Who shall say that anything is impossible hereafter?
What magnificent events may ensue, it would be useless now to think of determining.
Nearly 30 years before French newspaper Le Temps first serialized the global travels of Phileas Fogg, Monck Mason successfully crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a lighter-than-air craft. The New York Sun had the exclusive on the Victoria’s 75-hour trip, a tale of daring it noted had been accomplished, “without difficulty [and] any great apparent danger.”
Mason, a balloonist of unspecified European origin, departed England with seven crew members at 11AM on a Saturday, landing safely on Sullivan's Island, South Carolina at 2PM the following Tuesday. He and fellow renowned aeronaut Harrison Ainsworth penned the journals that served as the basis of the highly-detailed account.
The latter’s final entry captures a surprisingly effortless success, an hour before the voyage’s culmination. “We are in full view of the low coast of South Carolina,” he writes. “The great problem is accomplished. We have crossed the Atlantic -- fairly and easily crossed it in a balloon! God be praised! Who shall say that anything is impossible hereafter?”
The journals were handed off to The Sun’s editors as the crew rested at Fort Moultrie, a fortified Revolutionary War structure designed to defend Charlestown from British warship attack. The article’s author noted that the party’s future plans were uncertain, before wrapping up the piece with the same incredulous tones Aisnworth had employed hours prior,
This is unquestionably the most stupendous, the most interesting, and the most important undertaking, ever accomplished or even attempted by man. What magnificent events may ensue, it would be useless now to think of determining.
The broadside caused great sensation, as readers “besieged” the Sun offices in Lower Manhattan. “I never witnessed more intense excitement to get possession of a newspaper,” he noted. “As soon as copies made their way into the streets, they were bought up, at almost any price, from the newsboys.”
After word arrived from Fort Moultrie, the paper issued a retraction two days after the story’s publication.
The mails from the South last Saturday night not having brought a confirmation of the arrival of the Balloon from England, the particulars of which from our correspondent we detailed in our Extra, we are inclined to believe that the intelligence is erroneous. The description of the Balloon and the voyage was written with a minuteness and scientific ability calculated to obtain credit everywhere, and was read with great pleasure and satisfaction. We by no means think such a project impossible.
The account, it seems, was plausible enough to convince a public already burned by an account of fantastical extraterrestrial life in the pages of The Sun nearly a decade a prior. Author Edgar Allan Poe noted the similarities between “The Great Moon Hoax” and his recently-published early science-fiction short story, “The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall,” which detailed a hot air balloon journey to the moon’s surface.
Any bad blood between the author and the paper was apparently resolved by 1844, when Poe anonymously penned the account of the fictional Monck Mason’s cross-Atlantic journey for the paper.
It would be another 75 years before the Royal Navy’s Air Service R.34 became the first lighter-than-air craft to make the journey across the Atlantic, from Scotland to Mineola, New York.
Sources:
Balloon Hoax https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095443729
The Balloon Hoax https://poestories.com/read/balloonhoax
When Edgar Allan Poe Pranked New York City—And Inspired Jules Verne https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/524140/when-edgar-allan-poe-pranked-new-york-city-and-inspired-jules-verne