John Elliot, brother of Sir Gilbert Elliot 3rd Bt., (q.v.), went to sea in the AUGUSTA in 1745. He was made a lieutenant of the SCARBOROUGH in 1756 and gained promotion to command the HUSSAR in the following year under Hawke (q.v.) and then under Anson. In 1758 he commissioned the AEOLUS and in 1760 captured the small French squadron which was attempting a raid on Belfast. He was appointed to the GOSPORT, a forty-gun ship, but soon went back to his frigate off Brest. In 1761 he went to the Mediterranean in the Chichester. During the peace he commanded several ships and in 1777 was appointed to the TRIDENT which carried the Peace Commission of Lord Carlisle to Philadelphia. From the end of 1779 he commanded the EDGAR and was present at the first relief of Gibraltar. This was then followed by service in the Channel and in 1781, under Kempenfelt (1718-1782), he assisted in the capture of the French convoy. In 1782 Elliot went to the Romney. From 1786 to 1789 he was Governor and Commander-in-chief, Newfoundland, and in 1787 was made rear-admiral. He became a vice-admiral in 1790 and hoisted his flag in the Barfleur. Although promoted to admiral in 1795, he saw no further service.
Thomas Fremantle entered the Navy in 1777 and after service in the West Indies was promoted to lieutenant in 1782. He was promoted to captain in 1793 when he commissioned the Tartar frigate and went to the Mediterranean. He led the way into Toulon in 1793 and in the following year served under Nelson at the siege of Bastia, after which he commanded the INCONSTANT, in which he took part in the action off Toulon, March 1795, and in the blockade of the North Italian coast In 1797 he accompanied Nelson to the attack on Santa Cruz where both were severely wounded. Fremantle took part in the battle of Copenhagen in 1801 and was also at Trafalgar He returned to England in 1806, was made a Lord of the Admiralty until his appointment as Captain of the Royal Yacht in 1807. In 1810 he was promoted to rear-admiral and to a command in the Mediterranean, and in 1812 took command of the squadron in the Adriatic In 1818 he was appointed Commander-in-Chief, Mediterranean, and died at Naples. See Anne Parry, The Admirals Fremantle (London, 1971)
Furness Withy was incorporated as a company in 1891 upon the amalgamation of Christopher Furness' business in West Hartlepool and London with Edward Withy's shipbuilding yard in Hartlepool. By 1914 the company had acquired interests all over the world in liner and tramp shipping and in shipbuilding, but from 1920 they concentrated on liner services. In addition to the North Atlantic service, they developed other American routes based principally on New York and including Bermuda and the West Indies. The Furness Line to the Pacific coast of North America via Panama was started in 1921. An interest in the refrigerated meat trade with South America had begun before the First World War. The Argentine Cargo Line was formed in 1908 to acquire the freight contracts of the Anglo-Argentine Shipping Co. Two ships were managed by Birt, Potter and Hughes in agreement with Furness Withy and Manchester Liners, another subsidiary. The Line was amalgamated in 1912 with the newly formed British and Argentine Steam Navigation Co Ltd. In 1911 Furness Withy acquired a large holding in Houlder Brothers and the British and Argentine's vessels were operated in association with those of the Houlder Line. In 1914 the Furness-Houlder Argentine Lines was incorporated for the purpose of building a fleet of large, fast twin-screw steamers for the conveyance of chilled and frozen meat from the River Plate to London in conjunction with the Royal Mail Steam Packet Co, Furness Withy and Houlder Brothers. There were other additions to the company. The Prince Line was purchased in 1916 and with this services were developed to the Mediterranean and from New York to the Far East and the River Plate. The River Syndicate was incorporated in 1920 to acquire a controlling interest in the Danube shipping which had formerly belonged to South German, Austrian and Hungarian companies. The Syndicate (which formed the Danube Navigation Co Ltd in July 1920) went into voluntary liquidation in 1968. The break-up of the Royal Mail group in 1931 and 1932 led to the formation of a new company, Royal Mail Lines Ltd which became part of the Furness Withy Group. Later this was closely integrated with Furness Lines. In 1933 a substantial holding in the Shaw Savill Line was also acquired.
Miss Cicely Fox Smith, who had travelled in Canada and Africa, wrote a number of popular books on sailing ships of the last century. She was also a contributor to Punch for many years and well known for her attractive verses.
Miss Ganz taught dancing at Mr Littlejohn's Navy School between 1888 and 1898. Later she took pupils, many of whom were from the Royal Naval College, Greenwich.
After serving an apprenticeship of seven years to William Brown of Gillingham, William Godden of Chatham became a Fisherman and Dredgerman of the City of Rochester in 1821.
Greene entered the Admiralty as a Higher Division Clerk in 1881 From 1887 to 1892 he was Private Secretary to successive First Lords and became Principal Clerk in the Secretary's department in 1902. He was Assistant Secretary of the Admiralty, 1907 to 1911, in which year he became Permanent Secretary Considerable changes in the constitution of the Admiralty Board and other departments were made in 1917 and Greene became Secretary of the Ministry of Munitions, which post he held until his retirement in 1920.
Greet entered the Navy in 1867 and was promoted to midshipman in 1869. He served in the Pacific in the ZEALOUS and FAWN and was made a sub-lieutenant in 1874 He served in the JUNO, China Station, 1876 to 1877, and was promoted to lieutenant in 1878. He then spent the usual period at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich, before his appointment to the Tenedos in 1882. In 1887 he served in the IRON DUKE, Channel, and in the following year he was appointed to the CHAMPION, Pacific Station. He was promoted to commander in 1891, served in the Channel and, from 1896, at a training establishment, and was promoted to captain in 1897. He retired with the rank of rear-admiral in 1907 and became an admiral on the retired list in 1916.
F W G Grant, Shoreham Pilot and Captain, born 8th March 1905, at Southwick, Sussex, son of Frederick Grant (born 1866, discharged Ebenezer in 1890) and Ellen Grant (formerly Sayers). His Father was a Trinity House Pilot licensed for the London Outports District of Shoreham-by- Sea, Sussex. Captain FWG Grant was appointed a Trinity House Pilot. A former master of the Tug "Harold Brown" owned by the Shoreham Harbour Trustees in 1971. Mr Grant had a varied life as a deck boy before qualifying as a master.
Dr Philip Gosse (1879-1959) ended his career as Superintendent of the Radium Institute, London in 1930, after which he not only collected documents and books relating to piracy, but wrote many works on the subject.
Baillie Grohman joined the Navy in 1903, becoming a lieutenant in 1909. He served in the Mediterranean and on the China station, and during the First World War on the east coast, in the Dover Patrol and in minesweepers In 1922 and 1923 he served in the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea, and was made commander in the latter year He then became Senior Officer, First Minesweeping Flotilla, 1923 to 1924. He was promoted to captain in 1930 and between 1931 and 1933 was Senior Officer of a British Naval Mission to China. He then served in the Mediterranean, commanded a training establishment and at the beginning of the Second World War was again in the Mediterranean. He was promoted to rear-admiral in 1941 and in the same year was attached to the staff of the General Officer Commanding, Middle East. In 1942 he was nominated as Naval Force Commander for the Dieppe Raid, but, although he took part in the planning of the raid, he did not command it. Afterwards he became Flag Officer, Harwich, and in 1943 was promoted to vice-admiral, retiring in 1946.
Cuthbert Grasemann (d 1962) was a railwayman who rose to be Public Relations Officer of the Southern Railway, and later of the Southern Region of British Railways. He had a particular interest in the cross-channel ships and was co-author, with G.W.P. McLachlan, of English Channel Packet Boats (1939).
See sub-fonds level descriptions for individual biographies.
Fiott joined the Navy as a volunteer in 1798 and was present at the battle of Copenhagen, 1801. He took part in the Walcheren expedition of 1809 and in 1810 was made a lieutenant but court-martialled in the same year for using seditious language, dismissed his ship and put to the bottom of the Lieutenants' List. Soon afterwards, however, he was appointed to the MARLBOROUGH and served in the West Indies. After two years on half-pay he bought the QUEEN, a trading vessel, which was lost in 1818. From then until 1827 he owned the RETRENCH, sailing as master while still on half-pay until 1823. In this year the RETRENCH was attacked by Spanish pirates off Cuba. When he received a commission In 1823 to command HMS RENEGADE in the West Indies, he employed another half-pay naval captain on the Retrench, which was wrecked in 1824 but salvaged and, in 1827, sold In 1824 he was court-martialled again on various charges including that of mistreating his crew but was acquitted. From 1827 Fiott lived on the continent and remained there until his death.
Boyles became a lieutenant in 1777 and a captain in 1790. During the French wars he served in the West Indies, the Channel and the Mediterranean. He became a rear-admiral in 1809 and from 1810 to 1812 served in the Mediterranean, in the TRIDENT and the CANOPUS. He became a vice-admiral in 1814.
Hewett entered the navy in 1847, serving as midshipman in the second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852-3. In 1854 he was acting mate of the BEAGLE and in command of a Lancaster gun in the battery before Sevastopol, he gallantly opened fire on a Russian column ordered to spike the gun and withdraw the men. His action proved decisive using grapeshot and wheeling the gun around and firing within 300 yards. His involvement at Inkermen (5 Nov 1854) proved distinguished and Captain Lushington promoted him to Lieutenant and with seniority on 26 October 1854. He was also appointed Commander of the Beagle until 1857. One of the first recipients of the Victoria Cross for his conduct on 26 October and 5 November 1854, he appeared In the Gazette on 24 February 1857. Later Hewett was appointed commander of the ROYAL YACHT in 1858, then continued to command the VIPER, RINALDO and BASILISK. He was flag captain to Sir H Kellet in the OCEAN, 1870-2 and captain of DEVASTATION, 1872-3. From 1873-6 he was commodore and commander- in- chief on the west coast of Africa. He was made KCB on 31 March 1874 and later was also KCSI, chevalier of the Legion d?Honneur, member of the order of the Mejidiye and the Abyssinian order of Solomon. In 1877 he was appointed to the ACHILLES and commander-in- chief in the East Indies in April 1882. He became vice-admiral on 8 July 1884 and between 1886-8 was in command of the channel fleet. He was sent as a patient to Haslar Hospital, Gosport, where Hewett died on 13 May 1888.
See sub-fonds level descriptions for individual biographies.
After qualifying at Cambridge, Heald served in the Navy as a Temporary Surgeon, 1914 to 1915. He was in the ROHILLA, hospital ship, which was wrecked in 1914, and then the CONQUEROR. He was subsequently Principal Medical Officer, RAF, Middle East, and Medical Adviser, Department of Civil Aviation, Air Ministry. Dr Heald was Consulting Physician to the Royal Free Hospital and Consulting Physician, Rheumatic Diseases at the Middlesex Hospital.
Hammill entered the Navy in 1865, was made a lieutenant in 1871 and a commander in 1881. At the bombardment of Alexandria, 1882, he commanded the MONARCH and then the Naval Brigade. He later served with the Naval Brigade at Port Said. Hammill again served with a Naval Brigade during the Sudan Campaign of 1884 to 1885, when he accompanied the Nile Expedition despatched for the relief of General Gordon. He commanded the naval force south of Wadi Halfa during the passage of the steamers through the Second Cataract and served with the Nile Flotilla in surveying the Upper Nile. For these services he was promoted to captain in 1885. Hammill held various posts at the Admiralty between 1886 and 1892. He then returned to service afloat until his early death.
Montgomerie was a brother of Hugh Montgomerie, 12th Earl of Eglinton. The family intermarried with the Hamiltons of Rozelle, Ayrshire. The two families managed and commanded East India Company ships for nearly fifty years. Montgomerie was commander of the BESBOROUGH for three voyages, 1777 to 1788, and commander and managing owner of the BONHAM CASTLE on her first voyage, 1793 to 1794. He was managing owner of the ship for her next three voyages, between 1795 and 1801, which were made under the command of his cousin, John Hamilton.
E.S. Houlder started business as a ship and insurance broker in 1853 and soon began specializing in the Australian trade. when his brother joined him in 1856, the name Houlder Brothers and Company was adopted. They soon began owning ships and extended their regular service to Australia to New Zealand. The search for return cargoes led them to the Pacific Islands and by the end of the 1860s an interest in the carriage of contract cargoes resulted in voyages to India and South Africa. In 1881 the Company turned its attention to the South American trade and was responsible for the first shipments of frozen meat from the River Plate. The partnership became a limited liability company in 1898. In 1911, Furness Withy (q.v.) acquired a large holding of the Company's shares. Interests in the Australian and other trades were sold in 1912 and the Company concentrated its activities on the development and extension of its South American trade and in particular the River Plate meat trade. An associate company, Empire Transport Co Ltd, had been set up in 1902 and joint ventures with Furness Withy included: British & Argentine Steam Navigation Co Ltd, 1911 to 1933, British Empire Steam Navigation Co Ltd, 1914, and Furness Houlder Argentine Line Ltd, 1915. During the inter-war period oil tankers were added to the facilities for handling bulk cargoes. A large holding in the Alexander Shipping Co Ltd was purchased in 1938 and a controlling interest was acquired in 1947. After the Second World War, the interest in the South American trade was maintained and the bulk shipping activities were further diversified by the addition of ore carriers and gas tankers. Houlder Brothers became a wholly owned subsidiary of Furness Withy.
Sir John was the son of Sir William Herschel. He was Senior Wrangler at Cambridge and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1813 for his contributions to chemistry and mathematics. Through assisting his father he came to adopt astronomy as his career and went to live at the Cape of Good Hope from 1833 to 1838, making a star survey of the southern sky. The results of this work were published in 1847. On his return to England, Herschel became an active member of several scientific societies. He was employed as Master of the Mint from 1850 to 1855 and wrote many articles for the Encyclopaedia Britannica and other general works of reference. There is a translation of Gunther Buthman's 'The shadow of the telescope. A biography of John Herschel' by B E Pagel (New York, 1970).
Henslow entered the dockyard service as a shipwright apprentice to Sir Thomas Slade (d 1771). After a period at the Navy Office as a draughtsman, he moved quickly up the service as Master Boat Builder at Woolwich, 1762 to 1764, Purveyor of Chatham Yard, 1764 to 1765, and Master Caulker of Portsmouth, 1765 to 1767. In 1767 he was Second Assistant to the Master shipwright at Portsmouth and in 1771 was the Assistant to the Surveyor of the Navy. He was Master Shipwright at Plymouth, 1775 to 1784 In 1785 he was appointed Surveyor of the Navy, which post he held until 1806.
Horton-Smith was a barrister and joint founder and Secretary of the Imperial Maritime League, which was active between 1908 and 1913. It was founded as a protest against the British Navy League, which fully supported the actions of Lord Fisher. The Imperial Maritime League felt that the Navy League did not go far enough in its demands for the strengthening of British naval power. Horton-Smith was the author of numerous pamphlets on naval affairs.
Atlases, maps and plans - documents.
Hamilton entered the Navy in 1869 and served in the Bristol in the West Indies, 1870 to 1871, and then in the Ariadne in the Mediterranean, 1872. From 1877 to 1878 he served in the Martin training brig on a cruise to the West Indies. In 1878 he joined the Liffey which sailed to Coquimbo where the crew took over the Shah. On the return voyage Hamilton thus found himself as part of the Naval Brigade in the Zulu War of 1879, for which service he was mentioned in despatches. He was also made a lieutenant in this year. He then served in the Mediterranean in the Thunderer until 1881. In 1892 he was made a commander and appointed to the Hood, 1893 to 1896, in the Mediterranean. He was promoted to captain in 1898. In 1907 he was made rear-admiral and from 1914 to 1916 was Second Sea Lord. He then became Commander-in-Chief, Rosyth, in which command he died.
Hamilton entered the Navy in 1822 and became a lieutenant in 1829. Between 1826 and 1830 he served in the CAMBRIAN in the Mediterranean and on the South American Station. From 1839 he spent four years sheep farming in Australia. He was promoted to captain on the retired list in 1856.
Lieutenant-Colonel John Huskisson was the youngest son of Captain Thomas Huskisson (q.v.). He was appointed a second lieutenant in the Royal Marines in 1833 and served in the CAMBRIDGE, Mediterranean Station, from 1840 to 1842, being promoted to first lieutenant in 1842. He served in HMS OCEAN from 1844 to 1847 and then became Quartermaster of the Chatham Division, rising to captain in 1852. The outbreak of the Crimean War led to his appointment to the NANKIN, East Indies in 1854. He rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel, 1879, on the retired list and died ca.1889.
Jacques Vivier was probably a professional scribe working in Paris at the end of the 16th century. No further biographical information is currently available.
Pierre Seguin was born in 1566. He was a doctor in Paris; Professor of Surgery at the College Royal de France, 1594-1599; Professor of Medicine, 1599-1618 and 1623-1630; surgeon to King Louis XIII; and Principal Physician to the Queen-mother, Anne of Austria. He died in 1648.
Guy de Chauliac, a French surgeon, also known as Guido de Cauliaco, was one of the most famous surgical writers of the middle ages. At Avignon, he was physician to Pope Clement VI as well as two further popes. His major work Chirurgia magna (1363) was used as a manual by physicians for three centuries.
Charles Alexandre Lesueur was born in 1778, the son of a French naval officer. Aged 23, he sailed from his home at Le Havre, France, on an expedition to Australia and Tasmania. During the next 4 years, Lesueur and the naturalist François Péron collected over 100,000 zoological specimens representing 2,500 new species, and Lesueur made 1,500 drawings. Lesueur met William Maclure in 1815, and was persuaded to join him in Philadelphia where he lived until the end of 1825. Lesueur travelled on Maclure's 'Boatload of Knowledge' to Mount Vernon, Indiana, and then a few miles on to New Harmony. He remained there until 1837, when he returned to France. He was appointed curator of the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle du Havre in 1845, which was created to house his many drawings and paintings. He died in 1846.
Frederick Christian Lewis was born in London, in 1779. He was primarily a printmaker and engraver, and his prints were highly valued by his contemporaries. He became engraver of drawings to Princess Charlotte, Prince Leopold, George IV, William IV, and Queen Victoria. He also made tours in Europe producing various etchings. He died in Enfield, Middlesex, in 1856.
Biographical information regarding B A Vitry was unavailable at the time of compilation.
Sir Richard Owen was born in Lancaster, in 1804. He was educated at Lancaster Grammar School and then enlisted as a midshipman in the Royal Navy. He became interested in surgery He returned to Lancaster and became indentured to a local surgeon, in 1820. He entered the University of Edinburgh medical school, in 1824 and privately attended the lectures of Dr John Barclay. He moved to London and became apprentice to John Abernethy, surgeon, philosopher and President of the Royal College of Surgeons, in 1825. He became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons, in 1826. He became Assistant Curator of the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, in 1827, and commenced work cataloguing the collection. He set up a private practice in Lincoln's Inn Fields. He became lecturer on comparative anatomy at St Bartholomew's Hospital, in 1829. He met Georges Cuvier in 1830 and attended the 1831 debates between Cuvier and Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire, in Paris. He worked in the dissecting rooms and public galleries of the Jardin des Plantes, Paris, in 1831. He published anatomical work on the cephalopod Nautilus, and started the Zoological Magazine, in 1833. He worked on the fossil vertebrates brought back by Darwin on the Beagle. He became a Fellow of the Royal Society, in 1834; Hunterian Professor of Comparative Anatomy and Physiology, in 1836-1856; and gave his first series of Hunterian Lectures to the public, in 1837. He was awarded the Wollaston gold medal by the Geological Society, in 1838; helped found the Royal Microscopical Society, in 1839; and identified the extinct moa of New Zealand from a bone fragment, 1839. He refused a knighthood in 1842. He examined reptile-like fossil bones found in southern England which led him to identify "a distinct tribe or sub-order of Saurian Reptiles" he named Dinosauria, in 1842. He developed his concept of homology and of a common structural plan for all vertebrates or 'archetype'. He became Joint Conservator of the Hunterian Museum with William Clift, in 1842, and Conservator, in 1849. He was elected to 'The Club', founded by Dr Johnson, in 1845. He was a member of the government commission for inquiring into the health of London, in 1847, including Smithfield and other meat markets, in 1849. He described the anatomy of the newly discovered (in 1847) species of ape, the gorilla, [1865]. He engaged in a long running public debate with Thomas Henry Huxley on the evolution of humans from apes. He was a member of the preliminary Committee of organisation for the Great Exhibition of 1851. He was Superintendent of the natural history collections at the British Museum, in 1856, and began researches on the collections, publishing many papers on specimens. He was prosector for the London Zoo, dissecting and preserving any zoo animals that died in captivity. He taught natural history to Queen Victoria's children, in 1860. He reported on the first specimen of an unusual Jurassic bird fossil from Germany, Archaeopteryx lithographica, in 1863. He lectured on fossils at the Museum of Practical Geology, and he was Fullerian Professor of Physiology at the Royal Institution, during 1859-1861. His taxonomic work included a number of important discoveries, as he named and described a vast number of living and fossil vertebrates. He campaigned to make the natural history departments of the British Museum into a separate museum, leading to the construction of a new building in South Kensington to house the new British Museum (Natural History), opened in 1881; [now the Natural History Museum]. He was knighted in 1884. He died in Richmond in 1892.
Sir Everard Home was born in Hull, Yorkshire, in 1756. He was educated at Westminster School, and became a surgical pupil of his brother-in-law John Hunter (1728-1793), surgeon at St George's Hospital, London. Home qualified through the Company of Surgeons in 1778 and was appointed assistant surgeon in the new naval hospital at Plymouth. In 1779 he went to Jamaica as staff surgeon with the army, but on returning to England in 1784 he rejoined Hunter at St George's as assistant. He was elected FRS in 1787, and in the same year he became assistant surgeon at St George's Hospital. In 1790-1791 Home read lectures for Hunter and in the following year he succeeded Hunter as lecturer in anatomy. Home joined the army in Flanders in 1793, but returned just before Hunter's sudden death in 1793. He then became surgeon at St George's Hospital and was also joint executor of Hunter's will with Matthew Baillie, Hunter's nephew. In 1793-1794 they saw Hunter's important work, On the Blood, Inflammation and Gun-Shot Wounds, through the press and in 1794 Home approached Pitt's government to secure the purchase for the nation of Hunter's large collection of anatomical and pathological specimens. After protracted negotiations the collection was purchased for £15,000 in 1799 and presented to the College of Surgeons. In 1806 the collection was moved from Hunter's gallery in Castle Street to form the Hunterian Museum at the new site of the college in Lincoln's Inn Fields. Home was chief curator and William Clift, who had worked with Hunter since 1792, was retained as resident conservator. Clift also had charge of Hunter's numerous folios, drawings, and accounts of anatomical and pathological investigations, which were essential for a clear understanding of the collection. In the years following Hunter's death Home built up a large surgical practice and published more than one hundred papers of varying quality, some very good, mainly in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. The society awarded him its Copley medal in 1807. He gave the Croonian lectures fifteen times between 1794 and 1826. As Hunter's brother-in-law and executor he had great influence at the Royal College of Surgeons where he was elected to the court of assistants in 1801, an examiner in 1809, master in 1813 and 1821, and its first president in 1822. Having, with Matthew Baillie, endowed the Hunterian oration, he was the first Hunterian orator in 1814, and again in 1822. He became Keeper and a trustee of the Hunterian Museum in 1817 and was Professor of Anatomy and Surgery at the college from 1804 to 1813, and again in 1821. His Lectures on Comparative Anatomy were published in 1814 with a volume of plates from drawings by Clift. A further volume of lectures followed in 1823 accompanied by microscopical and anatomical drawings by Bauer and Clift. Two more volumes appeared in 1828. This work, although lacking in structure, is an important record of Hunter's investigations, especially the last two volumes. Home drew heavily on Hunter's work in the papers and books which he published after Hunter's death. Before the collection was presented to the Company of Surgeons in 1799 Home arranged for Clift to convey to his own house Hunter's folio volumes and fasciculi of manuscripts containing descriptions of the preparations and investigations connected with them. He promised to catalogue the collection, refusing help, but, despite repeated requests, only a synopsis appeared in 1818. B C Brodie says that Home was busily using Hunter's papers in preparing his own contributions for the Royal Society. Home himself later stated that he had published all of value in Hunter's papers and that his one hundred articles in Philosophical Transactions formed a catalogue raisonée of the Hunterian Museum. Home destroyed most of Hunter's papers in 1823. After his death in 1832, a parliamentary committee was set up to enquire into the details of this act of vandalism. Clift told this committee in 1834 that Home had used Hunter's papers extensively and had claimed that Hunter, when he was dying, had ordered him to destroy his papers. Yet Home, who was not present at Hunter's death, had kept the papers for thirty years. Clift also declared that he had often transcribed parts of Hunter's original work and drawings into papers which appeared under Home's name. Home produced a few of Hunter's papers which he had not destroyed and Clift had copied about half of the descriptions of preparations in the collection, consequently enough of Hunter's work survives to suggest that Home had often published Hunter's observations as his own. Although the full extent of Home's plagiarism cannot be determined, there is little doubt that it was considerable and this seriously damaged his reputation.
Sir Richard Owen was born in Lancaster, in 1804. He was educated at Lancaster Grammar School and then enlisted as a midshipman in the Royal Navy. He became interested in surgery He returned to Lancaster and became indentured to a local surgeon, in 1820. He entered the University of Edinburgh medical school, in 1824 and privately attended the lectures of Dr John Barclay. He moved to London and became apprentice to John Abernethy, surgeon, philosopher and President of the Royal College of Surgeons, in 1825. He became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons, in 1826. He became Assistant Curator of the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, in 1827, and commenced work cataloguing the collection. He set up a private practice in Lincoln's Inn Fields. He became lecturer on comparative anatomy at St Bartholomew's Hospital, in 1829. He met Georges Cuvier in 1830 and attended the 1831 debates between Cuvier and Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire, in Paris. He worked in the dissecting rooms and public galleries of the Jardin des Plantes, Paris, in 1831. He published anatomical work on the cephalopod Nautilus, and started the Zoological Magazine, in 1833. He worked on the fossil vertebrates brought back by Darwin on the Beagle. He became a Fellow of the Royal Society, in 1834; Hunterian Professor of Comparative Anatomy and Physiology, in 1836-1856; and gave his first series of Hunterian Lectures to the public, in 1837. He was awarded the Wollaston gold medal by the Geological Society, in 1838; helped found the Royal Microscopical Society, in 1839; and identified the extinct moa of New Zealand from a bone fragment, 1839. He refused a knighthood in 1842. He examined reptile-like fossil bones found in southern England which led him to identify "a distinct tribe or sub-order of Saurian Reptiles" he named Dinosauria, in 1842. He developed his concept of homology and of a common structural plan for all vertebrates or 'archetype'. He became Joint Conservator of the Hunterian Museum with William Clift, in 1842, and Conservator, in 1849. He was elected to 'The Club', founded by Dr Johnson, in 1845. He was a member of the government commission for inquiring into the health of London, in 1847, including Smithfield and other meat markets, in 1849. He described the anatomy of the newly discovered (in 1847) species of ape, the gorilla, [1865]. He engaged in a long running public debate with Thomas Henry Huxley on the evolution of humans from apes. He was a member of the preliminary Committee of organisation for the Great Exhibition of 1851. He was Superintendent of the natural history collections at the British Museum, in 1856, and began researches on the collections, publishing many papers on specimens. He was prosector for the London Zoo, dissecting and preserving any zoo animals that died in captivity. He taught natural history to Queen Victoria's children, in 1860. He reported on the first specimen of an unusual Jurassic bird fossil from Germany, Archaeopteryx lithographica, in 1863. He lectured on fossils at the Museum of Practical Geology, and he was Fullerian Professor of Physiology at the Royal Institution, during 1859-1861. His taxonomic work included a number of important discoveries, as he named and described a vast number of living and fossil vertebrates. He campaigned to make the natural history departments of the British Museum into a separate museum, leading to the construction of a new building in South Kensington to house the new British Museum (Natural History), opened in 1881; [now the Natural History Museum]. He was knighted in 1884. He died in Richmond in 1892.
Thomas James Poole was born in Bridgwater, in 1809. He was apprenticed as a surgeon to Anthony Huxtable and Henry Clark in 1825. He went on to receive his medical education at St Bartholemews hospital, and passed his LSA in 1830, and his MRCS in 1832. Poole practised around the Somerset area and was Medical Officer to the Bridgewater Union, fl 1847. He died in 1881.
Anthony Huxtable MRCS, was a surgeon, apothecary and accouchier apprenticed to John Ball in Williton, Somerset, in 1797. He was practising surgery in Bristol in 1825, and his address given as Union Street, King Square, Bristol in 1826.
Henry Clark was a surgeon, apothecary and accouchier practising in Bristol, in 1825.
Samuel Crompton was born in Berry Fold House, Over Darwen, Lancashire, in 1817. He was apprenticed to his uncle Samuel Barton, an opthalmic surgeon in Manchester (possibly 1790-1871; MRCS 1811 and FRCS 1844; surgeon to the Manchester Eye Hospital from 1815). He received his medical education partly at the Manchester School of Medicine, Pine Street, and St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, from 1838. He became a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, and a Licentiate of the Apothecaries Society in 1839, and later MD St Andrews, in 1862. He returned to Manchester to practice in 1840. He became surgeon to Henshaw's Blind Asylum, Old Trafford, c 1849. He was Consultant Physician at Salford Royal Hospital and Dispensary. He published a treatise entitled Results of an Investigation into the Causes of Blindness, with Practical Suggestions for the Preservation of the Eyesight, in 1849. He retired to Cranleigh, Surrey, in 1881. He died in 1891.
Hugh Owen Thomas was born in 1834. He came from 7 generations of bone-setters, originally from Anglesey in North Wales. He was apprenticed to his uncle, Dr Owen Roberts, at St Asaph in North Wales, in 1851. He studied medicine at Edinburgh University, and University College London. He become a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1857. He went to Liverpool in 1858, to help his father, and set up his own practice in 1859. He spent most of his working life in the slums of Liverpool treating the poor. From 1870, he ran a free clinic on Sundays, where he treated dockers, shipyard workers and seamen. In the treatment of tuberculosis and fractures, he strongly advocated the use of rest which should be 'enforced, uninterrupted and prolonged'. His ideas were published in Diseases of the hip, knee and ankle joints, with their deformities (1875). This was at a time when it was often suggested that excision or amputation were the solution for chronic bone disorders. In order to achieve rest and immobilisation he invented several types of splints that were manufactured in his own work shop by both a blacksmith and a saddler. He also invented a wrench for the reduction of fractures and an osteoclast to break and reset bones. He was elected a member of the Liverpool Medical Institution in 1876, published many works on orthopaedic surgery, and was given an honorary degree by the University of St Louis. He died in 1891.
Sir Anthony Carlisle was born in Stillington, Durham, in 1768. He was sent to his maternal uncle, Anthony Hubback, in York, for medical training. Following his uncle's death Carlisle transferred to a Durham surgeon, William Green, in 1784. Carlisle went to London in the late 1780s, and attended lectures by John Hunter, Matthew Baillie and others. He became the house pupil of Henry Watson, and on Watson's death succeeded him to the post of surgeon to the Westminster Hospital, in 1793. He began offering lectures on surgery in 1794, hoping to establish a formal medical school there. He advocated the systematic collection and publishing of hospital statistics. He was active in securing the collections of John Hunter for the Royal College of Surgeons, during the 1790s. He was one of the original members of the College in 1800. He sat on Council and the Court of Examiners. He served as Vice-President and twice as President (1829 and 1839). He delivered the Hunterian Oration in 1820. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1804. With William Nicholson, he electrolyzed water into its constituent gases and communicated this to the Royal Society in 1800. He secured the post of Professor of Anatomy at the Royal Academy in 1808, and also studied art there. He was appointed surgeon to the Duke of Gloucester and then surgeon-extraordinary to the Prince Regent (later King George IV). He was investigated but exonerated for three cases of neglect in 1838. He opposed male midwives on the grounds of modesty and incompetence. He died in 1840.
Sir Charles Blicke was born in 1745. He trained at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, and was elected assistant surgeon in 1779. John Abernethy became his apprentice in 1779. Blicke became surgeon in 1787. He was a member of the Court of Assistants at Surgeon's Hall and in 1803 was knighted and became Master of the Royal College of Surgeons in London. The Court of Assistants gave their thanks to him in 1811, for his work as Treasurer during the building of the College. He died in London, in 1815.
William Sharpe was a former member of Court but no further biographical information was available at the time of compilation.
Richard Phillips Jones was born in c 1797. He was educated at St George's Hospital. He entered as a 12 month pupil of Sir Everard Home, in 1817. He became MRCS in 1819. He obtained his MD from Glasgow, in 1821. He was a member of a Medical Board attending those dying of cholera in Wales, in 1832. He was appointed Honorary Physician to the Chester General Infirmary, in 1835. He became Physician to the Denbighshire General Dispensary and Asylum for Recovery of Health. He was appointed JP for the City of Chester and County of Denbigh, in 1845. He was Mayor of Chester, 1846-1848 and 1852-1853. He became FRCS in 1858. He also became Consulting Physician and Honorary Governor of the Chester General Infirmary, in 1861. He died in 1867.
Berkeley George Andrew Moynihan was born in Malta, in 1865. He moved with his mother to Leeds, in 1867. He was educated in Leeds, and then at the Blue Coat School, Newgate Street, London from 1875-1881. He studied at the Royal Naval School, Eltham, from 1881-1883, and then proceeded to the Medical School of Yorkshire College, in Leeds. He graduated MB at the University of London in 1887, and became a Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England the same year. He passed the examination for the Fellowship in 1890, and for Master of Surgery in 1893, being awarded the gold medal. After serving as house surgeon at the Leeds General Infirmary in 1887, he acted as demonstrator of anatomy in the Medical School from 1893-1896. He was elected assistant surgeon to the infirmary in 1896, was surgeon from 1906, and consulting surgeon from 1927 until his death. He was lecturer in surgery from 1896-1909, and from 1909-1927 he was professor of clinical surgery in the University of Leeds. At the Royal College of Surgeons of England, Moynihan was appointed an examiner in anatomy on the board of examiners in anatomy and physiology for the Fellowship in 1899. He gave three lectures as Arris and Gale lecturer in 1899, and three lectures in 1900. In 1920 he gave a lecture as Hunterian professor of surgery and pathology, and in the same year delivered the Bradshaw lecture. He was Hunterian Orator in 1927. He served on the Council of the College from 1912-1933, and was elected President, 1926-1931. During World War One, he held the rank of major à la suite attached to the 2nd Northern General Hospital of the Territorial RAMC, with a commission dated 14 Oct 1908. He was gazetted temporary colonel, AMS, in 1914, and served in France. On demobilization in 1919 he was holding the rank of major-general. He had been chairman of the Army Advisory Board form 1916, and chairman of the council of consultants 1916-1919. He died in 1936.
Alexander Monro, secundus, was born in Edinburgh in 1733. He was the third son of Alexander Monro, primus, (1697-1767), Professor of Medicine and Anatomy at Edinburgh University. From an early age Alexander was designated as his father's successor as Professor of Medicine and his father took his education very seriously. Monro secundus' name first appears on his father's anatomy class list in 1744. The following year he matriculated in the Faculty of Arts at Edinburgh University. He began attending medical lectures in 1750. In 1753, still a student, he took over the teaching of his father's summer anatomy class and at his father's instigation was named joint Professor of Medicine and Anatomy in 1754. He graduated MD in 1755, and then went on an anatomical grand tour, studying in London with William Hunter, and in Berlin with Johann Friedrick Meckel. He matriculated on 17 Sep at Leiden University and became friends with Albinus. His tour was interrupted when his father's recurring illness brought him home to take up the duties of the professorship in 1758. He became a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh in 1759. In the 50 years he taught at Edinburgh University Monro secundus became the most influential anatomy professor in the English speaking world, lecturing daily from 1 to 3pm, in the 6-month winter session. He spent every morning preparing for his class anatomical specimens from his own extensive collection. When the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh attempted to institute a professorship of surgery Monro acted vigorously to protect his chair, protesting to the town council against such a step. He succeeded in 1777 in having the title of his own professorship formally changed to the Chair of Medicine, Anatomy and Surgery, preventing the establishment of a course of surgery in Edinburgh for thirty years. The anatomical research which secured Monro's posthumous medical reputation was his description of the communication between the lateral ventricles of the brain, now known as the foramen of Monro. He first noted it in a paper read before the Philosophical Scoiety of Edinburgh in 1764. Monro was a member of the Harveian Society (a medical supper club), secretary to the Philosophical Society of Edinburgh, a manager of the Royal Infirmary, and district commissioner for the city of Edinburgh. He married Katherine Inglis on 25 September 1762, and they had two daughters and three sons. The eldest son Alexander Monro tertius (1773-1859), succeeded his father as Professor of Medicine, Anatomy and Surgery. Monro secundus died in 1817.
Allen Thomson was born in 1809. He was the grandson of John Thomson (1765-1846), Professor of Military Surgery, and of General Pathology at the University of Edinburgh. He was also the first Professor of Surgery at the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. Allen Thomson was educated in Edinburgh, graduating MD in 1830. He then travelled to Europe, visiting Amsterdam, Strasbourg and Berlin, where he studied anatomical and pathological museums before returning to Edinburgh in 1831, as Lecturer in Anatomy and Physiology. He set up a teaching partnership with William Sharpey, where he taught the physiology, and Sharpey taught anatomy. The partnership lasted until 1836 when Sharpey was appointed Professor of Anatomy at University College London. Thomson became a Fellow of the Edinburgh College in 1832. He travelled to London and Europe for further anatomical study in 1833. He became Private Physician to the Duke of Bedford and his family in 1837, before being appointed to the Chair of Anatomy in Aberdeen in 1839. He returned to Edinburgh to become a teacher of anatomy in the extramural school in 1841, and then became Professor of Institutes of Medicine (Physiology) at the University of Edinburgh. One of the innovations that he introduced on his return to Edinburgh was to use the microscope in the teaching of anatomy. He became Chair of Anatomy at the University of Glasgow in 1848, until his retirement in 1877. By the time of appointment to Glasgow he had amassed a large collection of material for anatomical and physiological teaching which was added to the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1838, and of London in 1848, later becoming President of that Scoiety. He became President of the British Association in 1876, and was honoured with the degrees of LLD from the universities of Edinburgh and Glasgow. He died in 1884.
George Porter was born in Stainforth, Yorkshire, in 1920. He was educated at Thorne Grammar School 1931-1938, and was Ackroyd Scholar at the University of Leeds, 1938-1941. He served as a Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve Radar Officer in the Western Approaches and the Mediterranean from 1941 to 1945. In 1949 he married Stella Jean Brooke and they had two sons, John Brooke and Andrew Christopher George. In 1945 he went to the University of Cambridge to research chemical kinetics and photochemistry. He stayed at Cambridge until 1954 when he became Assistant Director of the British Rayon Research Association in Manchester. He studied the problems of dye fading and phototendering of fabrics. He was Professor of Chemistry at the University of Sheffield from 1955 to 1963 and became Firth Professor of Chemistry there from 1963 to 1966. He was also Professor of Chemistry at the Royal Institution of Great Britain (RI) from 1963 to 1966. In 1966 he became Director of the RI as well as Fullerian Professor of Chemistry of the Davy Faraday Research Laboratory at the RI. He researched into applying flash photolysis to the problem of photosynthesis and extended it to the nanosecond and picoseocnd regions. He remained Director of the RI until 1985 and during this time, he gave many lectures including several broadcasts on television. He published many papers and also books such as Chemistry for the Modern World, 1962 and Chemistry in Microtime, 1996. He received many awards for his work, gaining the Davy medal in 1971, the Rumford medal in 1978, the Michael Faraday medal in 1991 and the Copley medal in 1992. In 1967 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry with M. Eigen and R. G. W. Norrish. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1960 and became President of the Royal Society in 1985 until 1990. He became Chairman of the Centre for Photomolecular Sciences, at Imperial College London in 1990. He was knighted in 1972, awarded the Order of Merit in 1989 and made a life peer in 1990.
William Crookes was born the son of Joseph Crookes, tailor, and Mary Scott in London, in 1832. His education was irregular but eventually he attended A W Hofmann's Royal College of Chemistry in London in 1848. In 1850 he became Hofmann's assistant until 1854. He attended lectures at the Royal Institution of Great Britain (RI) given by Michael Faraday (1791-1867). In 1854 he was Superintendent of the Meteorological Department of the Radcliffe Astronomical Observatory in Oxford. In 1854 he worked with John Spiller on the collodion process of photography and improved it. In 1855 he taught chemistry at the College of Science in Chester. In 1856, he researched into photography and compiled a Handbook to the Waxed-Paper Process in Photography (Chapman and Hall, 1857). He also undertook the editorship of the Liverpool Photographic Journal in 1856, and in 1857 he became Secretary of the London Photographic Society, a position he held until 1858. He was also the editor and proprietor of the weekly Chemical News journal from 1859. In 1856 he married Ellen Humphrey and they subsequently had ten children. Crookes researched into spectra and in 1861 he discovered a new element which he called thallium. In 1863 he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society (RS). In 1865 he discovered the process of extracting precious metals from ores, however it had already been discovered in America and Crookes had to negotiate half rights over patents for using sodium amalgam, only to be superseded by the discovery of potassium cyanide as the best solvent of gold. From 1867 he became interested in spiritualism, which affected his views on science. By 1870 he decided to investigate spiritualism as a scientist and prove the existence of psychic force, an investigation which caused him to lose some respect as a scientist. Despite this, he developed the technique of determining the atomic weight of thallium. In 1873 he wrote the paper `Attraction and Repulsion resulting from Radiation' published in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society; this resulted in his invention of the radiometer in 1875. In 1876 he researched into radiant matter and found that molecular pressure was the result of radiant matter being affected by magnets. In the 1880s he worked on incandescent lamps for electricity. He became Director of the Electric Light and Power Company in 1881 and patented his designs on incandescent lamps, however he sold these as newer and better designs developed. In c1891 he became Director and later Chairman of the Notting Hill Electric Light Company which prospered in its time. In 1890 he was elected President of the Institution of Electrical Engineers. In 1897 he was elected President of the Society for Psychical Research and in the same year he was knighted. He gave lectures on making diamonds at the RI in 1897 and became its Honorary Secretary in 1900 a position he held until 1912. In 1908 he was elected Foreign Secretary of the RS until 1913 when he was elected President of the RS, a position he held until 1915. He published papers in journals such as Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, as well as Proceedings of the Royal Society and in Chemical News. He died in 1919.
William Hasledine Pepys was born the son of W H Pepys, cutler and maker of surgical instruments, in London, in 1775. His educational background is not known. In 1796 he founded the Askesian Society, which led to the foundation of the British Mineralogical Society, the Geological Society and the London Institution, in Finsbury Square, London. He was an original manager of the London Institution and was Honorary Secretary from 1821 to 1824. He became the Treasurer and Vice-President of the Geological Society. He worked on soda-water apparatus in 1798 and also researched into using mercury contacts for electrical apparatus and tubes coated in India rubber to convey gases, inventing the mercury gasometer as a result. In 1807 he invented a type of eudiometer, and in 1808 he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society. He extended his father's business into making instruments for the philosophical discipline. He was active in the management of the Royal Institution of Great Britain (RI) and was its Vice-President in 1816. He published papers of his work in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, and in Philosophical Magazine with William Allen (1770-1843). He was a Quaker and he died in Kensington, London in 1856.
William Lawrence Bragg was born the son of William Henry Bragg, physicist and Gwendoline Todd, in Adelaide, Australia, in 1890. As a child, he attended Queen's preparatory school and St Peter's College in Adelaide. He went to the University of Adelaide at the age of 15 in order to study mathematics and graduated in 1908 in physics and chemistry. In 1909 he came to England with his family and went to study at Cambridge. In 1910 he gained first class honours in part one of the mathematical Tripos and subsequently gained a first in part two of the physics Tripos in 1912. In 1914 he became a Fellow and lecturer in Natural Sciences at Trinity College Cambridge. He began researching under J. J. Thomson and worked on the reflection of x-ray waves by planes of atoms in crystals, in order to reveal the position of atoms thus developing crystal analysis. The relationship between the angle of incidence and wavelength, and between parallel atomic planes is known as Bragg's Angle' orBragg's Law'. He worked on crystal structure and its arrangement in sodium and potassium. He also worked with his father, William Henry Bragg, particularly on the structure of diamond, resulting in a joint publication in 1915 called X-Rays and Crystal Structure. It was for this work with his father that he jointly won the Nobel Prize for physics in 1915, and at 25 years old, he remains the youngest ever winner of the Nobel Prize. During the First World War and until 1919, William Lawrence (he was known as Lawrence in order to distinguish him from his father) primarily served in the Royal Horse Artillery until he became Technical Adviser to the Map Section in order to research into sound ranging to locate enemy guns. In 1919 he became Langworthy Professor of Physics at the University of Manchester, a position he held until 1937. He set up the School of Crystallography at Manchester and introduced the study of atomic radii, x-ray diffraction, scattering atoms, analysing structures, branch of optics, order-disorder changes and metals, alloys and silicate. He developed quantitative crystallography and worked on the structure of minerals and later, protein. In 1921 he married Alice Hopkins and they had four children, Stephen Lawrence, David William, Margaret Alice and Patience Mary. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1921. In 1937 he became Director of the National Physics Laboratory, but only until 1938 when he became Cavendish Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Cambridge. He held this position until 1953 having reorganised the Cavendish Laboratory into separate branches of physics. It was split into nuclear physics, low temperature physics, radio physics, crystallography and metal physics. Whilst at Cambridge, he realised the potential of using crystal analysis on living cells, after Max Perutz had shown him an x-ray photograph of haemoglobin. In the Second World War, Lawrence became a consultant to the sound ranging section of the army, and also to the Admiralty on underwater detection using sound waves (known as asdic or sonar). He was also on the Ministry of Supply Committee and assisted the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. In 1941 he went to Ottawa, Canada as a scientific liaison officer for the war effort. In 1941 he was knighted. From 1939 to 1943, he was President of the Institute of Physics, whereby he promoted x-ray research and also became the first President of the International Union of Crystallography. In 1947 he helped set up what became the Medical Research Council Laboratory of molecular biology at the Cavendish laboratory, Cambridge. Under his direction, Francis Crick and James Watson determined the double helix structure of DNA. In 1953 he became Fullerian Professor of Chemistry at the Royal Institution of Great Britain (RI). In 1954 he became Director of the Davy-Faraday Research Laboratory at the RI, and developed it into a major centre for x-ray analysis. He was the first person to be denominated Director of the RI. He introduced corporate membership to the RI and performed lectures on television for the first time. He worked closely with Max Perutz and John Kendrew at Cambridge (who gained a Nobel Prize for their work on proteins) and under his guidance David Phillips (later Lord), determined the structure of lysozyme in 1965 which was the first enzyme to have its structure identified. Lawrence was Chairman of the Frequency Advisory Committee from 1958 to 1960. He retired from the RI in 1966, but continued to lecture there until 1971. He gained several medals in his career including the Hughes medal in 1931, the Royal Medal in 1946 and the Copley medal in 1966 from the Royal Society. He published many articles and books such as `The Diffraction of Short Electromagnetic Waves by a Crystal' in Proceedings of the Cambridge Philosophical Society, 1912; The Crystalline State in 1934 and others in journals such as Philosophical Magazine, Transactions of the Faraday Society and Proceedings of the Royal Society. Lawrence died near Waldringfield, Suffolk in 1971.
Bawden was born in North Tawton, Devon, and educated at local grammar schools and Emmanuel College, Cambridge, 1926-1930, where he read for Part I of the Natural Sciences Tripos and the Cambridge Diploma in Agricultural Science. After graduating from Cambridge he worked as Research Assistant to R.N. Salaman at the Potato Virus Research Institute in Cambridge. In 1936 he moved to Rothamsted Experimental Station, Hertfordshire, as Virus Physiologist, and became successively Head of the Plant Pathology Department, 1940-1958, Deputy Director, 1950-1958, and Director from 1958 to his death. Bawden served on many committees, and on the Council of the Royal Society of which he was also Treasurer. He lectured and travelled widely and was frequently invited to advise on overseas agricultural projects. He was elected FRS in 1949 (Leeuwenhoek Lecture 1959) and knighted in 1967.
Blagden was born at Wotton-Under-Edge, Gloucestershire. He studied medicine at Edinburgh and received his M.D. in 1768. He was elected FRS in 1772 and served as a medical officer in the British Army from about 1776 to 1780. He was Henry Cavendish's assistant from 1782 to 1789, from whom he received an annuity and a considerable legacy. Blagden succeeded Paul Henry Maty as Secretary of the Royal Society in 1784 (while the Society was divided over the efficacy of its President, Sir Joseph Banks, a close friend of Blagden's), serving until 1797. Both in this capacity and as Cavendish's assistant he became involved in the prolonged 'water controversy' - who had priority in discovering the composition of water, claimed by both Cavendish and James Watt in England and A L Lavoisier in France. Blagden admitted responsibility for conveying, quite well-meaningly, word of the experiments and conclusions of both Cavendish and Watt to Lavoisier; and he overlooked errors of date in the printing of Cavendish's and Watt's papers. His experiments on the effects of dissolved substances on the freezing point of water led to what became known as 'Blagden's Law', where he concluded that salt lowers the freezing point of water in the simple inverse ratio of the proportion the water bears to it in the solution. In fact Richard Watson had first discovered the relationship in 1771. Blagden spent much of his time in Europe, particularly in France, where he had many friends among French scientists such as C L Berthollet. He died in Arcueil in 1820. He was knighted in 1792.