Regency Personalities Series-Sir John Herschel

Regency Personalities Series
In my attempts to provide us with the details of the Regency, today I continue with one of the many period notables.

Sir John Herschel
7 March 1792 – 11 May 1871

John Herschel

Herschel was born in Slough, Berkshire, the son of Mary Baldwin and William Herschel. He studied shortly at Eton College and St John’s College, Cambridge, graduating as Senior Wrangler in 1813. It was during his time as an undergraduate that he became friends with Charles Babbage and George Peacock. He took up astronomy in 1816, building a reflecting telescope with a mirror 18 inches (460 mm) in diameter and with a 20-foot (6.1 m) focal length. Between 1821 and 1823 he re-examined, with James South, the double stars catalogued by his father. For this work, in 1826 he was presented with the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society (which he won again in 1836), and with the Lalande Medal of the French Academy of Sciences in 1825, while in 1821 the Royal Society bestowed upon him the Copley Medal for his mathematical contributions to their Transactions. Herschel was made a Knight of the Royal Guelphic Order in 1831.

He served as President of the Royal Astronomical Society three times: 1827–1829, 1839–1841 and 1847–1849.

His A preliminary discourse on the study of natural philosophy published early in 1831 as part of Dionysius Lardner’s Cabinet cyclopædia set out methods of scientific investigation with an orderly relationship between observation and theorising. He described nature as being governed by laws which were difficult to discern or to state mathematically, and the highest aim of natural philosophy was understanding these laws through inductive reasoning, finding a single unifying explanation for a phenomenon. This became an authoritative statement with wide influence on science, particularly at the University of Cambridge where it inspired the student Charles Darwin with “a burning zeal” to contribute to this work.

He published a catalogue of his astronomical observations in 1864, as the General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters, a compilation of his own work and that of his father’s, expanding on the senior Hershel’s Catalogue of Nebulae. A further complementary volume was published posthumously, as the General Catalogue of 10,300 Multiple and Double Stars.

He also conceptualizes a practical contact lens design in 1823.

Declining an offer from the Duke of Sussex that they travel to South Africa on a Navy ship, Herschel and his wife paid £500 for passage on the S.S. Mountstuart Elphinstone, a ship of 611 tons, which departed from Portsmouth on 13 November 1833. The voyage to South Africa was made in order to catalogue the stars, nebulae, and other objects of the southern skies. This was to be a completion as well as extension of the survey of the northern heavens undertaken initially by his father William Herschel. He arrived in Cape Town on 15 January 1834 and set up a private 21 ft (6.4 m) telescope at Feldhausen at Claremont, a suburb of Cape Town. Amongst his other observations during this time was that of the return of Comet Halley. Herschel collaborated with Thomas Maclear, the Astronomer Royal at the Cape of Good Hope and the members of the two families became close friends.

In addition to his astronomical work, however, this voyage to a far corner of the British empire also gave Herschel an escape from the pressures under which he found himself in London, where he was one of the most sought-after of all British men of science. While in southern Africa, he engaged in a broad variety of scientific pursuits free from a sense of strong obligations to a larger scientific community. It was, he later recalled, probably the happiest time in his life.

In an extraordinary departure from astronomy, he combined his talents with those of his wife, Margaret, and between 1834 and 1838 they produced 131 botanical illustrations of fine quality, showing the Cape flora. Herschel used a camera lucida to obtain accurate outlines of the specimens and left the details to his wife. Even though their portfolio had been intended as a personal record, and despite the lack of floral dissections in the paintings, their accurate rendition makes them more valuable than contemporary collections. Some 112 of the 132 known flower studies were collected and published as “Flora Herscheliana” in 1996.

As their home during their stay in the Cape, the Herschels had selected ‘Feldhausen'(“Field Houses”), an old estate on the south-eastern side of Table Mountain. Here John set up his reflector to begin his survey of the southern skies. Herschel, meanwhile, read widely. Intrigued by the ideas of gradual formation of landscapes set out in Charles Lyell’s Principles of Geology, he wrote to Lyell on 20 February 1836 praising the book as a work that would bring “a complete revolution in [its] subject, by altering entirely the point of view in which it must thenceforward be contemplated” and opening a way for bold speculation on “that mystery of mysteries, the replacement of extinct species by others.” Herschel himself thought catastrophic extinction and renewal “an inadequate conception of the Creator” and by analogy with other intermediate causes, “the origination of fresh species, could it ever come under our cognizance, would be found to be a natural in contradistinction to a miraculous process”. He prefaced his words with the couplet:

He that on such quest would go must know not fear or failing
To coward soul or faithless heart the search were unavailing.
Taking a gradualist view of development and referring to the evolution of language, he commented
“Words are to the Anthropologist what rolled pebbles are to the Geologist — battered relics of past ages often containing within them indelible records capable of intelligent interpretation — and when we see what amount of change 2000 years has been able to produce in the languages of Greece & Italy or 1000 in those of Germany France & Spain we naturally begin to ask how long a period must have lapsed since the Chinese, the Hebrew, the Delaware & the Malesass [Malagasy] had a point in common with the German & Italian & each other — Time! Time! Time! — we must not impugn the Scripture Chronology, but we must interpret it in accordance with whatever shall appear on fair enquiry to be the truth for there cannot be two truths. And really there is scope enough: for the lives of the Patriarchs may as reasonably be extended to 5000 or 50000 years apiece as the days of Creation to as many thousand millions of years.”

The document was circulated, and Charles Babbage incorporated extracts in his ninth and unofficial Bridgewater Treatise, which postulated laws set up by a divine programmer. When HMS Beagle called at Cape Town, Captain Robert FitzRoy and the young naturalist Charles Darwin visited Herschel on 3 June 1836. Later on, Darwin would be influenced by Herschel’s writings in developing his theory advanced in The Origin of Species. In the opening lines of that work, Darwin writes that his intent is “to throw some light on the origin of species — that mystery of mysteries, as it has been called by one of our greatest philosophers”, referring to Herschel.

Herschel returned to England in 1838, was created a baronet, of Slough in the County of Buckingham, and published Results of Astronomical Observations made at the Cape of Good Hope in 1847. In this publication he proposed the names still used today for the seven then-known satellites of Saturn: Mimas, Enceladus, Tethys, Dione, Rhea, Titan, and Iapetus. In the same year, Herschel received his second Copley Medal from the Royal Society for this work. A few years later, in 1852, he proposed the names still used today for the four then-known satellites of Uranus: Ariel, Umbriel, Titania, and Oberon.

Herschel made numerous important contributions to photography. He made improvements in photographic processes, particularly in inventing the cyanotype process and variations (such as the chrysotype), the precursors of the modern blueprint process. In 1839, he made a photograph on glass, which still exists, and experimented with color reproduction, noting that rays of different parts of the spectrum tended to impart their own color to a photographic paper. Herschel made experiments using photosensitive emulsions of vegetable juices, called phytotypes and published his discoveries in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London in 1842. He collaborated in the early 1840s with Henry Collen, portrait painter to Queen Victoria. Herschel originally discovered the platinum process on the basis of the light sensitivity of platinum salts, later developed by William Willis.

Herschel coined the term photography in 1839. He may, however, have been preceded by Brazilian Hércules Florence, who used the French equivalent, photographie, in private notes which one historian dates to 1834. Herschel was also the first to apply the terms negative and positive to photography.

He discovered sodium thiosulfate to be a solvent of silver halides in 1819, and informed Talbot and Daguerre of his discovery that this “hyposulphite of soda” (“hypo”) could be used as a photographic fixer, to “fix” pictures and make them permanent, after experimentally applying it thus in early 1839. His ground-breaking research on the subject was read at the Royal Society in London in March 1839 and January 1840.

Herschel wrote many papers and articles, including entries on meteorology, physical geography and the telescope for the eighth edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. He also translated the Iliad of Homer.

He invented the actinometer in 1825 to measure the direct heating power of the sun’s rays, and his work with the instrument is of great importance in the early history of photochemistry.

He proposed a correction to the Gregorian calendar, making years that are multiples of 4000 not leap years, thus reducing the average length of the calendar year from 365.2425 days to 365.24225. Although this is closer to the mean tropical year of 365.24219 days, his proposal has never been adopted because the Gregorian calendar is based on the mean time between vernal equinoxes (currently 365.2424 days).

In 1836, he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

In 1835, the New York Sun newspaper wrote a series of satiric articles that came to be known as the Great Moon Hoax, with statements falsely attributed to Herschel about his supposed discoveries of animals living on the Moon, including batlike winged humanoids.

He married Margaret Brodie Stewart (1810–1884) on 3 March 1829 at Edinburgh and was father of the following children:

1. Caroline Emilia Elizabeth Herschel (31 March 1830 – 29 Jan 1909), who married Alexander Hamilton-Gordon
2. Isabella Herschel (5 June 1831 – 1893)
3. Sir William James Herschel, 2nd Bt. (9 January 1833 – 1917),
4. Margaret Louisa Herschel (1834–1861), an accomplished artist
5. Prof. Alexander Stewart Herschel (1836–1907), FRS
6. Col. John Herschel FRS, FRAS, (1837–1921) surveyor
7. Marie Sophie Herschel (1839–1929)
8. Amelia Herschel (1841–1926) married Sir Thomas Francis Wade, diplomat and sinologist
9. Julia Edith Herschel (1842–1933) married on 4 June 1878 to Captain (later Admiral) John Fiot Lee Pearse Maclear
10. Matilda Rose Herschel (1844–1914)
11. Francisca Herschel (1846–1932)
12. Constance Ann Herschel (1855–20 June 1939)

On his death at Collingwood, his home near Hawkhurst in Kent, he was given a national funeral and buried in Westminster Abbey.

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Regency Personalities Series-John Hudson

Regency Personalities Series
In my attempts to provide us with the details of the Regency, today I continue with one of the many period notables.

John Hudson
1773 – 31 October 1843

John Hudson was the son of John Hudson, a farmer at Haverbrack in the parish of Beetham. He attended Heversham School and entered Trinity College, Cambridge in 1793. He became senior wrangler in 1797, also winning the Smith’s prize in that year, and obtained his MA in 1800.

He became a Fellow, in 1798, and tutor, in 1807, of Trinity College, Cambridge, where he notably tutored George Peacock: he also tutored John Martin Frederick Wright. In 1815, he became the vicar of Kendal, Westmoreland. In 1815, he married the daughter of an army officer by the name of Culliford.

At Cambridge, Hudson also tutored Charles James Blomfield who became a prominent bishop. As a bishop, Blomfield visited Hudson’s parish and at a dinner party declared “I remember well, Mr. Hudson, how much I stood in awe of you at College.” To which Hudson retorted, “Perhaps so, but your Lordship has turned the tables on me now.”

Hudson died at Haverbrack, Tuesday, October 31, 1843 at the age of 71 and was buried in the interior of the parish church at Kendal.

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Regency Personalities Series-George Peacock

Regency Personalities Series
In my attempts to provide us with the details of the Regency, today I continue with one of the many period notables.

George Peacock
9 April 1791 – 8 November 1858

George Peacock

George Peacock
Peacock was born on 9 April 1791 at Thornton Hall, Denton, near Darlington, County Durham. His father, the Rev. Thomas Peacock, was a clergyman of the Church of England, incumbent and for 50 years curate of the parish of Denton, where he also kept a school. In early life Peacock did not show any precocity of genius, and was more remarkable for daring feats of climbing than for any special attachment to study. Initially, he received his elementary education from his father and then at Sedbergh School, and at 17 years of age, he was sent to Richmond School under Dr. Tate, a graduate of Cambridge University. At this school he distinguished himself greatly both in classics and in the rather elementary mathematics then required for entrance at Cambridge. In 1809 he became a student of Trinity College, Cambridge.

In 1812 Peacock took the rank of Second Wrangler, and the second Smith’s prize, the senior wrangler being John Herschel. Two years later he became a candidate for a fellowship in his college and won it immediately, partly by means of his extensive and accurate knowledge of the classics. A fellowship then meant about pounds 200 a year, tenable for seven years provided the Fellow did not marry meanwhile, and capable of being extended after the seven years provided the Fellow took clerical orders, which Peacock did in 1819.

The year after taking a Fellowship, Peacock was appointed a tutor and lecturer of his college, which position he continued to hold for many years. Peacock, in common with many other students of his own standing, was profoundly impressed with the need of reforming Cambridge’s position ignoring the differential notation for calculus, and while still an undergraduate formed a league with Babbage and Herschel to adopt measures to bring it about. In 1815 they formed what they called the Analytical Society, the object of which was stated to be to advocate the d ‘ism of the Continent versus the dot-age of the University.

The first movement on the part of the Analytical Society was to translate from the French the smaller work of Lacroix on the differential and integral calculus; it was published in 1816. At that time the best manuals, as well as the greatest works on mathematics, existed in the French language. Peacock followed up the translation with a volume containing a copious Collection of Examples of the Application of the Differential and Integral Calculus, which was published in 1820. The sale of both books was rapid, and contributed materially to further the object of the Society. In that time, high wranglers of one year became the examiners of the mathematical tripos three or four years afterwards. Peacock was appointed an examiner in 1817, and he did not fail to make use of the position as a powerful lever to advance the cause of reform. In his questions set for the examination the differential notation was for the first time officially employed in Cambridge. The innovation did not escape censure, but he wrote to a friend as follows: “I assure you that I shall never cease to exert myself to the utmost in the cause of reform, and that I will never decline any office which may increase my power to effect it. I am nearly certain of being nominated to the office of Moderator in the year 1818-1819, and as I am an examiner in virtue of my office, for the next year I shall pursue a course even more decided than hitherto, since I shall feel that men have been prepared for the change, and will then be enabled to have acquired a better system by the publication of improved elementary books. I have considerable influence as a lecturer, and I will not neglect it. It is by silent perseverance only, that we can hope to reduce the many-headed monster of prejudice and make the University answer her character as the loving mother of good learning and science.” These few sentences give an insight into the character of Peacock: he was an ardent reformer and a few years brought success to the cause of the Analytical Society.

Another reform at which Peacock labored was the teaching of algebra. In 1830 he published a Treatise on Algebra which had for its object the placing of algebra on a true scientific basis, adequate for the development which it had received at the hands of the Continental mathematicians. To elevate astronomical science the Astronomical Society of London was founded, and the three reformers Peacock, Babbage and Herschel were again prime movers in the undertaking. Peacock was one of the most zealous promoters of an astronomical observatory at Cambridge, and one of the founders of the Philosophical Society of Cambridge.

In 1831 the British Association for the Advancement of Science (prototype of the American, French and Australasian Associations) held its first meeting in the ancient city of York. One of the first resolutions adopted was to procure reports on the state and progress of particular sciences, to be drawn up from time to time by competent persons for the information of the annual meetings, and the first to be placed on the list was a report on the progress of mathematical science. Dr. Whewell, the mathematician and philosopher, was a Vice-president of the meeting: he was instructed to select the reporter. He first asked Sir W. R. Hamilton, who declined; he then asked Peacock, who accepted. Peacock had his report ready for the third meeting of the Association, which was held in Cambridge in 1833; although limited to Algebra, Trigonometry, and the Arithmetic of Sines, it is one of the best of the long series of valuable reports which have been prepared for and printed by the Association.

In 1837 Peacock was appointed Lowndean Professor of Astronomy in the University of Cambridge, the chair afterwards occupied by Adams, the co-discoverer of Neptune, and later occupied by Sir Robert Ball, celebrated for his Theory of Screws. An object of reform was the statutes of the University; he worked hard at it and was made a member of a commission appointed by the Government for the purpose.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in January 1818.

He was ordained as a deacon in 1819, a priest in 1822 and appointed Vicar of Wymewold in 1826 (until 1835).

In 1839 he was appointed Dean of Ely cathedral, Cambridgeshire, a position he held for the rest of his life, some 20 years. Together with the architect Sir George Gilbert Scott he undertook a major restoration of the cathedral building. This included the installation of the boarded ceiling.

While holding this position he wrote a text book on algebra in two volumes, the one called Arithmetical Algebra, and the other Symbolical Algebra.

Peacock’s main contribution to mathematical analysis is his attempt to place algebra on a strictly logical basis. He founded what has been called the philological or symbolical school of mathematicians; to which Gregory, De Morgan and Boole belonged. His answer to Maseres and Frend was that the science of algebra consisted of two parts—arithmetical algebra and symbolical algebra—and that they erred in restricting the science to the arithmetical part. His view of arithmetical algebra is as follows: “In arithmetical algebra we consider symbols as representing numbers, and the operations to which they are submitted as included in the same definitions as in common arithmetic; the signs and denote the operations of addition and subtraction in their ordinary meaning only, and those operations are considered as impossible in all cases where the symbols subjected to them possess values which would render them so in case they were replaced by digital numbers; thus in expressions such as we must suppose and to be quantities of the same kind; in others, like , we must suppose greater than and therefore homogeneous with it; in products and quotients, like and we must suppose the multiplier and divisor to be abstract numbers; all results whatsoever, including negative quantities, which are not strictly deducible as legitimate conclusions from the definitions of the several operations must be rejected as impossible, or as foreign to the science.”

Peacock’s principle may be stated thus: the elementary symbol of arithmetical algebra denotes a digital, i.e., an integer number; and every combination of elementary symbols must reduce to a digital number, otherwise it is impossible or foreign to the science. If and are numbers, then is always a number; but is a number only when is less than . Again, under the same conditions, is always a number, but is really a number only when is an exact divisor of . Hence the following dilemma: Either must be held to be an impossible expression in general, or else the meaning of the fundamental symbol of algebra must be extended so as to include rational fractions. If the former horn of the dilemma is chosen, arithmetical algebra becomes a mere shadow; if the latter horn is chosen, the operations of algebra cannot be defined on the supposition that the elementary symbol is an integer number. Peacock attempts to get out of the difficulty by supposing that a symbol which is used as a multiplier is always an integer number, but that a symbol in the place of the multiplicand may be a fraction. For instance, in , can denote only an integer number, but may denote a rational fraction. Now there is no more fundamental principle in arithmetical algebra than that ; which would be illegitimate on Peacock’s principle.

Politically he was a Whig.

His last public act was to attend a meeting of the university reform commission. He died in Ely on 8 November 1858 in the 68th year of his age and was buried in Ely cemetery. He had married Frances Elizabeth, the daughter of William Selwyn, but had no children.

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