theme The American Civil War; Naval & Maritime
Sub-collection The Gilder Lehrman Collection, 1860-1945
Additional Information Alexander Dallas Bache, American physicist, son of Richard Bache Jr. and Sara Bache, great-grandson of Benjamin Franklin, was born in Philadelphia. After graduating from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1825, he acted as assistant professor there for some time, and as a lieutenant in the corps of engineers he was engaged for a short time in the erection of coastal fortifications. He occupied the post of professor of natural philosophy and chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania from 1828 to 1841 and again from 1842 to 1843. Additionally, from 1839 to 1842, he served as the first president of Central High School of Philadelphia, the second oldest public high school in the United States. He spent the years 1836 to 1838 in Europe on behalf of the trustees of what, in 1848, was to become Girard College. Abroad, he examined European systems of education and, on his return, published a very valuable report. In 1843, on the death of Ferdinand Rudolph Hassler, he was appointed superintendent of the United States coast survey. He succeeded in impressing the United States Congress with a sense of the great value of this work and by means of the liberal aid it granted, he carried out a singularly comprehensive plan with great ability and most satisfactory results. By a skillful division of labor, and by the erection of numerous observing stations, the mapping out of the whole coast was completed. In addition, a vast mass of magnetic and meteorological data was collected.
Copyright The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History
Module Civil War, Reconstruction and the Modern Era: 1860-1945