Stephen Harriman Long - Biography

Biography

Long was born in Hopkinton, New Hampshire, the son of Moses and Lucy (Harriman) Long. He received an A.B. from Dartmouth College in 1809 and an A.M. from Dartmouth in 1812. In 1814, he was commissioned a lieutenant of engineers in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Upon the reorganization of the Army in 1816, he was appointed a Major on 16 April and assigned to the Southern Division under Maj. Gen. Andrew Jackson as a topographical engineer.

In 1817, Major Long headed a military excursion up the Mississippi River to the Falls of St. Anthony near the confluence with the Minnesota River. As a result of his recommendations, the Army established Fort Snelling to guard against Indian incursions against settlers in the Upper Mississippi Valley. Long recorded his experiences of the expedition in Voyage in a Six-oared Skiff to the Falls of St. Anthony, in 1860.

In March 1819 he married Martha Hodgkiss of Philadelphia Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the sister of Isabella Hodgkiss Norvell, wife of US Senator John Norvell. Soon afterwards he led the scientific contingent of the 1819 Yellowstone Expedition to explore the Missouri River. In 1820 he was appointed to lead an alternative expedition through the American West, exploring areas acquired in the Louisiana Purchase. The specific purpose of the voyage was to find the sources of the Platte, Arkansas, and Red rivers.

Later, in 1823 he led additional military expeditions into the United States borderlands with Canada, exploring the Upper Mississippi Valley, the Minnesota River, the Red River of the North and across the southern part of Canada. During this time he determined the northern boundary at the 49th parallel at Pembina.

Following his official military expeditions, Major Long spent several years on detached duty as a consulting engineer with various railroads. Initially he helped to survey and build the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. In 1826 he received his first patent for his work on railroad steam locomotives. Long received many more patents for locomotive design and worked with other Army engineers in planning and building the railroad.

In 1832, along with William Norris and several other business partners, he formed the American Steam Carriage Company. The business was dissolved in 1834 due to the difficulties in placing Long's locomotive designs into production.

Colonel Long received a leave of absence to work on the newly incorporated Western & Atlantic Railroad in Georgia. His yearly salary was established at $5,000, the contract was signed May 12, 1837 and he served as the chief engineer for the W&A until November 3, 1840. He arrived in north Georgia in late May and his surveying began in July and by November he had submitted an initial report which the construction followed almost exactly.

In 1838 he was appointed to a position in the newly separated U.S. Corps of Topographical Engineers. Like most of their officers Major Long remained loyal to the Federal government during the Civil War, and he became Colonel of the Corps in 1861 until its merger back into the U.S. Corps of Engineers in 1863. He died in Alton, Illinois in 1864.