Memoirs of the Distinguished Men of Science of Great Britain Living in the Years 1807-8Walker, William
History
Memoirs of the Distinguished Men of Science of Great Britain Living in the Years 1807-8
Walker, William
Scientists -- Great Britain -- Biography
Herschel died peacefully at Slough, at the advanced age of
eighty-three, on the 23rd of August, 1822, only one year after the
publication of his latest memoir in the 'Transactions' of the then
recently formed Astronomical Society, of which he was the first
president.--_Sixth Dissertation, by James David Forbes, D.C.L., F.R.S.,
&c., Encyclopædia Britt._, eighth edition.--_English Cyclopædia._
London, 1856.--_Weld's Hist. of Roy. Society._
EDWARD CHARLES HOWARD, F.R.S.
Born May 28, 1774. Died September 28, 1816.
Mr. Howard was born at Darnell, in the parish of Sheffield, and
was the third brother of the twelfth Duke of Norfolk. His name has
become intimately connected with the manufacture of sugar, from the
many improvements which he introduced into the old processes for the
refinement of this most important article of commerce, and especially
by his invention of the vacuum-pan.
It is related, on the authority of the late Mr. C. Few, that Mr.
Howard's attention was drawn towards this subject by Mr. Charles
Ellis, who, on the occasion of an immense quantity of West India
sugar being in bond, and for which the revenue could find no market,
recommended Howard, whose talents as a practical chemist Mr. Ellis
was well acquainted with, to try and see if he could not relieve the
Government warehouses, by converting the raw sugar into some kind of
manure, and thus avoid the duty and render the article saleable. While
experimenting for this purpose, Mr. Howard accidentally discovered his
process of purifying sugar, for which, in conjunction with certain
sugar refiners, he took out patents, and ultimately realized a
considerable fortune.
Howard's vacuum-pan was patented in 1812; it depends for its action
on the principle that liquids boil at temperatures dependent on the
pressures they have to sustain. Thus water, under the ordinary pressure
of the atmosphere (30 inches barometer), boils at 212° F., whereas
in vacuo it will boil at about 80°; consequently a comparatively
low temperature will effect the boiling of sugar-syrup in vacuo,
evaporation will proceed far more safely than in the old process of
heating the syrup in open pans, and the percentage of waste will be
greatly reduced, rendering the manufacture highly profitable in a
commercial point of view.
Mr. Howard died at the early age of forty-two, and was buried at
St. Pancras, Middlesex. He left one son, and a daughter, Julia, who
was married in the year 1829 to the Hon. Henry Stafford Jerningham,
afterwards Lord Stafford.
CAPTAIN J. HUDDART, F.R.S.
Born Jan. 11, 1740. Died August 19, 1816.
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