The public took to the new invention after the capture of the murderer John Tawell, who in 1845, had become the first person to be arrested as the result of telecommunications technology. In the same year, Wheatstone introduced two improved forms of the apparatus, namely, the single and the double needle instruments, in which the signals were made by the successive deflections of the needles. Of these, the single-needle instrument, requiring only one wire, is still in use.
The development of the telegraph may be gathered from two facts. In 1855, the death of the Emperor Nicholas at St. Petersburg, about one o'clock in the afternoon, was announced in the House of Lords a few hours later. The result of The Oaks of 1890 was received in New York fifteen seconds after the horses passed the winning-post.