Wanted: Volunteer Codebreakers

[LoyaltyOfDogs]

An effort is underway to decode thousands of Civil War telegrams. The project's leaders are looking for 75,000 volunteers: http://bit.ly/292EjK4

 

[Waterloo50]

An effort is underway to decode thousands of Civil War telegrams. The project's leaders are looking for 75,000 volunteers: http://bit.ly/292EjK4

Followed the link and had a go at transcribing some telegrams and a couple of code books, it was actually quite interesting although much of the writing makes very little sense. This is something that I would quite happily get involved with. Its quite simple really, identify the document you wish to work on and underline the text you wish to transcribe. The more difficult bit is working out where a telegram begins and ends but I soon got the hang of it.
Good Post.

 

[caller]

An effort is underway to decode thousands of Civil War telegrams. The project's leaders are looking for 75,000 volunteers: http://bit.ly/292EjK4

I was JUST about to post on this myself. I have been working with this for about two weeks now and it is fascinating to me. It is the type of work I would love to do but don't have the CV to actually do for a living.

It is through zooniverse.org which is working in conjunction with a few other organizations to transcribe the many telegraph (15,971 telegrams according to the site) and cipher books of Thomas T. Eckert. Here is a quick background:

The Thomas T. Eckert Papers is an extensive and extraordinarily rare collection of Civil War telegraph messages, including a number of coded communiqués between Abraham Lincoln and officers of the Union Army. The collection is a near-complete archive of Thomas T. Eckert, the head of the military telegraph office of the War Department under Lincoln. The archive, which until recently was thought to have been destroyed, includes crucial correspondence that has never been published.

I first encountered zooniverse when they were doing some crowd-source type research on identification of tropical storm systems. They then added a WWI diary transcription opportunity. It really is an addictive place. The final product will, I believe, be available through the Huntington Digital Library at http://hdl.huntington.org/cdm/landingpage/collection/p16003coll11

On a personal level, this is an excellent opportunity for me because it will give me first hand interaction with telegrams which is the basis for a research project (read: book) I have had in mind for several years and this resource will be second to none.

NOTE: This post was not paid for by Zooniverse or any of the associated entities. I really am just this excited about it.

 

[Mike Serpa]

I gave it try. One was a telegram to Bufrord. the other was this-

pastel purple jingle dolphins vagabond???
https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/zooniverse/decoding-the-civil-war

 

[lelliott19]

Oh boy! @Mike Serpa suggested this site to me earlier today and now I am hooked!

It is amazing to read the telegrams. Unlike Mike's above, most of the ones Ive done today were not encoded so it was easy to understand the intent of the message. (A few were encoded)

Here's an example of one that was not encoded: "you have sufficient force to defeat all that Early has with him get in his rear and move up sharply, leaving him to go north."

Give it a try he said. It'll be fun he said.
Thanks @Mike Serpa

Seriously, if you havent tried it yet, you really should!

 

[Mike Serpa]

Oh boy! @Mike Serpa suggested this site to me earlier today and now I am hooked!

It is amazing to read the telegrams. Unlike Mike's above, most of the ones Ive done today were not encoded so it was easy to understand the intent of the message. (A few were encoded)

Here's an example of one that was not encoded: "you have sufficient force to defeat all that Early has with him get in his rear and move up sharply, leaving him to go north."

Give it a try he said. It'll be fun he said.
Thanks @Mike Serpa

Seriously, if you havent tried it yet, you really should!

Yes, it is exciting and fun!