[f. TELEGRAPH sb. or v. + -ER1.]
1. One who works a telegraph. (Now rare: the technical term being telegraphist.) In first two quots., one who signals by means of a semaphore or other mechanical means (TELEGRAPH sb. 1).
1795. Edgeworth, in Trans. R. Irish Acad. (1797), VI. 95. Flushed with victory the young telegrapher forgot his signal.
1842. Penny Cycl., XXIV. 151/2. Standing … with both discs held down and turned edgewise to the observer, the telegrapher indicated ‘attention.’
c 1865. J. Wylde, in Circ. Sc., I. 262/1. Another … source of annoyance to telegraphers.
b. Telegrapher’s cramp or palsy: = telegraphist’s cramp: see TELEGRAPHIST b.
1878. A. M. Hamilton, Nerv. Dis., 484–5. Telegrapher’s cramp…. The same form of cramp [as writer’s] affects the thumbs and fingers of telegraphers, so that their work eventually becomes an impossibility.
1890. Billings, Nat. Med. Dict., Telegraphers’ cramp, neurosis analogous to writers’ cramp, affecting muscles of forearm of telegraph-operators.
2. One who telegraphs a message or news; the sender of a telegram.
1834. Gen. P. Thompson, Exerc. (1842), III. 134. In fact what has the telegrapher to do, but be the orderly; and if the telegraphers are practicable, why should not all orderlies be telegraphers?
1865. Morn. Star, 2 Feb. The telegraphers take the liberty to assert [etc.].
1890. Spectator, 19 April. If he had been flustered by the noisy memorialists and telegraphers who did their best to disturb his judgment.
1901. Westm. Gaz., 17 Dec., 2/3. He has not succeeded enough to induce the telegrapher to desert the wiring mode for the wireless.
