George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Major-General United States Army
George Gordon Meade, Ed.

[206] apparatus are among Lieutenant Meade's papers, in his handwriting, written with a precision and clearness that would have entitled them to a place in an encyclopaedia. They were evidently made out (as is shown by the fact that they were found with a slip from a New York newspaper of October 1, 1853, embodying the same information with the amplifications that a newspaper man would make) for the purpose of correctly informing the writer of the printed article, so that he in turn could enlighten the public.

In October, 1853, Lieutenant Meade reported to the secretary of the Light-House Board that the light at Sand Key was exhibited July 20th for the first time, that the plans and estimates for a beacon on Rebecca Shoal were made, that the plans and estimates for a light-house in the northwest channel, Key West Harbor, were nearly ready, that the plans and estimates for light-houses at Cedar Keys Coffin's Patches would be prepared as soon as possible consistently with due care.

In December, 1853, letters passed between the secretary of state, secretary of war, and the chairman of the Light-House Board, showing, on the one part, intention to withdraw Lieutenant Meade from his duties in light-house construction and, on the other, resistance to accomplishment of that intention. His usefulness in the sphere in which he was acting had by this time become so well recognized by the Light-House Board that the intention of relieving him from his duties under it was abandoned.

In January, 1854, he gave full plans and estimates for the lighthouse to be erected on Sea Horse Key, Florida, discussing the character of the lighting apparatus, the physical characteristics of the key, and the question of the title to the land, and in the following April sent in a report from a preliminary examination of Coffin's Patches, with reference to the erection of a light-house there. In that connection he retracts his opinion, given in 1852, that a combination of masonry, upon which should be superposed iron piles, would be the best construction for such places, giving the maximum stability, and, although greater in first cost, in the interest of true economy. He said that, if for no other reason than the expense of the light-house establishment on coasts so extended as those of the United States, they would not be warranted in adopting that plan. But, independent of that, he said, he must admit that he had acquired more faith than he had had in the durability of structures on iron piles, and that experience and reflection had convinced him that they would, with