The history of the first locomotives in America. From original ...

FIRST LOCOMOTITE IN NEW YORK. 181
the day, Mr. David Matthew, who controlled its movements
on this memorable first occasion. As the tin
horn sounded the signal for starting, just as the author
had sketched the shape of the first of the passenger-cars
in the train, he supplied the place of passengers with
the likeness of several of the old citizens of Albany.
Hence the appearance of Mr. Thurlow Weed, ex-Gov-
ernor Yates, and others, as named in the article from the
Soston Advertiser. This original picture, as we have
before stated, was presented to the Connecticut Histor-
ical Society by the author. It has since been photographed
by J. L. Howard & Company, of Hartford, and
from this photograph the copy in lithograph by Sage &
Son was taken; but the engine is there erroneously
called an English machine, the " John Bull," and John
Hampson, an Englishman, is said to have been the
engineer. A second copy of this sketch, calculated to
mislead the public, has just been circulated by a firm'
in Boston, called the Antique Publishing Company, 75
Haverhill Street, and copyrighted in 1870. This
picture, like the one by Sage & Son, is taken from the
same photograph of the author's^ original sketch in the
Hartford Institute, and in its history, like the other,
purports to be a likeness of the English locomotive
" John Bull," and an Englishman, John Hampson, the
engineer. In this volume we shall furnish the evidence
to show that the original picture in the Connecticut
Historical Society Rooms was a true representation of
the American locomotive " De Witt Clinton," the third
American locomotive built for actual service, and the
first American-buUt locomotive run in the State of
New York; Sage & Son, and the Boston Antique
Publishing Company, to the contrary notwithstanding.
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