This hand-coloured lithograph is one of eight published in the 1861 edition of the Manual of the Corporation of the City of New York (New York: D.T. Valentine, 1861). It shows the USS Niagara (a steam frigate), HMS Agamemnon (a Second Rate ship of the line), HMS Valorous, and HMS Gorgon (both steam-powered paddle frigates; the Gorgon is misidentified as Gordon on the print) at a point in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, where they are laying the telegraph cable. Smokestacks can be seen on the decks of the Niagara and Agamemnon, and the paying-out machinery used to drop the cable into the ocean is clearly visible at the stern of the Niagara. Several human figures are also visible on the top deck of the Niagara. The prevalence of the American ship Niagara and the amount of detail used to illustrate her as opposed to the other three ships may be due to the fact that the publishers were also American.

In 1858, the Atlantic Telegraph Company employed these four ships to lay the submarine telegraph cable from Great Britain to Newfoundland. The two primary ships in use were the USS Niagara and HMS Agamemnon (launched in 1855 and 1845, respectively). The HMS Valorous and HMS Gorgon were used as escort vessels. Because there was no ship at the time that could bear the entire weight of the telegraph cable, it was divided between the Niagara and Agamemnon. The ends of the cable were spliced together when the ships reached the rendevous point in the mid-Atlantic Ocean. From that point, the Agamemnon sailed to Ireland and the Niagara to Newfoundland, each laying the cable along the way. Both ships landed the cable on August 5, but due to the cable's flawed design, it worked only for three weeks before failing.