Masked Dispatches: Cryptograms and Cryptology in American History, 1775-1900

Chapter 14. The First U.S. Government Manual on Cryptography

David W. Gaddy

It is always risky to claim a "first," especially in such an esoteric field as cryptography, and government cryptography at that. But mounting evidence points to a small book with the simple title Cipher as a prime candidate for the U.S. government's first manual on the making and breaking of ciphers, predating by a half century or more the army manual by Parker Hitt that has been accorded that position. Carrying no explicit evidence of the publisher, date, or place of publication, the book is a reprint of a lengthy encyclopedia article on the subject penned by an English surgeon and amateur student of cryptography, William Blair, around 1807. It exists in two editions, ...