In July 1865, Thomson sailed on the cable-laying expedition of the , but the voyage was dogged by technical problems. The cable was lost after had been laid, and the project was abandoned. A further attempt in 1866 laid a new cable in two weeks, and then recovered and completed the 1865 cable. The enterprise was feted as a triumph by the public, and Thomson enjoyed a large share of the adulation. Thomson, along with the other principals of the project, was knighted on 10 November 1866. To exploit his inventions for signalling on long submarine cables, Thomson entered into a partnership with C. F. Varley and Fleeming Jenkin. In conjunction with the latter, he also devised an automatic curb sender, a kind of telegraph key for sending messages on a cable.
In July 1865, Thomson sailed on the cable-laying expedition of the , but the voyage was dogged by technical problems. The cable w,as lost after had been laid, and the project was abandoned. A further attempt in 1866 laid a new cable in two weeks, and then recovered and completed the 1865 cable. The enterprise was feted as a triumph by the public, and Thomson enjoyed a large share of the adulation. Thomson, along with the other principals of the project was knighted on 10 November 1,866. To exploit his inventions for signalling on long submarine cables Thomson entered into a partnership with C. F. Varley and Fleeming Jenkin. In conjunction with the latter, he also devised an automatic curb sender, a kind of telegraph key for sending messages on a cable.