The function of the hatch/cover that was dredged up recently in the Wells Harbour by the Kari Hege while carrying out channel maintenance, has been solved.
Jim Jones who worked at Telcon Cables in Greenwich advised that the hatch cover is from a marker buoy where the end of broken cable is tied too while engineers grapple for the other end and re-join the cable. The hatch itself is for somebody to climb out during construction or repair. Greenwich manufactured buoys in a separate workshop just off the main cable manufacturing site.
The brass plaque in the middle of the circular steel hatch cover has the “Telegraph Construction & Maintenance Company London” engraved on it.
The Telegraph Construction & Maintenance Company was formed on the 7th April 1864, for the manufacture and laying of submarine cables. Its first major contract was to lay a cable across the Atlantic for the Atlantic Telegraph Company on the basis of no payment if the expedition failed, which is what happened in 1865. Another attempt in 1866, this time succeeded, as well as the recovery and completion of the 1865 cable using the Great Eastern. Following on from this many cables were laid all over the world.
Press Release, June 2, 2014; Image: Wells Harbour