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Chemistry in Great Britain and Ireland

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A History of Chemistry

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Abstract

After Priestley’s departure for America and Cavendish’s abandonment of chemistry there was no prominent figure in the science in Great Britain, and it was said there were only ten chemists in the country.1 Before the emergence of Davy and Dalton, however, there were several British and Irish chemists whose researches and publications are most decidedly worthy of mention.

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Footnotes

  1. O. T. Williams, Liverpool Medical and Chirurgical Journal, 1912, xxxii, 245–4; F. W. Lowndes, ib., 1916, xxxvi, 127–.

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  3. Phil. Trans., 1802, xcii, 49: Analysis of a Mineral Substance from North America, containing a metal unknown; Murray, Elements of Chemistry, 6 ed., Edinburgh, 1828, ii, 278, thought the mineral really came from Sweden.

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  4. Moore, DNB, 1893, xxxvi, 122; Garrod, Guy’s Hospital Reports, 1925, 373 (portr.); W. Babington and W. Allen, A Syllabus of a Course of Chemical Lectures read at Guy’s Hospital, London, 1802; Babington, Allen, and Marcet, same title, 1816; The Life of William Allen with Selections from his Correspondence, 3 vols. London, 1846, i, 59, 67, 73, 85.

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  5. Wolkow and Baumann, Z. physiol. Chem., 1891, xv, 228-85; Garrod, The Inborn Errors of Metabolism, 2 ed., 1923, 43; Neubauer, Vogel, and Huppert, Analyse des Hams, 10 ed., Wiesbaden, 1898, 243, 789; n ed., 1913, ii, 850; Hoppe-Seyler and Thierfelder, Handbuch der physiologisch-pathologisch-chemischen Analyse, 6 ed., 1893, 365; 9 ed., 1924, 303; Beilstein, Handbuch der organischen Chemie, 1927, x, 407; ib. I Ergw., 1932, x, 197.

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  6. An Essay on Combustion, with a view to a New Art of Dying [sic] and Painting. Wherein the Phlogistic and Antiphlogistic Hypotheses are Proved Erroneous, 8°, London, Printed for the Author, by J. Cooper, Bow Street, Covent Garden, 1794 (pref. dated 5 November), pp. xiii (v. blank), contents (v. blank), 182; German tr. by A. G. W. Lentin, Versuche uber die Wieder-herstellung der Metalle durch Wasser staff gas, Phosphor, Schwefel, Schwefelleber, geschwefeltes Wasserstoffgas, gephosphortes Wasserstoffgas, Kohle, Licht und Sauren, 120, Gottingen, 1798 (Sotheran Cat. 800 (1926) No. 10848). The book was reviewed by Ritter, in Schere’s Journal der Chemie, 1798, i, 443; Coindet, Ann. Chim., 1798, xxvi, 58-85 (theory on p. 63); and De la Metherie, J. de Phys., 1798, xlvi, 392; it is mentioned by Thomson, (2), 1817, ii, 253.

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  7. J. Phys. Chem., 1903, vii, 557; id., Chemical Statics and Dynamics, 1904, 303, corrected in id., Treatise, 1940, v, 812; Mrs. Fulhame says nothing about the combustion of carbon monoxide.

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  9. Arago, Eloge (1832), AdS, 1835, XIII, lvij-c; Pettigrew, Medical Portrait Gallery, 1844, iv; Barrow, Sketches of the Royal Society and the Royal Society Club, 1849, 162; Bence Jones, The Royal Institution, 1871, 223; Tyndall, New Fragments, 1892, 248-306; F. Oldham, Thomas Young, Physician and Philosopher, 1933; A. Wood (and F. Oldham), Thomas Young, Cambridge, 1954.

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  11. Anon., Ann. Phil., 1815, vi, 321, 472; 1816, vii, 111; Thomson, ib., 1816, vii, 343, announced that the author was Prout, who later, Med. Chirurg. Trans., 1817, viii, 534, admitted this.

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  12. B.A. Rep., 1832 (1833), 566–71: Abstract of Observations on Atmospheric Air; the lecture was illustrated by charts of the results.

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  13. Phil. Trans., 1824, cxiv, 45 (read 11 December 1823): On the nature of the acid and saline matters usually existing in the stomachs of animals; Isis, 1925, vii, 239.

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  15. Ann. Phil., 1818, xii, 441; Berzelius in letters of 1846-7 gave Thomson credit for this work (Briefwechsel zwischen J. Berzelius und F. Wohler, ed. O .Wallach, Leipzig, 1901, ii, 637, 664).

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  16. Phil. Trans., 1808, xcviii, I, 63 (read 14 January); Phil. Mag., 1808, xxxi, 102, 244; 1808 xxxii, 39 (in full); ACR, ii.

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  19. Turner, Phil. Trans., 1829, cxix, 291; John Prideaux, Phil. Mag., 1830, vii, 276; 1830, viii, 161 (defending Thomson); Turner, Phil. Mag., 1832, i, 109; Phil. Trans., 1833, cxxiii, 523; Thomson, Records of général Science, 1836, iii, 179 (188); R. Phillips, Phil. Trans., 1839, cxxix, 35; Mallet, J. Chem. Soc, 1893, lxiii, 1 (19 f.) for Thomson’s method.

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  20. Ann. Phil., 1820, xv, 161, 241; for method, see Thomson, Mem. Wernerian Nat. Hist. Soc, 1811, i, 504.

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  22. J. Muir, John Anderson. An Address to the Andersonian Chemical Society, Glasgow, October 1930.

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  23. E. F. Smith, Archeion, 1927, viii, 330-5 (poor portr.); Isis, 1928, xi, 473; picture of Hare’s lecture room and laboratory in Amer. J. Sci., 1831, xix, 26; Poggendorff, (1), i, 1018.

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  24. Newman, Quart. J. Sci., 1816, i, 65; H. J. Brooke, Ann. Phil., 1816, vii, 367; Newman, Description of a New Blow-Pipe, with Cautions and Instructions for its Use, when containing a mixed Atmosphere of Explosive Gases, 1817 (8 pp. and frontispiece); other suggested oxy-hydrogen blowpipes, G. Gray, Ann. Phil., 1817, ix, 479; J. T. Beale, ib., 481; Spilsbury, ib., 483; see Berzelius, Lehrbuch der Chemie, 1831, IV, ii, 863; Berzelius-Wohler, Briefwechsel, 1901, i, 353; ii, 222.

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  25. Clarke, Quart. J. Sci., 1816, ii, 104; Ann. Phil, 1816, viii, 313, 357; 1817, ix, 7, 89, 162, 194, 326 (capillary tubes in safety jet); 1817, x, 76, 133, 373; Ann. Phys., 1819, lxxii, 339-98 (with notes by Gilbert); The Gas Blow-Pipe, or Art of Fusion by Burning the Gaseous Constituents of Water, 1819 (109 pp. and plate of the apparatus); he mentions that Thomson called it the ‘oxy-hydrogen blow-pipe’. On Clarke, see [W. Otter], The Life and Remains of the Rev. Edward Daniel Clarke, Ll.D., Professor of Mineralogy in the University of Cambridge, 40, 1824; 2 vols. 8°, 1825 (portr., list of publications). Clarke published A Syllabus of Lectures on Mineralogy, Cambridge, 1807, London, 1818.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of London, UK

    J. R. Partington M.B.E., D.Sc. (Emeritus Professor of Chemistry, Fellow)

  2. Queen Mary College, London, UK

    J. R. Partington M.B.E., D.Sc. (Emeritus Professor of Chemistry, Fellow)

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© 1962 J. R. Partington

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Partington, J.R. (1962). Chemistry in Great Britain and Ireland. In: A History of Chemistry. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-00309-9_15

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