Sir Henry Roscoe, 1833–1915

Abstract

AMONG those whose efforts aroused Great Britain to a realisation of the value of scientific education few did more than Sir Henry Enfield Roscoe, whose birth took place in London on January 7, 1833, a century ago. The son of a judge and a grandson of William Roscoe the historian, he got his second christian name from a great-grandfather, Dr. Enfield, a colleague of Priestley's at Warrington. He was sent first to Liverpool High School and afterwards to University College, London, where he came under the influence of Graham and Williamson. Later, he spent some time under Bunsen, working in the historic old laboratory at Heidelberg where “beneath the stone floor at our feet slept the dead monks, and on their tombstones we threw our waste precipitates” Returning from Germany, Roscoe at the age of twenty-four years was appointed to succeed Frankland at Owens College, Manchester, a position he held with conspicuous success for thirty years. He was one of the foremost in engendering a spirit of research and many of his students afterwards rose to high rank. His collaboration with Dittmar, Harden and Schorlemmer, the first professor of organic chemistry in Great Britain, led to the publication of many notable works some of which are still sought after. One of his achievements as an experimentalist was the isolation for the first time of vanadium. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1863 and awarded a Royal medal in 1874; he served as president of the Society of Chemical Industry in 1881, and as president of the Chemical Society in 1882. He was elected member of parliament for South Manchester in 1885; in 1887, the year in which he retired from Owens College, he was president of the British Association. He was a member of various Royal commissions, and from 1896 until 1902 was Vice-Chancellor of the University of London. His eightieth birthday was marked by the presentation of his bust to the Chemical Society. He died on December 18, 1915, at Woodcote Lodge, West Horsley, Surrey, and was buried four days later in Brookwood Cemetery.