The Many-Sidedness of George Minchin Minchin: Educator, Satirist, and Early Pioneer of Television (International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d'histoire des idées, 248) 3031402421, 9783031402425

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International Archives of the History of Ideas 248 Archives internationales d'histoire des idées

Richard Hornsey

The Many-Sidedness of George Minchin Minchin Educator, Satirist, and Early Pioneer of Television

International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d’histoire des idées Founding Editors Paul Dibon Jeremy Popkin

Volume 248

Honorary Editor Sarah Hutton, Department of Philosophy, University of York, York, UK Editor-in-Chief Guido Giglioni, University of Macerata, Macerata, Italy Associate Editor John Christian Laursen, University of California, Riverside, CA, USA Editorial Board Members Jean-Robert Armogathe, École Pratique des Hautes Études, Paris, France Stephen Clucas, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK Peter Harrison, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia John Henry, Science Studies Unit, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK Jose R. Maia Neto, University of Belo Horizonte, Belo Horizonte,  Minas Gerais, Brazil Martin Mulsow, Universität Erfurt, Gotha, Germany Gianni Paganini, University of Eastern Piedmont, Vercelli, Italy John Robertson, Clare College, Cambridge, UK Javier Fernández Sebastian, Universidad del País Vasco, Bilbao, Vizcaya, Spain Ann Thomson, European University Institute (EUI), Florence, Italy Theo Verbeek, Universiteit Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands Koen Vermeir, Paris Diderot University, Paris, France

International Archives of the History of Ideas/Archives internationales d'histoire des idées is a series which publishes scholarly works on the history of ideas in the widest sense of the word. It covers history of philosophy, science, political and religious thought and other areas in the domain of intellectual history. The chronological scope of the series extends from the Renaissance to the Post-­ Enlightenment. Founded in 1963 by R.H. Popkin and Paul Dibon, the International Archives of the History of Ideas/Archives internationales d'histoire des idées, edited by Guido Giglioni and John Christian Laursen, with assistance of Former Director Sarah Hutton, publishes, edits and translates sources that have been either unknown hitherto, or unavailable, and publishes new research in intellectual history, and new approaches within the field. The range of recent volumes in the series includes studies on skepticism, astrobiology in the early modern period, as well as translations and editions of original texts, such as the Treatise of the Hypochondriack and Hysterick Diseases (1730) by Bernard Mandeville. All books to be published in this Series will be fully peer-reviewed before final acceptance.

Richard Hornsey

The Many-Sidedness of George Minchin Minchin Educator, Satirist, and Early Pioneer of Television

Richard Hornsey Electrical Engineering & Computer Science York University Toronto, ON, Canada

ISSN 0066-6610     ISSN 2215-0307 (electronic) International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d’histoire des idées ISBN 978-3-031-40242-5    ISBN 978-3-031-40243-2 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-40243-2 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland Paper in this product is recyclable.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful for the organizations that maintain the archives upon which the material in this book depends. I particularly acknowledge the generous assistance of the archivists and staff at the Royal Dublin Society, Offaly County Archives, the Royal Society of London, Oxford University Press, University College London, the Centre of South Asian Studies at the University of Cambridge, and Imperial College London. The staff of the Resource Sharing Department at the York University Libraries were of tremendous assistance in tracking down copies of numerous George Minchin publications. Most of all, I am grateful for my family and friends, and especially my parents Maurice Hornsey (1936–2021) and Sheila Hornsey (1935–2022).

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 Eminent in the World: Introduction and Motivation ��������������������������    1 1.1 Who Was George Minchin?��������������������������������������������������������������    1 1.2 Scientific Context of Minchin’s Career��������������������������������������������    3 1.3 Why Is Minchin’s Life Interesting?��������������������������������������������������    4 1.3.1 Objective One ����������������������������������������������������������������������    4 1.3.2 Objective Two ����������������������������������������������������������������������    4 1.3.3 Objective Three��������������������������������������������������������������������    5 1.3.4 Objective Four����������������������������������������������������������������������    5 1.3.5 Objective Five ����������������������������������������������������������������������    5 1.4 Chapters of Minchin’s Life and Career��������������������������������������������    5

2

 Minchin Minchin: Early Years and University in Ireland ������������������   11 2.1 Controversy��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   11 2.2 What’s in a Name?����������������������������������������������������������������������������   13 2.3 Education������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   18 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   23

3

 the Monkey Smooth? A Career at Coopers Hill ������������������������������   25 Is 3.1 Professor at Last��������������������������������������������������������������������������������   25 3.2 The Royal Indian Engineering College��������������������������������������������   27 3.3 Experimental Work ��������������������������������������������������������������������������   29 3.4 Birds��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   33 3.5 Teaching��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   34 3.6 Dead Rats������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   36 3.7 Marriage��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   38 3.8 Family ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   41 3.8.1 Una Eleanor��������������������������������������������������������������������������   41 3.8.2 Neville����������������������������������������������������������������������������������   43 3.9 Sports and Daily Life������������������������������������������������������������������������   46 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   48

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An Honorary Maxwellian: Colleagues and Electromagnetic Theory������������������������������������������������������������������   51 4.1 Publications��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   51 4.2 Correspondence��������������������������������������������������������������������������������   53 4.3 Fitzgerald and Lodge������������������������������������������������������������������������   54 4.3.1 George Francis Fitzgerald����������������������������������������������������   54 4.3.2 Oliver Lodge ������������������������������������������������������������������������   58 4.4 The Maxwellians������������������������������������������������������������������������������   59 4.4.1 More Maxwellian than Maxwell������������������������������������������   59 4.4.2 Oliver Heaviside and the Archbishop ����������������������������������   60 4.4.3 Electromagnetic Theory��������������������������������������������������������   62 4.4.4 The Review ��������������������������������������������������������������������������   64 4.4.5 Quaternions ��������������������������������������������������������������������������   66 4.5 Was Minchin a Maxwellian?������������������������������������������������������������   68 4.6 Royal Society������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   71 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   74

5

 Plus Ultra: Textbooks and Writing��������������������������������������������������   77 Ne 5.1 Textbooks������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   77 5.2 A Treatise on Statics ������������������������������������������������������������������������   78 5.3 John Jellett����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   80 5.4 Uniplanar Kinematics ����������������������������������������������������������������������   83 5.5 The Third Edition������������������������������������������������������������������������������   86 5.6 Minchin’s Acknowledgements����������������������������������������������������������   88 5.7 Language and Writing����������������������������������������������������������������������   91 5.8 Other Books��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   92 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   94

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Geometry Versus Euclid: Reforming the Teaching of Mathematics ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������   97 6.1 The Association for the Improvement of Geometrical Teaching������������������������������������������������������������������   97 6.2 Slow Progress������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  101 6.3 The Vices of our Scientific Education����������������������������������������������  102 6.4 Geometry for Beginners��������������������������������������������������������������������  105 6.5 Boys and Girls����������������������������������������������������������������������������������  108 6.6 End of Euclid������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  110 6.6.1 Geometry Versus Euclid��������������������������������������������������������  110 6.6.2 BAAS������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  111 6.6.3 Mathematical Association����������������������������������������������������  112 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  115

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Journeys to Al Fard and Other Exotic Destinations: Satires and Poems������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  117 7.1 Naturæ Veritas����������������������������������������������������������������������������������  117 7.1.1 Context����������������������������������������������������������������������������������  117 7.1.2 Stellar Visits��������������������������������������������������������������������������  119 7.1.3 The Revelation from Aldebaran��������������������������������������������  123 7.2 The Hupmanoor Satires��������������������������������������������������������������������  126 7.2.1 Another Voyage to Laputa and Balnibarbi����������������������������  127 7.2.2 How I Wrote My Reminiscences������������������������������������������  131 7.2.3 The Ruins of Bolbadlyon������������������������������������������������������  135 7.2.4 The Last Days of Balnibarbi ������������������������������������������������  139 7.3 Influences������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  143 7.3.1 The Spirit of Swift����������������������������������������������������������������  143 7.3.2 Science Fiction����������������������������������������������������������������������  145 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  148

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 Telephotographs: Photocells and Photo-­Batteries, 1880–1891������������  151 8.1 Context����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  151 8.2 Telephotographs��������������������������������������������������������������������������������  153 8.3 Image Mosaic������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  156 8.4 Photoelectric Work 1880–1890��������������������������������������������������������  159 8.5 Experiments in Photoelectricity, 1891����������������������������������������������  161 8.5.1 Tin Foil Photocells����������������������������������������������������������������  161 8.5.2 Selenium-Aluminium Cells��������������������������������������������������  163 8.5.3 Cameras and Solar Cells ������������������������������������������������������  164 8.5.4 Context and Impact of Minchin’s 1891 Paper����������������������  165 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  167

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Distant Scintillating Star: Starlight, X-rays, and Television, 1891–1908 ����������������������������������������������������������������������  169 9.1 First Electrical Measurements of Starlight ��������������������������������������  170 9.1.1 First Trials ����������������������������������������������������������������������������  170 9.1.2 Unequivocal Results at Daramona����������������������������������������  172 9.1.3 Press Reaction����������������������������������������������������������������������  177 9.1.4 Pioneer Achievement������������������������������������������������������������  178 9.2 Digression: Röntgen Rays����������������������������������������������������������������  179 9.3 Final Phase: After 1900��������������������������������������������������������������������  180 9.4 Television������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  183 9.4.1 Mechanically Scanned Transmitters ������������������������������������  184 9.4.2 Retina or Mosaic Transmitters����������������������������������������������  188 9.4.3 “Photon Flux Integrating Mode”������������������������������������������  190 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  192

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10 Balak,  the Son of Zippor: Impulsion Cells and Wireless Telegraphy��������������������������������������������������������������������������  197 10.1 Heinrich Hertz��������������������������������������������������������������������������������  197 10.2 Minchin’s Impulsion Cells��������������������������������������������������������������  200 10.3 Lodge and Marconi ������������������������������������������������������������������������  204 10.4 Minchin and Wireless Telegraphy��������������������������������������������������  208 10.4.1 Claiming Precedence����������������������������������������������������������  208 10.4.2 Minchin’s New Receiver����������������������������������������������������  210 10.4.3 Impulsion Cells Revisited ��������������������������������������������������  213 10.4.4 Continued Work������������������������������������������������������������������  213 10.5 Afterword����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  218 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  219 11 Through  Nature to Eternity: Final Years and Reflections ������������������  223 11.1 After Coopers Hill��������������������������������������������������������������������������  223 11.1.1 1906–1914��������������������������������������������������������������������������  223 11.1.2 Emma Minchin�������������������������������������������������������������������  227 11.1.3 Posthumous Tributes����������������������������������������������������������  228 11.2 Retrospective����������������������������������������������������������������������������������  231 11.3 Eminence and Prominence Revisited����������������������������������������������  232 11.4 Lodge and Legacy��������������������������������������������������������������������������  236 11.5 Other Scientific Generalists������������������������������������������������������������  241 11.5.1 Silvanus Phillips Thompson������������������������������������������������  241 11.5.2 Herbert McLeod������������������������������������������������������������������  244 11.6 Many-Sidedness������������������������������������������������������������������������������  245 References��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  246 Appendices��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  249 Bibliography ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  259 Index������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  277

Abbreviations

AIGT Association for the Improvement of Geometrical Teaching BAAS British Association for the Advancement of Science BL British Library EMF Electromotive force GMM George Minchin Minchin GFF George Francis Fitzgerald MA Mathematical Association MS Manuscript OJL Oliver Joseph Lodge OUP Oxford University Press PP UK Parliamentary Paper RDS Royal Dublin Society RIEC Royal Indian Engineering College, Coopers Hill TCD Trinity College, Dublin UCL University College, London

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List of Figures

Fig. 1.1 Photographic portrait of George Minchin taken on becoming President of the Coopers Hill Society in 1912. “With this number of the Magazine, we have the pleasure of presenting each Member with an excellent portrait of Mr. Minchin, which we are sure will be cherished by many of his former pupils and his old friends.” (Coopers Hill Magazine 8 no.26, November 1912)����������������������    2 Fig. 3.1 Royal Indian Engineering College, circa 1905. The original mansion containing accommodation for the President and professors is ahead, while the 1871 addition for student rooms is to the right�����������������������������������������������������   29 Fig. 3.2 Staff of the Royal Indian Engineering College in late 1903. George Minchin is seated in a place of seniority (fourth from the right, front row) next to President John Ottley (centre). (© British Library Board, Photo 297/2(329))��������������������������������������������������������������������������   35 Fig. 3.3 George Minchin in 1887, aged 42, at the time of his marriage�����   39 Fig. 3.4 George Minchin with his children Una and Neville in the grounds of the Coopers Hill college in about 1895. (By kind permission of the Offaly Archives)�����������������������   40 Fig. 4.1 Minchin’s publication of scientific papers, letters and presentations, books (new and new editions), and other writings (book reviews, patents, general letters, and essays) by time-period (see Appendix 2)��������������������������������   52 Fig. 7.1 Ideal scene in ancient Bolbadlyon, from George Minchin’s Ruins of Bolbadlyon, late 1894. (©The Royal Society, MS 161)�����������������������������������������������������  137

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List of Figures

Fig. 7.2 “High Potential Duel,” a Balnibarbian child playing with a scientific toy in the Glumtrap. (©The Royal Society, MS 161)���������������������������������������������������������������������������  141 Fig. 7.3 A Balnibarbian National Conundrum (Or “three cheers for Lemuel Gulliver.”). (©The Royal Society, MS 161)���������������  144 Fig. 8.1 George Minchin’s first photo-cell, reported in 1880. S and U refer to sensitized and unsensitized electrodes, respectively. (After Minchin, An Account of Experiments in Photo-­Electricity, 1880)�������������������������������������������������������������  156 Fig. 8.2 Minchin’s 1891 tin foil photocell. The figure “represents a cell connected with the electrometer. AB is a small glass tube nearly full of the liquid; P and Q are the sensitized and unsensitized plates, two fine platinum wires being either soldered to them or passed through minute holes in them, there wires being sealed into the glass tube at A and B, and connected with the poles m, n of a quadrant electrometer, E; the arrow L represents the incident light.” (After Minchin, Experiments in Photoelectricity, 1891, 82)���������  162 Fig. 9.1 Daramona House and Observatory (centre), Westmeath, Ireland c. 1900. (From W.E. Wilson, Astronomical and Physical Researches, frontispiece)������������������������������������������  173 Fig. 9.2 Minchin’s photo-­cell configuration for the star-­light measurements in 1895. (From W.E. Wilson, Astronomical and Physical Researches, 97)��������������������������������������������������������  175 Fig. 9.3 Minchin’s schematic for operating photocells in integrating mode, 1892 (RDS 10/56, reproduced courtesy of the RDS Library & Archives)����������������������������������������������������  191 Fig. 10.1 Hertz’s apparatus, consisting of an induction coil (A) which excites a spark in the gap (B). Two spheres (C, C1) provide capacitance. The wire loop receiver (abcd) detects the electromagnetic waves and produces a spark in the gap (M) (after Appleyard, Pioneers of Electrical Communication, fig. 8)������������������������������������������������������������������  199 Fig. 10.2 Minchin’s impulsion cell experiment, as sketched in a letter to Fitzgerald (top, RDS 10/33, reproduced courtesy of the RDS Library & Archives) and as published in 1890 (bottom)����������������������������������������������������������������������������  202 Fig. 10.3 Minchin’s apparatus for hearing the reaction of his impulsion cell to a remote spark (at p-q). When the impulsion cell (AB) returned to its sensitive state, it discharged the condenser (C) through the telephone earpiece (T), making an audible click (after Minchin, Detection of Electro-­Magnetic Disturbance at Great Distances)������������������������������������������������������������������������  203

List of Figures

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Fig. 10.4 Minchin’s sketch of his 1897 wireless receiver apparatus (RDS 10/104, reproduced courtesy of the RDS Library & Archives)����������������������������������������������������  211 Fig. 10.5 Minchin’s wireless transmitter and receiver, tested in Marconi’s antenna configuration and using Minchin’s thin film coherer. (RDS 10/83, reproduced courtesy of the RDS Library & Archives)����������������������������������������������������  215 Fig. 10.6 “Ladies’ Night” at the Royal Society, early 1900s. (From John Munro, Scientific London, in George R. Sims, Living London, 1901, 3:275)������������������������������������������  217 Fig. 11.1 The cairn-like grave of Emma and George Minchin at Wolvercote Cemetery, Oxford, with William Fisher’s grave in the background����������������������������������������������������������������  227 Fig. 11.2 Results from Google ngram searches on the terms “George M. Minchin,” “George Minchin Minchin,” and “Oliver Lodge” in publications between 1860 and 2010��������  240

List of Tables

Table 2.1 Maximum marks awarded in Trinity College, Dublin fellowship examinations, 1867�������������������������������������������������������   20 Table 2.2 Fellowships and prize winners at Trinity College, Dublin�������������   21 Table 4.1 Supporters of George Minchin’s application for Fellowship of the Royal Society in 1895 (in original order and name format). All except Johnstone-Stoney were from personal, rather than general, knowledge. Using information from the biographical records of the Royal Society��������������������������������   73 Table 5.1 Individuals (with affiliations) acknowledged by Minchin in the prefaces to his textbooks������������������������������������������������������   89 Table 9.1 Early development of electronic cameras and television���������������  184

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Chapter 1

Eminent in the World: Introduction and Motivation

Abstract  This introduction outlines the context and motivation for a biography of George Minchin and establishes the context of Minchin’s historical and scientific times. It is loosely centred on a contemporary’s view that, had he wanted to be, Minchin could have been prominent in the world as well as eminent. An important goal of the book is simply to tell George Minchin’s full story for the first time. This brings to light his remarkable versatility as a mathematician, experimenter, writer, and educator. Minchin’s friendships with influential scientists of his day, especially George Francis Fitzgerald and Oliver Lodge, offer an alternative perspective on the transformative developments in electrical engineering at the end of the nineteenth century. it seemed fit and proper that I should follow the example of scores of my contemporaries, and collect from memory and notebook every incident worthy of record concerning the famous people whom I had met. (George Minchin, unpublished satire “How I Wrote my Reminiscences” (1893)).

1.1 Who Was George Minchin? George Minchin Minchin (1845–1914) was a man of broad mathematical, scientific, and literary talents, who “caught the fire of life with both hands and conveyed its benefits to all around him.” Minchin, shown in Fig. 1.1, was best known as a mathematician and educator, writing several successful books that were celebrated for their “simplicity and lucidity” and “elegant scholarship.” He was also a strong advocate for the reform of scientific and mathematical education and his works revealed the severe deficiencies of mathematics and science teaching in British schools. He also used his humour and eloquence to bring scientific issues to the broader public. One of them cleverly reversed Jonathan Swift’s tale of useless science at the Academy of Lagado to suggest that British science was focused on personal gain rather than scientific advancement. In criticism of the popular book, Unseen © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Hornsey, The Many-Sidedness of George Minchin Minchin, International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d’histoire des idées 248, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-40243-2_1

1

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1  Eminent in the World: Introduction and Motivation

Fig. 1.1  Photographic portrait of George Minchin taken on becoming President of the Coopers Hill Society in 1912. “With this number of the Magazine, we have the pleasure of presenting each Member with an excellent portrait of Mr. Minchin, which we are sure will be cherished by many of his former pupils and his old friends.” (Coopers Hill Magazine 8 no.26, November 1912)

Universe, he also published Naturæ Veritas, an early work of science fiction in prose and verse about extra-terrestrial travels and energy conservation. By the end of the nineteenth century, Minchin had done more than any other individual to pave the way for television. Minchin was the first to record, transmit and reconstruct a light-dependent electrical signal. He came close to perfecting the technology, leading to demonstrations of photo-batteries (solar cells) and the first electrical measurements of starlight. Although photoelectricity occupied Minchin for his whole career, he was also an intimate of the small group of Maxwellians (Oliver Lodge, George Fitzgerald, Oliver Heaviside) that brought James Clerk Maxwell’s electromagnetic theories into the mainstream. His letters and reviews of the subject provide a fascinating new perspective on the work that founded modern electromagnetic theory. Minchin found that a version of his photocell was sensitive to electromagnetic waves, providing a sensitive receiver that predated other popular detectors of Hertzian Waves, such as Branly’s coherer. Oliver Lodge cited Minchin’s pioneering work in his refutation of Marconi’s infamous and controversial 1897 British patent on wireless telegraphy. At about the same time he was also among the first to perform experiments on x-rays. Yet in a posthumous tribute to Minchin his former laboratory assistant, Rollo Appleyard, wrote “If he had chosen to do so, he could have become prominent in the world as well as eminent.” The present book is devoted to exploring this simple statement. What did Minchin achieve to become eminent and why did he choose not to pursue prominence? And why is Minchin generally considered to be neither eminent nor prominent today? Ironically, Minchin’s lack of modern fame, together with his broad scientific accomplishments and engaging personality, allows a study of his career to offer an alternative perspective on an influential period of scientific discovery.

1.2  Scientific Context of Minchin’s Career

3

1.2 Scientific Context of Minchin’s Career For a British scientist interested in electrical phenomena, the last quarter of the nineteenth century was a truly remarkable time to be alive. Discovery after discovery paved the way for astonishing new technologies that captured public’s interest and made heroes of prominent scientists. Major civil engineering works throughout the British Empire were a source of national pride, and indeed constituted the raison d’être for the Royal Indian Engineering College where Minchin taught. Many of these developments were driven by the telegraph, that deceptively simple apparatus of battery, switch, and wire that revolutionized communications across the world. The need to understand and improve the performance of transatlantic cables lead Oliver Heaviside to take up the theories of James Clerk Maxwell and convert them into usable form. Work on lightning conductors for telegraph poles, among other things, brought Oliver Lodge into the field. And at the Valentia, Ireland terminus of the transatlantic cable, a chance discovery revealed selenium’s sensitivity to light, leading to widespread dreams of transmitting moving pictures electrically. Heinrich Hertz’s experiments confirming the existence and properties of electromagnetic waves gave credibility to the theories of Maxwell, Heaviside, Lodge, and Fitzgerald. But they also catalyzed improvements of equipment for transmitting and receiving ‘Hertzian waves,’ which morphed into the technology for wireless communications. Many scientists internationally contributed to these developments, but it fell to Guglielmo Marconi to combine them into a commercial product, bypassing Lodge and the British scientific establishment, much to their chagrin. By communicating wirelessly across the Atlantic, Marconi’s triumph of experimental persistence over prevailing scientific knowledge served as both a salutary lesson in commercialization and a spur for further research. Meanwhile, efforts to understand cathode rays by many international scientists led to the discovery of x-rays by Wilhelm Röntgen and culminated in J.J. Thomson’s pivotal 1897 talk on the ‘corpuscle’ of electric charge. The latter was immediately dubbed the electron by Fitzgerald, using his uncle’s 1891 (or earlier) name for an ‘atom of charge.’ The era of electronics had begun. Further discoveries and inventions in the early years of the twentieth century provided the first glimpses of electronic marvels to come  – the invention of the thermionic vacuum tube by John Fleming, early experiments on television using cathode ray tubes by Campbell Swinton and others, and Albert Einstein’s quantized explanation for the photoelectric effect. As the scientific foundations of the physical world were being transformed, it is unsurprising that the occupation of being a scientist was also in transition. Gentleman generalists were being replaced by a new generation of professional research specialists, and the goalposts for achieving eminence were changing. By 1907 the University of Oxford finally joined other institutions in offering an engineering degree and the experimental sciences were well established in British universities.

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1  Eminent in the World: Introduction and Motivation

Very slowly, scientists and progressive teachers achieved success in their campaign to improve mathematical and technical education at British schools. George Minchin’s scientific career from 1875 to 1914 spanned all these world-­ changing transitions. Indeed, he participated in many of them.

1.3 Why Is Minchin’s Life Interesting? By examining the career of a figure who is little known today but who was an active participant at the time, we can see the developments of the late nineteenth century through fresh eyes. Because of the diversity of Minchin’s interests and contributions, the new view of Victorian British science achieved in this way is quite broad. Between 1879 and 1900, his wide variety of published works is supplemented by the stream of thoughts, questions, designs, updates, and commentaries contained in more than two hundred letters to his friends (Sir) Oliver Joseph Lodge and George Francis Fitzgerald. In addition, four unpublished satires read at public lectures contain a witty commentary on contemporary science and society. The present work’s goals are therefore summarized below.

1.3.1 Objective One As the first full-length examination of this fascinating but little-known Victorian mathematician, scientist, and educational reformer, an important objective of this book is simply to tell George Minchin’s story. Much of the information is absent from his obituaries, yet his formative years in Ireland not only provide context for Minchin’s career but offer interesting insights into the academic world of the time. Piecing together the surviving evidence reveals a personality in which precise mathematics, careful experimentation, a vivid imagination, elegant writing, and a keen appreciation for the absurdities of life were combined.

1.3.2 Objective Two A second objective is to bring attention to Minchin’s remarkable versatility as a mathematician, experimenter, writer, and educator, and thereby to restore his position as an important scientific figure of his time. He made extraordinary advances in photo-electricity which led to the first electric measurements of starlight. While credit for inventing television cameras has gone to those who published impractical concepts, Minchin was far ahead of other British scientists when it came to demonstrating real devices.

1.4  Chapters of Minchin’s Life and Career

5

1.3.3 Objective Three The late Victorian scientific revolution has generally (and naturally) been viewed from the perspectives of the influential men of the time  – Lord Kelvin, William Crookes, Oliver Lodge, Alexander Graham Bell, Guglielmo Marconi. Other influential figures such as William Preece, George Fitzgerald, Oliver Heaviside, and Heinrich Hertz have also received attention over the years. Minchin’s correspondence with Lodge and Fitzgerald has not yet been fully analyzed, so a third objective is to explore his relationships with these two key figures and to examine them from a different viewpoint.

1.3.4 Objective Four Owing to a combination of his own discoveries and the interest of his friend Oliver Lodge, Minchin became an early experimenter in wireless telegraphy. In contrast to this work, which lasted a decade, his interest on the ability of x-rays to charge materials electrically was over in a few months. The fourth objective of the present book is to examine the British scientific community’s response to such breakthroughs from the perspective of one involved at the grass roots.

1.3.5 Objective Five Meeting the first four objectives will justify Minchin’s contemporary eminence. A final intention of this book is then to explore the reasons why he did not, or chose not to, achieve prominence. By doing so, his story becomes a useful lens through which to examine the meanings of eminence and prominence when applied to scientists, and how history treats them. This book is therefore part biography of George Minchin, part exploration of his scientific achievements, and part reflection on late Victorian science from his standpoint.

1.4 Chapters of Minchin’s Life and Career Because of Minchin’s many-sidedness, this biography is structured thematically rather than strictly chronologically. Each chapter considers an element of Minchin’s career. Some, such as education reform, books, and photoelectricity, span this entire period. Others occupy a finite duration. It takes this approach to emphasize sequence of developments within each theme and to avoid the confusion of treating multiple

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1  Eminent in the World: Introduction and Motivation

themes simultaneously. Minchin tackled a remarkable number of distinct projects at once. So, to help the reader to understand concurrent events in his life, an overall timeline and a chronological list of publications are included as Appendices. Many of the chapter titles are quotes from Minchin’s writing on the relevant topic. The next two chapters contain a narrative of Minchin’s life that completes the fragmentary information in his obituaries and makes progress towards addressing the first objective. Chapter 2 concerns Minchin’s early life in Ireland until his departure to join the Royal Indian Engineering College at Coopers Hill near London. This period encompasses several defining events that influenced his subsequent career. Minchin was born in the far west of Ireland during the potato famine to a lawyer father and a theatrical singer mother. His birth name was George Minchin Smith. When his mother died, ten-year-old Minchin continued his education in Dublin with an uncle by marriage David Bell, a Shakespearean scholar (and uncle to Alexander Graham Bell) from whom he is supposed to have learned his love of language. After a highly successful undergraduate degree, Minchin took his new name. While the change can be dated to a few months after his father’s death, the direct cause remains unknown. In 1872 Minchin challenged the Trinity College authorities over their decision to award a professorship to another candidate. After an official public investigation, the decision was upheld and Minchin, having incurred the displeasure of those authorities, ultimately departed Dublin. However, the friends and colleagues he made at Trinity remained influential throughout his career. Minchin’s wide circle of friends and acquaintances spoke of him as ‘joyous,’ ‘enthusiastic,’ ‘genial,’ ‘whimsical,’ ‘singularly lovable,’ and ‘charming,’ a man who “caught the fire of life and conveyed its benefits to all around him.” His buoyant character shaped his views on education, humour and satires, diverse interests, and experimental enthusiasms. George Minchin’s character, interests, personality, and family life are rediscovered through events and anecdotes from his career at Coopers Hill college. The nature of the college and its students had a strong influence, both positive and negative, on Minchin’s philosophy of education and scientific accomplishments. The final phase of Minchin’s life following the closure of Coopers Hill in 1906 is reserved for Chap. 11. Chapter 4 serves as a bridge between the primarily biographical earlier material and Minchin’s scientific career. It provides a general overview of Minchin’s publications and introduces his relationships with the group of Maxwellians consisting of George Francis Fitzgerald, Oliver Lodge, and Oliver Heaviside. The issue of whether Minchin was a Maxwellian himself is approached through his review of Heaviside’s Electromagnetic Theory and his letters on the topic to Lodge and Fitzgerald. At this time, Minchin was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society. Following the theme of relationships, this chapter examines the role played in Minchin’s election by his network of supporters, and in particular the Trinity College diaspora. In so doing, this chapter begins to approach objectives two and three. Each of the next six chapters (5–10) focuses on a particular theme in Minchin’s career  – textbooks, mathematical reforms, satires and poems, photoelectric cells, measurements of starlight and x-rays, and wireless telegraphy. The general approach

1.4  Chapters of Minchin’s Life and Career

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is to explore Minchin’s contributions to the topic by considering his published works, while using his private correspondence to elucidate his underlying thought processes, challenges, ideas, and questions. While the emphasis is on objective two, Minchin’s core scientific contributions and impact, these chapters advance all five objectives in varying degrees. Chapter 5 addresses Minchin textbooks. He was renowned for his skill as an educator, both as a lecturer to his students and as a writer of widely circulated textbooks. Foremost among these was his two-volume Treatise on Statics, the writing and improvement of which spanned his entire career from the first edition in 1877 to the posthumous seventh edition in 1915. Despite vowing never to write another book after the challenges of the third edition, Minchin in fact wrote six other texts. His letters to friends reveal the ideas, difficulties, and uncertainties he experienced during the writing process. His innovation, writing style and philosophy are examined in context of contemporary works. Reviews of these books in journals and periodicals also help to place them in the context of competing works and explain their popularity. Their reception is also informative about the status of technical education at the time. Continuing the theme of education, Chap. 6 concerns Minchin’s career-long passion for reforming mathematics teaching. In the late nineteenth century, Euclid was the foundational text for geometry. Students were typically required to learn the propositions verbatim. Minchin was a strong advocate for reforming this practice and served as President of the Association for the Improvement of Geometrical Teaching (later the Mathematical Association). He also spoke out about the need for replacing classics with science in the curriculum of England’s elite schools. Minchin’s criticisms of the status quo contain some of his most insightful writing (such as The Vices of Our Scientific Education). These beliefs led Minchin to try new teaching techniques on his eight-year-old son, resulting in a book on the subject, Geometry for Beginners. This chapter also assesses Minchin’s views on the scientific education of women. In his desire to communicate scientific ideas more widely, Minchin took the unusual steps of publishing poetry and presenting satirical lectures to the local community. In 1887 Minchin published Naturæ Veritas, an account of conversations with extra-terrestrial beings about the limits of human scientific understanding, written in both prose and verse. It is among the first examples of science fiction. He also gave presentations to both scientific and lay audiences in which “in the spirit of a Rabelais or a Swift, he tilted against humbug, unmasked accepted respectabilities, [and] overwhelmed dishonesty with innuendo and invective.” Chapter 7 therefore summarizes the themes and ideas of Naturæ Veritas and its reception by reviewers. It also discusses for the first time four unpublished satires  – Another Voyage to Laputa (1891), How I Wrote my Reminiscences (1893), The Ruins of Bolbadlyon (1894), and Last Days of Balnibarbi (1898) – to reveal the stories, their influences, references to contemporary events. Minchin’s views on the scientific and broader social issues of his day, expressed through these satires, may partially account for his absence from the upper echelons of learned societies.

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Chapter 8 relates the first decade of Minchin’s work on photoelectricity. In contrast to the photoresistors in more widespread use, Minchin’s cells produced an electrical signal in response to illumination. In a rudimentary demonstration, he was the first to convert an optical signal into electricity, transmit it over a wire, and reproduce it photographically. He also constructed and measured ‘photo-batteries’ that for the first time generated voltages large enough to be useful. Although unsuccessful, Minchin conducted early trials of cameras consisting of an array of pixels. By the end of this first decade of research, Minchin’s cells were small enough, reliable enough, and sensitive enough to use for measuring starlight. This outstanding achievement, the result of long and patient experimentation, was made before an understanding of material properties, electrons, and semiconductors. As detailed in Chap. 9, Minchin and his friends used his sensitive cells to make the first definitive electrical measurements of starlight on January 7, 1894. The popular press expressed astonishment that the influence of such remote objects, dubbed ‘electricity from the stars,’ could be detected on earth. These measurements heralded a new age of scientific measurement of stars, ultimately leading to information on their ages and compositions. Minchin’s brief digression into experiments with the newly discovered Röntgen Rays (x-rays) is also included here. He concluded that x-rays were waves and not particles based on his measurements of their effects on electrically charged bodies of different materials. Chapter 9 concludes with a discussion of Minchin’s roles in the early development of television technology. In addition to his successful demonstrations of photoelectricity, he also attempted to capture pictures electrically throughout his career, as well as joining in the general speculations of the time on what Minchin called ‘telephotographs.’ But because he did not publish concepts without experimental data, his contributions have since been overlooked. Because of his connections to the Maxwellians, Minchin was one of the first to start experimenting with “Hertzian waves” after their discovery in 1887. His early finding that his photoelectric cells could detect radio waves (predating Édouard Branly’s 1890 invention of the coherer by as much as 2 years) led to Minchin performing extensive experimental work on wireless transmission. His close association with Oliver Lodge, the foremost British opponent of Marconi, adds a fascinating new perspective to the development of this critical technology. Chapter 10 captures Minchin’s wireless telegraphy ‘fever,’ describes his experiments at Coopers Hill, and his efforts to design improved Hertz wave receivers. His letters reveal his uncharacteristic interest in commercializing his work, private thoughts on Marconi, and the disruptions caused in the scientific community when commercial interests and scientific politics were mixed. The concluding Chap. 11 addresses Minchin’s life and research in Oxford after the closure of Coopers Hill in 1906, as well as his death, and tributes from colleagues. It then proceeds to draw together the themes of the book to explore the larger context of Minchin’s work and the factors that determine a scientist’s legacy. These factors included field(s) of contribution, attitude and personality, and the influence of working environment. Minchin was also a generalist at a time when

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scientific recognition became increasingly linked to research specialization. These themes are expanded by comparing Minchin’s career with those of two contemporaries, the fellow generalist Silvanus Phillips Thompson and Coopers Hill colleague Herbert McLeod. By doing so, the chapter addresses Rollo Appleyard’s comment concerning Minchin’s eminence and his choice not to become prominent.

Chapter 2

Minchin Minchin: Early Years and University in Ireland

Abstract  Minchin’s university career at Trinity College, Dublin was eventful. It included awards and prizes but also a controversy and public investigation in 1872 resulting from his challenge to a fellowship appointment. Additionally, he changed his name from George Minchin Smith to George Minchin Minchin soon after graduating. While the motivation remains a mystery, this chapter determines the date of this change and examines some possible reasons. It also explores Minchin’s family history and early education and introduces the friends and colleagues at TCD who remained influential throughout his career. I remember conversing at the Hall dinner in Trinity College with a Junior Sophister who, having read Algebra, stoutly maintained that there was nothing in the science more advanced than Quadratic Equations! Whether he subsequently altered this belief or not I cannot say, but I know that at the time he was not open to conviction. (George Minchin, On Bumptiousness (1879))1

2.1 Controversy On the morning of Tuesday May 28, 1872, a young mathematician named George Minchin Minchin presented himself at the chapel of Trinity College Dublin to claim a professorship he had not been awarded.

 George M. Minchin, “On Bumptiousness,” in Parting Words to Boys Leaving School and Entering upon Life, edited by Maurice Charles Hime (London: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co., 1879), 157. The book was intended to help young men to avoid the “new kinds of temptations and dangers to which boys on leaving school and becoming for the first time their own masters … are invariably exposed.” Most of the essays in this work were written by members of the clergy but some chapters were contributed by fellow scientists Monck, Tarleton, and Traill. There was a strong Trinity College Dublin representation among the authors, including the then Chaplain of Coopers Hill, Rev. Charles Crosslé (also spelled Crosslegh) who was admitted to TCD a few years before Minchin, in 1858. 1

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Hornsey, The Many-Sidedness of George Minchin Minchin, International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d’histoire des idées 248, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-40243-2_2

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2  Minchin Minchin: Early Years and University in Ireland

In front of the College’s Provost and seven Senior Fellows, Minchin announced that the candidate they had selected for the fellowship should be disqualified on religious grounds. Additionally, as runner up, he believed he should be elected instead. The authorities refused. Then, when the time came for the top choice, Frederick Purser, to take the oath required for admission to the Fellowship, he declined to do so. Understandably perplexed, the Provost and Senior Fellows withdrew. They reconvened at the chapel at 5:30 that evening to give Purser an opportunity to change his mind. Although the latter did not show up, Minchin arrived to restate his claim. But again, he was refused. Two weeks earlier, on May 13, George Minchin had been among those starting the examination for two vacant fellowships at Trinity College. On the day the exam concluded, May 25, Minchin and two other candidates, William McCay and Arthur Panton, petitioned the provost to demand that Purser should be deemed ineligible for the fellowship. Their reasoning was that Purser was a member of the Moravian Church rather than of the Irish Church, as the College’s statutes of the time required.2 Their petition went unheeded and 2 days later the Provost and Senior Fellows announced the order of merit in the exam to be Purser, McCay, Minchin, and Panton. The first two were duly elected to the vacant fellowships and Minchin was awarded the Madden Premium as runner up. This set the scene for the confusion in the chapel the following day. Ultimately the matter went to a special hearing before Sir Joseph Napier, Vice-­ Chancellor of the University, and the Most Reverend Richard Chenevix Trench, Lord Archbishop of Dublin. A large group of lawyers also convened – three for the College, three for Minchin and Panton as joint petitioners who included the Solicitor-General for Ireland, Christopher Palles. A further two represented Purser, the respondent.3 Minchin and Panton claimed that Purser should have been disqualified from the competition. McCay and Minchin should therefore be made fellows and Panton be awarded the Madden Premium.4 Three days of testimony were heard during June 1872. Subsequently, the Vice Chancellor and Archbishop delivered their judgement on July 6 in the examination hall of the university before the fellows and a “large assemblage of the graduates” of the College.5

 Trinity College’s admissions records for July 2, 1856, confirm that Frederick Purser declared his religion to be Moravian. TCD archive ref. IE TCD MUN V 23/6, folio 76–100v (1854/55–1857/58). 3  Stephen N.  Elrington, Election of Fellows of Trinity College: Report of the Proceedings at a Visitation (Dublin: Hodges, Foster, & Co., 1872). 4  Minchin claimed that one of the Senior Fellows, Rev. John A. Malet, had voted in his favour, so that once the votes cast for Purser were discounted, he had received the majority. This claim was contested by Purser’s lawyer and the College authorities stated that Malet had voted in favour of McCay for the first fellowship. Elrington, Election of Fellows, xviii & 34. 5  “Trinity College,” Freeman’s Journal, July 8, 1872, 3. 2

2.2  What’s in a Name?

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After a lengthy review of the history and interpretation of the College Statutes and religious definitions, the Visitors concluded that the teachings of the Moravian Church were not incompatible with those of the Irish Church. Purser had therefore committed no heresy and his election by the Provost and Senior Fellows was valid. It transpired that Purser had refused to take the oath of admission not directly on religious grounds but because the ancient declaration stated that each new fellow would pursue the study of theology or enter holy orders. Everyone knew that this had become merely a convention in the modern College, but Purser would not make a declaration he knew to be untrue. Instead, he planned to seek leave to appeal to the Queen for a dispensation. The Visitors concluded that Purser had been properly elected to the fellowship, but by refusing to make the declaration had then effectively resigned. Accordingly, the position had again become vacant and should be filled by a new competition the following year – it could not be awarded directly to Minchin. Legal costs of £120 incurred by Minchin and Panton were paid from college funds. Both Panton and Purser were eventually successful in obtaining fellowships at Trinity College. Panton was elected in 1873.6 In the wake of Prime Minister Gladstone’s defeated Irish Universities Bill in 1873, oaths and declarations for fellowships at Trinity were eliminated by the so-called Fawcett Act, paving the way for Purser to enter the fellowship in 1879.7 By then, however, Minchin had moved to England.

2.2 What’s in a Name? George Minchin Minchin had entered Trinity College in January 1862 at the age of 16. However, a search through the college admissions records for this name will not be successful.8 This is because he changed his name, for reasons which remain a mystery.9

 1884 Dublin University Calendar, 403. See also “Obituary,” Times, December 24, 1906, 4.  “University Tests (Dublin) (No.3),” UK House of Commons Parliamentary Paper, Bill 124, 36 Vict, April 3, 1873. 8  Trinity College Dublin Admissions records for 17 January 1862 under George Minchin Smith. His religion was listed as Church of England and his father was identified as Geo. M.  Smith, Attorney. TCD archive ref. IE TCD MUN V 23/6 folio 126 to 150v (1861–1863). 9  For example, the 1884 Catalogue of Graduates of Dublin University listed his BA under ‘George Minchin Smith’ and his MA under ‘George Minchin Minchin,’ each entry referring to the other. A Catalogue of Graduates of the University of Dublin vol.II (Dublin: Hodges, Figgis, & Co., 1884), 109 & 144. In the 1912–13 Dublin University Calendar, a footnote under the scholarship entry for ‘George Minchin Smith’ stated “Now George Minchin Minchin.” Dublin University Calendar, vol. III. special supplemental volume for the year 1912–1913 (Dublin: Hodges, Figgis, & Co., 1913), 644. 6 7

14

2  Minchin Minchin: Early Years and University in Ireland

Minchin was born as George Minchin Smith on May 25, 1845, to a father of the same name.10 George Minchin Smith senior (henceforth G.M. Smith) came from Valentia Island, County Kerry, a small island just off the far west coast of Ireland (also written Valencia at the time). About 2500 people, mostly small farmers and overwhelmingly Catholic, lived on Valentia in 1845. However, the potato famines that began in the year of Minchin’s birth heralded a long decline in the population. Mixed among the farmers were workers from the prominent slate quarry and, 10 years later, the engineers and signallers of the transatlantic telegraph cable which would come ashore at the eastern end of the Island. Most of the land belonged to the Knights of Kerry, the Fitzgerald family, although Trinity College itself also held estates on Valentia. G.M. Smith’s father, Thomas J. Smith, resided at the Donnybrook estate, a large house on the south coast of the Island which in 1846 boasted formal gardens and landscaped grounds.11 The middle name of Minchin probably came from the maiden-name of Thomas Smith’s wife. Thomas leased 173 acres the surrounding land from the Knight of Kerry and in turn rented it to numerous local farmers.12 Donnybrook itself was probably a large farmhouse and had an annual ratable value of over £3, comparable with other large houses in the area (such as the nearby Coarha-Beg House).13 As the nineteenth century progressed, maps of the area show that Donnybrook struck hard times, losing its formal gardens by 1895 and being reduced to a pair of small buildings by 1902. Today, all that remain are the overgrown ruins of the central portion of the original buildings, overlooking the scenic Portmagee Channel that separates Valentia Island from the mainland. Nineteen-year-old G.M.  Smith entered King’s Inn in Dublin in 1839 to study law, a popular profession for the sons of minor gentry because it assisted in managing the family property.14 Soon after his graduation in 1844, he married George Minchin’s mother Alicia (or Alice) Hyland, the fifth daughter of Sophia Kelly and William Hyland, a Dublin merchant.15  Baptism record for George Minchin Smith, dated June 27, 1845, reference KY-CI-BA-22830, page 11, entry 84. Available at www.irishgenealogy.ie (last accessed May 2023). 11  51°53′51.7”N 10°20′36.2”W.  It has been mistakenly assumed by other authors that the Donnybrook mentioned in Minchin’s baptism record referred to the district of Dublin of the same name. However, several other records, such as that of G.M. Smith’s second marriage, show the residence as “Donnybrook, Valencia.” Historic Ordnance Survey of Ireland maps are available at https://www.osi.ie/products/professional-mapping/historical-mapping/ (last accessed April 2023). 12  Sir Richard Griffith, Primary Valuation of Ireland, May 1852, Parish of Valencia, Tinnies Lower West, 146–47. 13  Small in comparison to the Knight’s own estate at Glanleam with a rateable value of ten times this amount. 14  Edward Keane, P.  Beryl Phair, and Thomas U.  Sadleir eds., King’s Inns Admission Papers 1607–1867 (Dublin: Stationery Office for the Irish Manuscripts Commission, 1982), 452. 15  “Births, Deaths, Marriages and Obituaries,” Freeman’s Journal, July 4, 1844. Marriage record for June 18, 1844, Church of Ireland St. Mark parish, reference DU-CI-MA-29713, entry 493. Available at www.irishgenealogy.ie (last accessed May 2023). 10

2.2  What’s in a Name?

15

Minchin’s baptism took place the following year at the now-ruined Protestant parish church of Kilmore on Valentia. He had at least two brothers, William Thomas Smith (b. 1846) and John Smith (b. ca. 1847).16 In a primarily Catholic part of Valentia, the Smith family was Protestant.17 Although Minchin was born in Valentia, the family also spent time in Dublin, where his brother William was baptised.18 Their mother Alicia, known as Alley, was a well-known singer and “professor” of vocal music. “A remarkably handsome, tall young lady, and an excellent singer,” she performed widely at the Theatre Royal and other venues in Dublin.19,20 Her son reputedly inherited her talent.21 Alicia died in Dublin just before Minchin’s tenth birthday and his father later remarried. The records show that on April 12, 1867, George M. Smith (solicitor and widower from Donnybrook, Valencia) married Honora O’Neil, daughter of a local farmer, at the Register Office in Caherciveen.22 Minchin’s half-sister Mary was born in March of the following year.23

  Baptism of William Thomas Smith, December 15, 1846, St. Mark, Dublin, reference DU-CI-BA-118593, entry 1617. Marriage of John Smith and Kate Sullivan, June 15, 1868, Caherciveen district, group reference 2991104, entry 12. Available at www.irishgenealogy.ie (last accessed May 2023). 17  In 1845, only 13 of the 183 residents of Lower West Tinni(e)s, the area containing Donnybrook, were Protestant. Daphne D.C. Pochin Mould, Valentia Portrait of an Island (Dublin: Blackwater, 1978), 64. 18  “Births,” Freeman’s Journal, December 2, 1846. Although William Smith was baptised in Dublin, the family’s abode was still listed as Valentia. 19  Death announcement, Armagh Guardian, April 20, 1855, 8. Quote from “The Theatre Royal, Dublin, from 1833 to 1837,” The Dublin University Magazine 72 (November 1868): 561. To confirm the connection, the front page of Freeman’s Journal for September 7, 1847, referred to the forthcoming performance of “Mrs. George M. Smith (late Miss Hyland).” 20  “Miss A. Hyland (familiarly called Alley) was also an especial favourite, an accomplished artiste (soprano), and good musician.” R.M. Levey & J. O’Rorke, Annals of the Theatre Royal Dublin (Dublin: Dollard, 1880), 90. In 1842, Miss Hyland was the victim of a burglary, so it is possible that she met G.M. Smith in his legal capacity at that time. “Robbery of Miss A. Hyland, of the Theatre Royal,” Freeman’s Journal, October 15, 1842. 21  “… attributed Mr. Minchin’s appointment to his attainments in vocal music which Colonel Chesney thought of great value for the Chapel Choir!” The Coopers Hill Magazine 8, no. 25 (July 1912): 391. 22  Marriage record for April 12, 1867, Caherciveen district, group registration 3130984, entry 11. Available at www.irishgenealogy.ie (last accessed May 2023). 23  Birth of Mary Smith, March 7, 1868, district of Valencia and Portmagee, group registration 7584692, pp.82–83, entry 413. There is an earlier birth registration for a boy, Richard Smith, with parents George Smith and Honora Smith (formerly Neill) of Valentia in 1865. Although highly suggestive, this record not only predates the marriage but lacks features found in almost all other relevant records – it was not George “M” Smith, the occupation is small farmer not solicitor, and Donnybrook is not mentioned (as are all present in Mary’s subsequent birth, for example). Birth of Richard Smith, March 19, 1865, district of Valencia and Portmagee, group registration 7527140, p.24, 25, & 26, entry 121. Available at www.irishgenealogy.ie (last accessed May 2023). 16

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2  Minchin Minchin: Early Years and University in Ireland

Based on information from family members,24 the Dictionary of Irish Biography states that Minchin changed his name on account of this second marriage, because Honora was both a servant ‘girl’ (although she was over 30 years old according to the marriage certificate) and a Roman Catholic.25 However, as will be shown below, Minchin did not change his name until some years after this marriage. The 1884 University of Dublin Catalogue of Graduates contains cross-referenced entries stating that Minchin won his scholarship in 1865 and received the BA in 1867 under the name of George Minchin Smith. But his MA in 1870 was bestowed as George Minchin Minchin.26 The range of dates for the name change can be narrowed by reference to the young student’s participation in the 1868 and 1870 elections for the representatives from Dublin University to the British House of Commons. In November 1868, a newspaper article listed Minchin under his birth name as a supporter of the unsuccessful Whig candidate, Professor Thomas Webb.27 But by February 1870, he appeared under his new name on the committee supporting the successful election of the Conservative David Plunket. A separate thread of evidence constrains this date range still further. Like his Dublin contemporaries Panton, McCay, and Burnside, and his future colleague Joseph Wolstenholme, Minchin contributed to the mathematical problems and solutions that appeared monthly in The Educational Times. As “Smith, G.M., B.A.,” he started contributing questions in 1868, soon after his graduation, and continued to do so until the issue dated October 1, 1869. But from the December 1, 1869 issue onwards, the name “Minchin, G.M., B.A.” was listed.28 On the basis that the magazine would probably have been published before its cover date, Minchin therefore adopted his new name in September or October of 1869. Michaelmas Term at Trinity College commenced in the second week of October, so it is reasonable to suppose that he did so before the start of the new academic year.  Particularly from the late Dick Smith, a grandson of G.M. Smith’s from his second marriage to Honora O’Neil. 25  Linde Lunney, Enda Leaney, and Patricia M. Byrne, “Minchin, George Minchin,” Dictionary of Irish Biography, revised March 2013, online at www.dib.ie. Originally published in James McGuire, James Quinn ed. Dictionary of Irish Biography (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2009). 26  1884 Catalogue of Graduates, 109 & 144. This is consistent with the 1868 Catalogue of Graduates, which just lists Minchin under his birth name (p.651). The Dublin University Calendar for 1867 also records Minchin’s awards (Senior Moderator in mathematics, junior moderator in experimental and natural science, Lloyd’s Exhibition, Scholarship) under ‘George Minchin Smith’ (Dublin University Calendar for the Year 1867 (Dublin: Hodges, Smith, & Co., 1867), 162, 168, 190 & 368). But, confusingly, later issues of the Calendar retroactively replaced entries for the Senior Moderator and Lloyd’s Exhibitioner with Minchin’s new name, making it misleadingly appear as if the change happened as early as 1865. The Dublin University Calendar for the Year 1884 (Dublin: Hodges, Figgis, & Co., 1884), 337 & 363. 27  “Professor Webb’s Committee,” Freeman’s Journal, November 17, 1868. 28  The Educational Times 22 (April 1869–March 1870): 162 & 213. The 1884 catalog of Trinity College graduates did not list any other individuals with these names and initials who could be confused with Minchin. 24

2.2  What’s in a Name?

17

Thus, Minchin’s name change took place fully two-and-a-half years after his father’s second marriage. This seems too long an interval for it to have been done in angry protest at an inappropriate social and religious union. In addition, Minchin’s support of equality of access to university education for Catholics suggests that he was not as vigorously anti-Catholic as such a reaction would imply.29 More importantly, however, Minchin’s father was already dead by October 1869. G.M. Smith passed away from a fever on February 10, 1869, at the early age of 48.30 The closeness of dates suggests that Minchin’s change of name was instead related to his father’s death. This may have resulted directly from a stipulation in Smith’s will, for example.31 Alternatively, the connection may have been indirect, with Minchin taking the opportunity afforded by his father’s death to distance himself from the family name. Perhaps this was Minchin’s way of stepping back from managing the land in Valentia, leaving that responsibility to his brother so he could pursue a career in academia? But what about the family account of the inappropriate union? This may have originated with Minchin’s brother William. In 1870 he married Mary Shea at the Caherciveen Registrar’s office. On the marriage certificate and in agreement with the story, Mary was identified as a “farm servant,” also resident at Donnybrook.32 Minchin’s name change and William’s marriage, coming so close together and within a year of their father’s death, may indeed have indicated some sort of division within the family. In nearly two hundred surviving letters, written between 1880 and 1900, Minchin made no reference at all to his father’s side of the family. This was despite writing about visiting Ireland on many occasions and in several letters mentioning his mother’s relations. For whatever reason, then, Minchin took the usual step in late 1869 of abandoning his original family name and adopting his distinctive duplicated moniker, George Minchin Minchin. Again, the reason for this duplication, rather than simply  In the University of Dublin debate on Gladstone’s University Education (Ireland) bill in 1873, Minchin voted in favour of an amendment that admitted that “the Roman Catholics of Ireland have a just cause of complaint, in the present condition of University education in this country.” Report of the proceedings at a special meeting of the Senate of the University of Dublin, on Tuesday, the 25th February, 1873, and three following days, to consider Mr. Gladstone’s university education bill (Ireland.) (Dublin: Hodges, Foster, & Co., 1873), vi & 55. 30  Death certificate for George Smith from Valencia, aged 48, married, attorney. Registrar’s district of Caherciveen, dated February 10, 1869, Quarter 1, vol. 5, p. 44, entry 243. His father, Thomas Smith, attended the death; he died 3 years later, at the age of 80. 31  Curiously, George Minchin was not alone in having this double name. Richard Minchin Minchin (1870–1931) changed his name from Welch in 1897 under the will of his uncle, George John Minchin. The latter was at Trinity College when Minchin changed his name. He may therefore have recalled that event when, with no children, he left his estate to his nephew. Sir Bernard Burke, Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Ireland (London: Harrison, 1912), 480–81. 32  Marriage of William Smith (gentleman of Donnybrook, Valencia, son of George M.  Smith, Solicitor) to Mary Shea, February 14, 1870, Registrar’s Office, Caherciveen, group registration 2739142, p. 55, entry 13. Available at www.irishgenealogy.ie (last accessed May 2023). Witnesses were brother John and grandfather Thomas. 29

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2  Minchin Minchin: Early Years and University in Ireland

dropping the name Smith, is unknown. It may have been to provide a middle initial that distinguished him from other individuals named George Minchin, of whom there were several, including George John Minchin at Trinity College.33

2.3 Education When his mother died in 1855 aged only 35, Minchin went to live and study with his uncle by marriage, David Charles Bell, the husband of Alicia’s sister Eleanor (Ellen, Elleen) Hyland. Bell was a Shakespearean scholar and teacher of elocution, to whose influence later writers attributed Minchin’s literary ability.34 This move was a critical step in Minchin’s life because it gave him an opportunity to fulfill his academic potential that might have been denied him had he remained in Valentia to run Donnybrook. Bell was also uncle to the future inventor of the telephone, Alexander Graham Bell, who was a couple of years younger than Minchin. One of Minchin’s obituaries stated the two boys had met at this time. But this is doubtful because Alexander was schooled in Edinburgh, first at home and then at the Royal High School. Any visits to Dublin could therefore only have been brief.35 However, they did meet in 1877 when Alexander was in London promoting his invention, and several of the Bell family letters mentioned Minchin. Little is known of Minchin’s schooling but in May 1860 George Minchin Smith was one of 36 candidates to take the Royal Dublin Society’s General Certificate of Merit. Eighteen passed, and he placed third on the list, with certificates in English, Arithmetic, Geometry, Algebra, Trigonometry, History, and Geography. For his performance he won a £3 prize.36 His school was listed as The King’s Hospital, which had been founded in 1669 by the Church of Ireland under the full title of The Hospital and Free School of King Charles II. It was known colloquially as the Blue Coat School. Minchin would have studied in its building on Blackhall Place in Dublin. When he entered Trinity College in 1862, though, the admissions records identified his teacher as Mr. Bell. On his matriculation, Minchin’s assigned tutor was George Ferdinand Shaw, who had himself graduated from Trinity College as Senior Moderator in mathematics in 1844 (the highest-ranking graduate, awarded a gold medal). Shaw had served in several senior offices of the University but by the time Minchin became his  1884 Catalogue of Graduates, 109.  “Dr. David Charles Bell Dead,” The Washington Post, October 29, 1902, 10. 35  Charlotte Gray, Reluctant Genius: the passionate life and inventive mind of Alexander Graham Bell (Toronto: Harper Collins, 2006), ch. 1. James Mackay, Sounds Out of Silence (Edinburgh: Mainstream, 1997), ch. 1. 36  “Report of the Examination for General and Commercial Certificates held on Monday, 28th May, 1860, and following days,” J. Royal Dublin Society, vol. III 1860–1861 (Dublin: Hodges, Smith, & Co., 1862), 3–5. 33 34

2.3 Education

19

student was best known as a leader writer for the Irish nationalist newspaper, the Nation. He had a reputation as the “wittiest man in College,” unrivalled for “an after-dinner speech or a slashing newspaper article.”37 In this, Shaw would have been an ideal match for Minchin’s own sharp humour. Under Shaw’s tutelage, Minchin’s mathematical abilities blossomed, and he earned in turn freshman honours in 1862, the Lloyd’s Exhibitioner in mathematics and physics (1865), Bishop Law’s £20 prize in mathematics (1867, jointly with Arthur Panton), and the M’Cullagh prize in mathematics and physics (1868). Each of these prizes had been established with donations to the College and were awarded by competitive examinations from those students eligible by year of study or position in the university. Shaw’s actual engagement in the education of his protégé is questionable, however, since the prevailing opinion was that the Fellows exercised “but little influence on the College life of the student except in their capacity as Examiners.”38 This impression is strengthened by Minchin himself, who credited someone else for being his teacher, writing: “It is right that I should acknowledge a debt to the man who taught me, whatever else he may have done.”39 That man was John Hewitt Jellett, a distinguished member of Trinity College known for his triple roles as a mathematician, clergyman, and academic administrator.40 Jellett published such contrasting works as A Treatise on the Theory of Friction and The Efficacy of Prayer.41 Although Minchin recognized his debt to Jellett as a mathematician, the second part of his comment showed that their subsequent relationship had not been easy. One reason lay with the 1872 fellowship controversy – Jellett was one of the seven Senior Fellows (and later Provost) who had decided against Minchin’s claim.42 Later, Jellett had also been publicly critical of the acknowledgement Minchin had written in the preface to his first book (discussed further in chapter five). In an additional twist, Minchin’s friend George Fitzgerald married Jellett’s daughter, Harriette, in 1885. At university, Minchin “schooled himself, … concentrated, and … kept himself fit,” working from 3 am to 3 pm. He learned new concepts by writing each on a single piece of paper and pinning it on his wall. The resulting mess of notes so annoyed him that he felt compelled to master each concept so he could remove the

 H.A Hinkson, Student Life in Trinity College, Dublin (Dublin: Charles, 1892), 36.  Hinkson, Student Life, 33. 39  Minchin to Fitzgerald, archive of the Royal Dublin Society reference 10/41 (hereafter cited in the form RDS 10/41): probably written December 1879 as Minchin was seeking Fitzgerald’s feedback on the proposed rewording of the acknowledgement to Jellett that appeared in the second edition of Statics, published in 1880. 40  “Rev. John Hewitt Jellett, D.D., D.C.L.” Nature 37 (February 23, 1888): 396–97. 41  John H. Jellett, A Treatise on the Theory of Friction (Dublin: Hodges, Foster, & Co., 1872). John H. Jellett, The Efficacy of Prayer, being the Donnellan Lectures for the Year 1877 (Dublin: Hodges, Foster, & Figgis, 1878). 42  Jellett was co-opted to the position of Senior Fellow in 1870 on the death of Dr. Thomas Luby. From that position, he was appointed Provost of Trinity College in 1881. 37 38

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2  Minchin Minchin: Early Years and University in Ireland

Table 2.1  Maximum marks awarded in Trinity College, Dublin fellowship examinations, 1867

Mathematics (pure and applied) 1200 Mental and moral sciences 600 Experimental physics 400 Classics 900 Hebrew and Chaldee 150

offending note.43 His favoured technique for learning the concepts was “by doing everything over again for himself in his own way,” making copious notes in the margins of his textbooks.44 Perhaps the most interesting of the College awards was the list of Fellowship Prizemen, which recorded those who received premiums for “distinguished answering at Fellowship Examinations.”45 That is, for the candidates who performed well, but not well enough to get the fellowship. The top-ranked runner up received the Madden Premium.46 The income from the Madden’s donation was to be given “into the hand of that disappointed candidate for the Fellowships whom … best deserved to succeed, if another Fellowship had been vacant.” Forty years after Minchin’s final attempt at the fellowship, a biographical article about him described what had happened: Mr. Minchin had been a candidate for a fellowship in Trinity College, Dublin, and had come out first in Mathematics; but the fellowship examination is one in which a candidate might take Mathematics, Physics, Metaphysics, Classics, and Hebrew, without restriction as to the number of subjects taken; and of these Mr. Minchin took the first three. Metaphysics, however, counted for double the value of Physics, and it was a strong subject of another candidate, who was elected.47

The examination for fellowships at Trinity College took place over 8 days, from Wednesday to Saturday on two consecutive weeks, 3 h in the morning and three in the afternoon. During that time, candidates could sit tests in any of the five subjects mentioned above, each of which included public oral exams. To discourage dilettantism, the examiners could choose to discount poor quality submissions. A candidate could gain a maximum number of points in each subject, as shown in Table 2.1.48 Although the article about Minchin was not entirely accurate, experimental physics was certainly given less weight than either Mental and Moral Sciences (psychology, philosophy, ethics) or Classics, and anyone taking that area could be at a disadvantage.

43  Rollo Appleyard, “A Tribute to the Memory of George M. Minchin,” Coopers Hill Magazine 10, no. 17 (March 1917): 265. 44  Prof. E.B. Elliott, quoted in Oliver J. Lodge, “George Minchin Minchin 1845–1914,” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A-92, no. 645 (October 2, 1916): xlix. 45  For example, Dublin University Calendar for 1884, 360. 46  Named after Samuel Molyneux Madden (d. 1798), son of the author and Trinity College benefactor of the same name, who in his will left property to fund the prize. 47  The Coopers Hill Magazine 8, no. 25, July 1912, 391. 48  1867 University of Dublin Calendar, 52.

2.3 Education

21

Table 2.2  Fellowships and prize winners at Trinity College, Dublin 1870 Fellowship: George Cathcart Madden: William Burnsidea George Minchin Frederick Fleming Townsend Mills Frederick Pursera William McCaya Thomas Crossley a

1871 William Burnside George Minchin Frederick Pursera William McCaya Townsend Mills Thomas Crossley Arthur Pantona Charles Keene

1872 1873 William McCay Arthur Panton (Frederick Pursera) George Minchin Frederick Pursera a Arthur Panton George F. Fitzgeralda Frederick Fleming John Sharkey

1877 George F. Fitzgerald Frederick Pursera Thomas Maguirea William Robertsa

Charles Keene

Indicates those who later became fellows

As we have seen, Minchin won the Premium in 1872, ahead of Arthur Panton. The standings for the Fellowship Prizemen over the adjacent few years are shown in the Table 2.2. This table shows why in 1872 Minchin, on at least his third fellowship attempt, pursued his claim against Purser so vigorously. Indeed, the four men involved (McCay, Minchin, Panton, Purser) had each attempted the fellowship exams on numerous occasions – Purser’s eventual success in 1879 came at his sixth attempt. He was something of an outsider in this quartet because he had entered Trinity College in 1856, 6 or 7 years before the rest of the group. So, it might have been natural for the others jointly to challenge Purser’s eligibility. Towards the end of 1872, Minchin and Purser attended the same mathematical lectures with a view to competing for the fellowship again.49 Although Minchin may have taken the fellowship examination in 1873, his name did not appear on the list of Prizemen.50 This seems unlikely given his record of excellent performances, but there were extenuating circumstances. A correspondent to Freeman’s Journal 2 years later noted that Minchin had been “under a cloud” at Trinity College since the fellowship Visitation and had been “lately refused a post of trifling value, which he was well eminently qualified to fill.” Its author, “A University Elector,” believed this to be because Minchin had written a letter after the Visitation “reflecting in a very moderate manner” on the conflict of interest of one of the Visitors.51 The College

 “Latest News,” The Belfast News-Letter, November 16, 1872.  That Minchin may have competed again in 1873 is implied by R.B. McDowell and D.A. Webb, Trinity College Dublin 1592–1952 An Academic History (Cambridge University Press, 1982), 539n15. 51  A University Elector, “The Trinity College Election,” Freeman’s Journal, March 30, 1874, 6. 49 50

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2  Minchin Minchin: Early Years and University in Ireland

Board forced Minchin to retract it and was presumably not disposed favourably towards him thereafter, regardless of his performance in examinations. No fellowships were to become vacant in the following 3 years, a gap which would have been fully apparent in advance to prospective candidates. So, when the Professorship of Applied Mathematics at the Royal Indian Engineering College near London became available in 1875, it is unsurprising that Minchin jumped at the opportunity. The Dublin University Calendar’s list of Fellowship Prizemen includes the names of other people with whom Minchin would collaborate or whose works he would study – Robert Ball, Francis Tarleton, and William Monck. And a few years later came the fellowship for George Francis Fitzgerald, a scientist with whom Minchin would maintain correspondence for over 20 years until the former’s untimely death. A number of these gentlemen also came in for some gentle ribbing in the following contemporary “doggerel verses:” Fitzgerald knows the laws of light, And lightly vaults the rail; His lady love’s a mermaid fair, And thereby hangs a tale. A sportsman, too, is Anthony, A shot that cannot fail; Great Jove alone can save the birds When he is on the trail. Oh! Burnside is a jolly man, And Burnside loves a horse; He takes things always as they come, And nothing bars his course. George Cathcart out of Hall’s not bad, Yet a Judas beard has he; Some say the devil gives him tips In trigonometry. Last night I heard two cats discourse Upon the shortest way, To find their locus on the leads, And one said, “Ask M’Cay.52

Men from this small group of gifted scholars formed the foundation of Minchin’s network of professional colleagues. Twenty years later, half of the signatures on Minchin’s application for fellowship of the Royal Society were from Trinity College.

52

 Hinkson, Student Life, 45–46.

References

23

References Appleyard, Rollo. 1917. A Tribute to the Memory of George M. Minchin. Coopers Hill Magazine 10 (17): 263–265. Burke, Sir Bernard. 1912. Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Ireland. London: Harrison. A Catalogue of Graduates of the University of Dublin vol. II. 1884. Dublin: Hodges, Figgis, & Co. Dublin University Calendar for the Year 1867. 1867. Dublin: Hodges, Smith, & Co. Dublin University Calendar for the Year 1884. 1884. Dublin: Hodges, Figgis, & Co. Dublin University Calendar, vol. III. Special supplemental volume for the year 1912–1913. 1913. Dublin: Hodges, Figgis, & Co. Elrington, Stephen N. 1872. Election of Fellows of Trinity College: Report of the Proceedings at a Visitation. Dublin: Hodges, Foster, & Co. Gray, Charlotte. 2006. Reluctant Genius: the Passionate Life and Inventive mind of Alexander Graham Bell. Toronto: Harper Collins. Griffith, Sir Richard. 1852, May Primary Valuation of Ireland. Available at https://askaboutireland. ie/griffith-­valuation/ Hinkson, H.A. 1892. Student Life in Trinity College, Dublin. Dublin: Charles. Jellett, John H. 1872. A Treatise on the Theory of Friction. Dublin: Hodges, Foster, & Co. ———. 1878. The Efficacy of Prayer, being the Donnellan Lectures for the Year 1877. Dublin: Hodges, Foster, & Figgis. Keane, Edward, P. Beryl Phair, and Thomas U. Sadleir, eds. 1982. King’s Inns Admission Papers 1607–1867. Dublin: Stationery Office for the Irish Manuscripts Commission. Levey, R.M., and J. O’Rorke. 1880. Annals of the Theatre Royal Dublin. Dublin: Dollard. Lodge, Oliver J. 1916, October 2. George Minchin Minchin 1845–1914. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A-92 (645): xlvi–l. Lunney, Linde, Enda Leaney, and Patricia M. Byrne. 2009. Minchin, George Minchin, Dictionary of Irish Biography, revised March 2013, online at www.dib.ie. Originally published in James McGuire, James Quinn eds. Dictionary of Irish Biography. Cambridge University Press. Mackay, James. 1997. Sounds Out of Silence. Edinburgh: Mainstream. McDowell, R.B., and D.A. Webb. 1982. Trinity College Dublin 1592–1952 an Academic History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Minchin, George M. 1879. On Bumptiousness. In Parting Words to Boys Leaving School and Entering Upon Life, ed. Maurice Charles Hime, 155–160. London: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co. Pochin, Mould, and D.C. Daphne. 1978. Valentia Portrait of an Island. Dublin: Blackwater. Report of the Examination for General and Commercial Certificates held on Monday, May 28, 1860, and following days, J. Royal Dublin Society, vol. III 1860–1861. Dublin: Hodges, Smith, & Co., 1862. Report of the proceedings at a special meeting of the Senate of the University of Dublin, on Tuesday, the 25th February, 1873, and three following days, to consider Mr. Gladstone’s university education bill (Ireland). 1873. Dublin: Hodges, Foster, & Co. Rev. John Hewitt Jellett, D.D., D.C.L. 1888, February 23. Nature 37: 396–397. The Theatre Royal, Dublin, from 1833 to 1837. 1868, November. The Dublin University Magazine 72: 558–571. University Tests (Dublin) (No.3). 1873, April 3. House of Commons Parliamentary Paper, Bill 124, 36 Vict.

Chapter 3

Is the Monkey Smooth? A Career at Coopers Hill

Abstract  Minchin’s contemporaries spoke of him as ‘joyous,’ ‘enthusiastic,’ ‘singularly lovable,’ a man who “caught the fire of life and conveyed its benefits to all around him.” His buoyant character shaped his views on education, humour and satires, diverse interests, and experimental enthusiasms. George Minchin’s character, talents, personality, and family life are discovered through events and anecdotes from his career at the Royal Indian Engineering College, Coopers Hill. Professional themes centre on his appointment to Coopers Hill, the commencement of his experimental work, and the transition from his previous, purely mathematical endeavours. Minchin’s marriage to Emma, his children, and his passions for birds, tennis, and cricket comprise the backdrop of his personal life. Several of my friends, for instance – men of physical science, skilful metaphysicians, literary men – do not know the difference between a goldfinch and a bullfinch, or between a grouse and a pheasant! … the omission of the teaching of natural history (in an easy and interesting shape) in our schools fits ill with the vast importance now attained by Biology, a science of immense possibilities, and one which is “advancing by leaps and bounds.” (George Minchin, Selborne Society Letters (1887))1

3.1 Professor at Last In February 1875, a small advertisement appeared in the Times announcing that the professorship of applied mathematics at the Royal Indian Engineering College would become vacant in April.2 This institution had been established in 1871 to train engineers for the Public Works Department in India to build the infrastructure of the British Raj. The College became known colloquially as Coopers Hill because of its  George M. Minchin, “The Study of Natural History in Schools,” Selborne Society Letters 5 (May 1887): 55. 2  The Times, February 17, 1875, 3 (col. 3). 1

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Hornsey, The Many-Sidedness of George Minchin Minchin, International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d’histoire des idées 248, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-40243-2_3

25

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location overlooking the River Thames near Egham, just outside London. Minchin was interviewed for the professorship by the founding president of the College, Sir George Chesney. Some years after his appointment to Coopers Hill, Colonel Chesney told [Minchin] that his candidature was unconsciously, but powerfully, supported by another Dublin candidate for the professorship of Applied Mathematics who arrived at Coopers Hill to be interviewed by the President almost at the same hour as that fixed for the interview with Mr. Minchin. Neither candidate was aware of the application of the other; but Mr. Minchin’s rival informed Colonel Chesney that he would not have competed if he had known the circumstances. The President was decided by this fortuitous testimonial.3

Following a swift selection process, the newspapers announced the Secretary of State for India’s decision to appoint Minchin at Coopers Hill towards the end of March 1875.4 He received an initial salary of £450 per annum, plus free accommodation (which he took in College), coal, and gas.5 In less than 4 years, two other young men had already held the professorship. The first, (Alfred) George Greenhill, rebelled at Chesney’s rather military management of the College. He moved to Cambridge in 1874 and then, ironically, to the Royal Artillery College at Woolwich, where he became the foremost ballistics expert of the day.6 To his former colleague Minchin wrote a poem, Owed to Greenhill’s Cat, the first two verses of which were: O thou whose eyes have fed on many a page Strewn upon chairs and floors of Legal Attics, Replete with symbols scattered by the Sage In Calculus, Kinetics, Hydrostatics – Though hard thy couch may be, though scant thy rations, No Cat did ever see such fine equations! Thy coat electric, when the air is dry, And thou upon the floor art calmly lying, Thy Master’s hand has charged upon the sly, And then, the laws of Science verifying, Sparks to thy nose from out his proffered knuckle Have made thee start and made thy Master chuckle!

 From a profile of Minchin when he was elected President of the Coopers Hill Society in 1912. Unfortunately, he was unable to attend the annual meeting and dinner that summer because of ill health (see Chap. 11). “C.H. Society,” Coopers Hill Magazine 8, no. 25 (July 1912): 391. 4  For example, “Mail News,” Glasgow Herald, March 29, 1875, 5. The Belfast News-Letter of the same day took delight in observing both that Minchin was an alumnus of Trinity College and that he had competed successfully against “senior wranglers of Cambridge who were candidates.” 5  Described in Minchin’s contract, dated April 27, 1875. In 1889 the Secretary of State for India approved a set of changes in mathematics teaching at Coopers Hill, resulting in the appointment of Alfred Lodge as Professor of Pure Mathematics and a salary increase for Minchin to £600 per annum (including an allowance for coal and gas), plus free lodgings (or an additional allowance of £100). British Library (hereafter BL) IOR:L/PWD/8/388. This reorganization was occasioned by the superannuation of the then Professor of Mathematics, Joseph Wolstenholme, to whom Lodge had served as Assistant Professor. 6  “Sir George Greenhill,” The Times, February 14, 1927, 17. 3

3.2  The Royal Indian Engineering College

27

Although undated, the mathematical reference to Greenhill’s knighthood in the last few lines suggests it was 1908: If x denotes our simple “A. G. G.,” Then x + ∆ x we’ll now him call; For, if we write “Sir A. G. G.,” you see There’s just a Fine Knight difference – that’s all.7

Greenhill’s successor, Edward Nanson, stayed barely 1 year before emigrating to Australia to take up an appointment at the University of Melbourne.8 Greenhill and Nanson were each aged 23 at the time of their appointments, whereas Minchin was 29. After 5 years of trying, Minchin had, despite his earlier disappointments, at last got his professorship. The result was afterwards felt by Mr. Minchin to be a blessing in disguise, as it introduced him to the stimulating scientific life of England at a time when Science was in a stagnant slate in Dublin and great scientific activity prevailed in England.9

Minchin remained at his post for 31 years until the Royal Indian Engineering College was closed by the government in 1906. This chapter focuses on Minchin’s life at the College, his family, and his character as revealed by the anecdotes told by him and about him. Minchin’s professional accomplishments will be covered in later chapters.

3.2 The Royal Indian Engineering College Coopers Hill was arguably the first institution in Britain to offer a comprehensive engineering education. Its foundation in 1871 came at a time when unprecedented investment in public works in India necessitated a corresponding supply of well-­ trained civil engineers. Such works had hitherto mainly fallen under the auspices of the Royal Engineers, but issues of capacity and competence during the 1860s had led to an increasing requirement for a corresponding corps of civilian engineers. But attempts by the government to entice British civil engineers to India had met with limited success. Coopers Hill was therefore established to meet this need, over the objections of the Government of India which was expected to pay for it.10

 G.M.  Minchin, Owed to Greenhill’s Cat, for private circulation c.1908, in the archives of the Royal Society, London, MS/928/4/2/6. 8  G. C. Fendley, “Nanson, Edward John (1850–1936),” in Australian Dictionary of Biography, eds. Bede Nairn and Geoffrey Searle (Melbourne University Press, 1986), 10:663. Also available online at https://adb.anu.edu.au 9  “C.H. Society,” Coopers Hill Magazine 8, no. 25 (July 1912): 391. 10  A complete history of the Royal Indian Engineering College is found in Richard Hornsey, Imperial Engineers (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2022). 7

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The College ethos lay somewhere between that of a military academy and an Oxbridge college. It was purposely designed to provide a pathway for young men from the country’s fee-paying “public schools” into an engineering career in India. A guaranteed position for graduates in the Indian Public Works Department led to fierce competition for the 50 places initially available each year. The Times published lists of candidates who succeeded in the competitive entrance examinations and the annual prize days were grand affairs that attracted large crowds of dignitaries. However, the pace of construction in India slowed and for financial reasons Coopers Hill was forced to admit students seeking a general engineering education. It also started training telegraph and forestry officers for India. By the early years of the twentieth century, a combination of factors led to the ultimate abolition of the College. Over its 35-year existence, engineering training had progressed from a model based on apprenticeships to a recognized university discipline, and Coopers Hill was no longer at the forefront. This situation had largely resulted from confusion over the College’s mandate. It still had to serve the needs of India, while at the same time the government demanded that it should be financially self-sustaining. To achieve the latter, the College took on students not destined for India. But it could not offer the same breadth of emerging new engineering subjects that other institutions provided, nor indeed their fully fledged engineering degrees. Ultimately, the government decided that these other universities could provide enough engineers for India and used a rather dubious financial pretext to close Coopers Hill. Ironically, having been opposed to its creation, the Government of India now opposed its closure. Although institutions in India offered an engineering education, members of the superior establishment of the Indian Public Works Department were almost exclusively educated in England where young men with the ‘right character’ were trained to assume command of operations in India. Coopers Hill emphasized traditional manly pursuits of rugby football, cricket, and rowing, and membership of the volunteer military corps was strongly encouraged. High tuition fees ensured that students came from relatively wealthy backgrounds. In its last decade, however, students from around the world started attending the College on scholarships from their home governments. To achieve the right degree of esprit de corps, all students at the Royal Indian Engineering College lived on site in the large mansion bought for the purpose by the India Office in late 1870 (Fig. 3.1). The original house contained living quarters for the President and professors, classrooms, a lecture theatre, and library. A new wing had been added before opening day to accommodate 100 students, and a teaching laboratory constructed for physical science and chemistry. A second residence block was built a few years later to bring the College’s capacity to 150 (although enrollments never reached that maximum). Coopers Hill occupied extensive grounds overlooking the valley of the River Thames and Runnymede, where the Magna Carta had been signed. At the time, George Chesney commented that it was “impossible to speak too highly of the general suitability of the place for the proposed purpose.” The grounds became

3.3  Experimental Work

29

Fig. 3.1  Royal Indian Engineering College, circa 1905. The original mansion containing accommodation for the President and professors is ahead, while the 1871 addition for student rooms is to the right

home to rugby fields, cricket pitches, a shooting range, tennis courts, and eventually a small golf course. A muddy walk across the fields brought College members to the boathouse.

3.3 Experimental Work In Dublin, Minchin had been known as a mathematician, so his Irish friends were initially sceptical when he turned his hand to experimental sciences. Writing a few years later when he was starting to get interesting results, Minchin commented: The Holy Man, 𝛱, and 𝛭𝛼𝜒𝜂 expressed an opinion that my experimenting, physical ideas, + c., would lead to nothing. You may tell them, one + all, that I mean to give them The Lie Direct.11

Minchin was in the habit, later adopted to some extent by Fitzgerald and Lodge, of referring to his friends by nicknames, Greek letters, or sometimes both.12 Thus, his letters were addressed to 𝛷 (phi = Fitzgerald), 𝛬 (lamda = Lodge), or 𝜆 (lowercase lamda = Oliver’s younger brother, Alfred, also at Coopers Hill). He usually signed himself with a sigil made of the combination of his initials, 𝛤 and 𝛭. In this

 GMM to GFF, RDS 10/21, dated to around 1880 by its context. Minchin explicitly identified the Holy Man in this letter. Other soubriquets, such as The Owl, remain uncertain. The phrase “the lie direct” is from Shakespeare’s As You Like It. 12  Lodge and Fitzgerald used this system after 1890. Bruce J. Hunt, “‘Our Friend of Brilliant Ideas’: G. F. Fitzgerald and the Maxwellian Circle,” European Review 15, no. 4 (2007): 533. 11

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example, the Holy Man was astronomer Richard Johnson,13 𝛱 was Arthur Panton,14 and 𝛭𝛼𝜒𝜂 was William McCay. Minchin began ‘dabbling’ (to use Lodge’s rather patronizing term) in experimental physics soon after joining Coopers Hill. He used to travel to London at weekends and during college vacations to work in the laboratory of George Carey Foster at University College in South Kensington. On his longer visits, Minchin usually stayed in small boarding houses on Coleshill Street near Sloane Square.15 Minchin also joined the Junior Oxford and Cambridge Club, which also served members of Trinity College, Dublin.16 Initially, Minchin had undertaken a “certain course of training” in Carey Foster’s laboratory but by early 1879 he started collecting equipment for his own experiments: I have laid in a store of instruments + materials for batteries, + c., in order that I may practically study Exp[erimental] Physics. I have the ideas of a few experiments, some of which, if “brought to an excellent work,” will eclipse the Telephone!17

Within a year, Minchin performed his own experiments, conceiving and building several instruments that included a thermopile and a new electrometer. Most famously, he commenced his early experiments on photoelectricity.18 Carey Foster had established one of the first university physical laboratories and was a strong advocate for students learning from experimentation. His facility became a well-­ known training ground for those interested in experimental physics, including Oliver Lodge, whom Minchin met there, and William Ayrton. Minchin and Foster were at first sight dissimilar characters, the one gregarious and eloquent, the other shy and hesitant. Nevertheless, they enjoyed a strong friendship based on respect for each other’s abilities. Minchin’s opinion of his friend echoed those of others who had worked closely with Foster: Carey Foster is ∞ly nice + an excellent mathematician. There is splendid work done in his lab., as all the men work the math[ematical] theory of Heat, Light, Elect[ricity], Magnetism,

 Richard Johnson (1840–1894) studied classics at Trinity College before turning to experimental science. He was a member of the expedition to Hawaii in 1874 to view the transit of Venus, in the wake of which he was elected a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society. He taught at the College until his death. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 55 (February 1895), 194–95. 14  Minchin mentioned Π quite frequently in his letters to Fitzgerald, often jokingly, for example in connection with beating him at racquets: “I go over to Dublin to defeat the blatant Π at racquets.” He was clearly located in Dublin and the context pointed towards Π being Arthur Panton (see Chap. 2). This is confirmed by Minchin’s statement that Π was correcting the proofs of his 1898 book Geometry for Beginners (GMM to GFF, RDS 10/104, dated October 27, 1897) and his thanks to Panton for this service in the preface of that book. 15  Coleshill Street was later renamed Eaton Terrace. 16  Minchin’s membership is inferred from the use of the Club’s notepaper in 1880 and 1881. Club details from Dickens’s Dictionary of London 1882 (London: Macmillan 1882), 142. 17  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/110, dated Friday, January 17. By matching day and date, the year was 1879. “Bring it to an excellent work” is from Psalm 74  in the Church of England Book of Common Prayer. 18  Oliver J. Lodge, “George Minchin Minchin 1845–1914,” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A-92, no. 645 (October 2, 1916): xlvi–l. 13

3.3  Experimental Work

31

+ c. at same time as experiments. I feel quite up to my neck sometimes when we discuss the math[ematics] of polarised light, gratings, + a hundred other things.19

For his part, Carey Foster had the greatest respect for Minchin’s mathematical abilities and his obituarist, A.H. Fison, quoted several charming letters between the pair.20 At the Junior Oxford and Cambridge Club in 1881, Minchin, Lodge, Foster, Frederick Guthrie, and assistant JW Clark celebrated with champagne21 the success Minchin’s of first invention, the absolute sine electrometer. This was a clever version of a standard electrometer that could measure absolute, rather than relative, voltages. It worked by balancing the electrostatic force on a plate due to the applied voltage against the gravitational force due to its mass. The operator used a micrometer screw to tilt the apparatus until the deflection of the plate was zero. Once the system was calibrated, it gave the voltage, V = 0.0456√(m), where m was the number of turns of the micrometer.22 The electrometer was built by the Groves instrument makers of Bolsover Street, London, and tested in Foster’s lab. Minchin worked on improvements to the electrometer for the next 2 years, with a view to sending one to Professor William Arnold Anthony at Cornell University.23 The improvements did not go smoothly, however, and it took nearly a year after Groves completed the instrument for it to work satisfactorily.24 Oliver Lodge later felt that the absolute sine electrometer might have been made into a practical instrument, but in a foreshadowing of the impulsion cells a decade later, it proved “troublesome to adjust.”25 After the mid-1880s, Minchin appears to have done no more work on it.26

 GMM to GFF, RDS 10/141, probably dating from early 1880 after the publication of the second edition of Statics. 20  A.H. Fison, “George Carey Foster,” Journal of the Chemical Society 115 (1919): 425–26. See also Oliver Lodge, “George Carey Foster, 1835–1919,” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. A96 (1920): xv – xviii. 21  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/70, dated May 15, the year 1881 by reference to Minchin’s presentation of the electrometer to the Physical Society on May 14, 1881. 22  The presentation is listed in Proceedings of the Physical Society of London 5 (January 1882 – March 1884): 3. The operation of the absolute sine electrometer is given in G.M. Minchin, “On the Absolute Sine Electrometer,” Report on the Fifty-First Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, York 1881 (London: John Murray, 1882), 558–59. Also George M.  Minchin, “The Determination of Electromotive Force in Absolute Electrostatic Measure,” Nature 25 (January 19, 1882): 278–80 (with a correction announced on p.290). 23  “Physical Notes,” Nature 28 (July 26, 1883): 308. 24  George M. Minchin, “Electrostatic Measurement of E.M.F.,” Nature 29 (March 27, 1884): 501. 25  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/49, dated March 26, attributed to 1881. Also Oliver Lodge, Past Years, an autobiography (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1931 reprinted 2012), 142–43. 26  Lodge’s obituary for Minchin stated that the absolute sine electrometer had been developed further and commercialized by Cambridge Instruments in the form of the Wilson-Kaye tilted gold leaf electrometer. He was, however, mistaken. While the Wilson-Kaye instrument was similar to the extent that it incorporated a tilted electrode, its purpose was not to enable an absolute measurement of the voltage but to achieve a high sensitivity. G.W.C.  Kaye, “Some Notes on the Tilted Gold Leaf Electrometer, with Suggestions as to the Manipulation of Gold Leaf Suspensions, Suitable Insulators for Electrometer Work, & c.,” Proceedings of the Physical Society of London 23 (1910): 209–18. 19

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A small teaching laboratory for physics and chemistry, designed by Minchin’s colleague Herbert McLeod, was included in the original renovations of the Coopers Hill mansion. However, there was no space there for Minchin’s research work.27 As his interests in experimental measurements developed, the College instead built him an “experimental shed” to house his equipment. It was completed towards the end of 1879.28 When the Coopers Hill started taking general student admissions in the 1880s and physics was separated from chemistry, Minchin advised President Taylor to consult William Siemens and William Thomson (Lord Kelvin) about improving the laboratory facilities.29 Accordingly, a physical laboratory was established which included a lecture room, preparation room, teaching laboratory, and a small optical laboratory. The latter, where Minchin carried out his work, was ultimately equipped with a slate optical table ten feet long and one-and-a-half inches thick, with a firm concrete foundation.30 Rollo Appleyard, Minchin’s assistant from 1885 to 1892, recalled the scene: From the top of Coopers Hill, it will be remembered, the Physical laboratory looked out across and along the Thames valley – miles and miles. Physics was accorded there a lecture theatre, a preparation room, a main laboratory and a small optical laboratory. Most of Minchin’s experiments were carried out in the small room. This could be darkened by means of folding wooden shutters. There was a lawn and a garden of roses outside it, and through the garden was a path which led to the College woods and across Runnymede to the College boat-house. You must picture him there early on a summer's morning, looking out to watch the blackbirds and the wag-tails on the lawn.31

 Professor Herbert McLeod, “Laboratory, C.E. College,” dated April 14, 1871, British Library IOR L/PWD/8/8, 375–87. 28  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/41 and 10/42. Although these letters are undated, they discuss the wording of Minchin’s acknowledgement to Jellett for the preface of Statics. The final wording from 10/42 appears in the second edition of that book, dated December 1879. 29  Remodelling of Course of Instruction and Retirement of certain of the Professors and Lecturers, UK Parliamentary Paper (hereafter PP) Cd.539 (London: His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1901), 70–1. This report detailed hearings conducted by the Board of Visitors of the Royal Indian Engineering College in 1901. Their investigation was called in response to a public outcry after the new President, William Ottley, fired seven professors to make way for curricular reforms. Minchin gave evidence about mathematics teaching at the College and his view of the new curriculum. While not opposed to the curriculum, Minchin disagreed with the firings of his long-time colleagues and Ottley saw him as one of his foremost opponents within the academic staff. Hornsey, Imperial Engineers, 234–39. 30  GMM to OJL, UCL, undated but written at the end of February 1899 by reference to Minchin’s letter to Nature criticizing Euclid. George M.  Minchin, “Geometry versus Euclid,” Nature 59 (February 16, 1899): 369–70. See also Appleyard, “A Tribute to the Memory of George M. Minchin,” 264. 31  Appleyard, “A Tribute to the Memory of George M. Minchin,” 264. This passage, among others, was quoted by Oliver Lodge in his obituary for Minchin. 27

3.4 Birds

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3.4 Birds Appleyard’s last comment referred to one of Minchin’s most talked-about passions – birds. Scientist and spiritualist Oliver Lodge commented about Minchin’s early days at Coopers Hill: He was a bachelor in those days, and his hobby was keeping innumerable birds in cages. I slept in the college sometimes, and he put me up in a spare bedroom from which he had raked out sufficient of the bird-cages and apparatus to allow of the insertion of a bed.32

Alicia Cameron Taylor, daughter of Coopers Hill’s second president Sir Alexander Taylor and who knew Minchin personally, attributed this fascination to a “blend of delicate beauty, helplessness, and gallantry common to feathered things.”33 Minchin lived in the main college building in those days and the 1881 census coincidentally captured the visits of both Lodge, then at University College, London, and George Francis Fitzgerald. In about 1884, for example, Minchin wrote to Fitzgerald that his time was occupied with six Indian birds he had received as a present from a former student, a starling he had been “bringing up since very tender infancy…(a wonder of a pet now),” and two chaffinches.34 Later, this tame starling was joined by 23 other birds, including a woodpecker, titmice, linnets, and a bullfinch.35 One of the latter, while usually affectionate, would not “tolerate the presence of a certain official of the College” and flew at the intruder’s face.36 Based on these experiences, Minchin wrote a charming article on the individual characters of the birds. He described how his habit of adopting wild birds dated from at least his student days: One of the most affectionate pets I ever saw was a sparrow, who received the name of “Passer.” I brought him up from the nest when I was an undergraduate, and he used to follow me about the quadrangle, and the College Park. … At night this bird took no notice whatever of any conversation carried on in the room where he slept (in the feathers of a stuffed seagull on the top of a book case).37

Natural history featured strongly in Minchin’s life at Coopers Hill, and when called upon to give a speech to the Coopers Hill Society dinner, Minchin related several stories that included a tale of canaries that survived being dosed with “Keating’s insect-destroying powder”38 to grace the College’s Lawrence corridor with song, and the construction of a thermostatically controlled incubator for nightingale eggs.  Lodge, Past Years, 143–44.  Alicia Cameron Taylor, General Sir Alex Taylor C.G.B., R.E.: his times, his friends, and his work (London: Williams & Norgate, 1913), 2:258. 34  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/12, dated “June 6,” attributed to 1880. 35  GMM to Ball, RDS 10/27, dated “March 8,” attributed to 1884. 36  George M.  Minchin, “Individual Character in Birds,” The Selborne Magazine for lovers and students of living nature 1 (1888): 185. 37  Minchin, “Individual Character in Birds,” 186. 38  Keating’s Persian Insect Destroying Powder was a popular mid-nineteenth-century treatment that was unrivalled for killing bedbugs, fleas, and cockroaches but “quite harmless to animal life.” 32 33

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3  Is the Monkey Smooth? A Career at Coopers Hill

Students brought Minchin a stream of orphaned creatures for him to look after in his sitting room – birds, squirrels, a mole – causing him to lament humorously, “1 know not how many theorems in Statics and Hydrostatics have been lost to the world by the teeth of squirrels or the influence of young birds in that room.”39 Sometimes the students’ wildlife-related hijinks were on a large scale. As President of the Society, Minchin described at another dinner shortly before his death how some of the engineering students “sallied out in the early hours of one summer morning, and drove from their feeding ground in front of The Barley Mow [pub] a flock of about 100 geese into the College and lodged them in one of the Forestry lecture rooms.” Apparently, this was intended to be a “slur on the intelligence” of the forestry students.40

3.5 Teaching Minchin seems to have been an instant success as a lecturer, winning over students and staff alike with his easy charm and ready wit. Oliver Lodge stated that by “universal testimony his teaching was clear, broad, and enthusiastic, and he was most popular with the students, not only inside but also outside the lecture room.” He was an indulgent tutor to his assigned students, allowing them freedom to learn from experience and defending them against punishment for their misdemeanors. A photograph of Minchin and his colleagues in 1903 is presented in Fig. 3.2. Descriptions of Minchin’s teaching and writing praised his ‘lucidity’ and ‘persuasive speech and imagination.’ Even George Chesney fell under Minchin’s spell: He combines in a peculiar degree the power of lucid explanation, and of interesting his pupils in subjects which, under ordinary handling, may easily be made dry and repulsive. Over and over again when visiting his lecture room with the intention of staying only a few minutes, I have found myself sitting out the whole lecture, so interesting, and indeed charming, did I find his demonstrations on the black-board of the processes of both pure and applied mathematics.41

As it happened, Chesney’s interest was not purely because of his professor’s eloquence. Until observing Minchin, Chesney was unaware that mathematics could be taught by lecturing rather than the traditional tutorial system. Minchin preferred a combined approach, using what today might be called ‘problem-based learning,’ stating: … a method of teaching mathematics or any scientific subject wholly by lecturing must be a failure, undoubtedly. But the method at Cooper’s Hill is nothing of the sort. It is a very careful combination of the lecture and the tutorial system. In every lecture which I deliver  Coopers Hill Magazine 8, no. 21 (August 1911): 327–28. Also, George M. Minchin, “Notes on Natural History,” The Selborne Magazine for lovers and students of living nature 2 (1889): 103–5. 40  Coopers Hill Magazine 9, no.3 (August 1913): 36. Minchin quipped that the forestry students would henceforth never be “at a loss for an anser.” 41  Lodge, “George Minchin Minchin,” xlvi. 39

3.5 Teaching

35

Fig. 3.2  Staff of the Royal Indian Engineering College in late 1903. George Minchin is seated in a place of seniority (fourth from the right, front row) next to President John Ottley (centre). (© British Library Board, Photo 297/2(329)) in mathematics, and in every one that I have delivered since 1875, there has been a general exposition of the subject whenever a new branch of it cropped up, explaining the nature and aims and so on, and sometimes the history, to the whole of the class. It has been then illustrated by me on the blackboard by worked-out examples. That has, in turn, been followed up by individual work set to the members of the class; and then I have gone round from one to another, to see how this work was being done. … I myself had been lectured in mathematics by such men, for instance, as Salmon and Jellett, and I knew that lecturing in mathematics was perfectly possible; so I introduced a combination of the lecture and the tutorial system. Sir George Chesney came at least 20 times to my lectures; he used to sit down amongst the students for two hours at a time, and so he made himself thoroughly acquainted with the system. His praise of it was very high.42

Towards the end of the college’s existence Sir William Preece, a member of the board of visitors, said that had “never heard anything but the very highest encomiums on the mode and the way in which mathematics is imparted to the students at Cooper’s Hill.”43 One story particularly illustrated Minchin’s easy style with the students as well as, indirectly, the sophisticated mathematical concepts he taught:

42 43

 PP Cd.539 (1901), 68.  PP Cd.539 (1901), 76.

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3  Is the Monkey Smooth? A Career at Coopers Hill He had a very keen sense of humour, and those who were present at the time will never forget an incident in one of his mathematical lectures – he set the following problem: a short smooth pole is placed with one end resting on a smooth horizontal plane and the other against a smooth vertical wall, with what velocity should a monkey slide down the pole so as to prevent the latter slipping down? There was a silence in the class for some minutes when one of the students – a fellow Irishman – asked “Please, Sir, is the monkey smooth?” The laughter was great and the Professor was so tickled that he was unable to tackle any serious work for the rest of the lecture.44

Some students, however, found Minchin’s mathematics challenging and occasional remarks to this effect appeared in the College newspaper, The Coopers Hill Magazine. One memorable poem described a student cramming Minchin’s course materials late at night before the examination. He thought of the comfort and warmth of his bed, And the sleep that alas was denied him, Then he turned with a sigh to the “Pomph” that he read To the Minchin and Lodge just beside him. He thought how his friends had grown distant and cool, For his rudeness had forced them to “chuck” him, And he knew very well they would think him a fool If the Examiner decided to pluck him.45

3.6 Dead Rats Minchin was reputed to have been a troublesome guest, often late for dinner, when he showed up at all. One further story, told my Minchin himself, serves to underline both the challenges and delights of his companionship. In 1899, in the middle of a letter about his work, Minchin delightedly launched into the tale of his bottle of valerate of ethyl (ethyl pentanoate) that he was trying in his experiments. In low concentrations it is used as a food flavouring with the scent of apples but at higher concentrations it smells of rotten fruit. I got a small bottle of valerate of ethyl to try … but after 1 second it stank out Stocker + the whole Physical Lab. I took it (well corked up) + hid it in the Chemical Lab. It was scented out + expelled in 5 minutes. I hid it in the Bursar’s office, in his absence, at the top of a cupboard. When he returned, he smelt drains (he said) + found it out. He shoved it into the Chem[ical] Lab again. It was ousted again, + I hid it in a drawer in His Eloquence’s room. That night there was a dance in the College, + he brought some ladies to the room. They swore to dead rats!! After hunting about, they found it, + it was shoved at arm’s length into a large passage outside. It stunk out the corridor!

 Announcement of Minchin’s death, Coopers Hill Magazine 9, no. 6 (April 1914): 81–82.  Coopers Hill Magazine 1, no. 3 (November 1897): 37. ‘Pomph’ was the students’ nickname for Callcott Reilly, professor of engineering construction. 44 45

3.6  Dead Rats

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I brought it home, + deposited it in the study. It stunk out the house, + Mrs. Minchin rebelled. I hid it in the ivy outside the verandah, + all the visitors to the house, + the neighbours complained. I removed it, + buried it at the foot of a tree in the garden. I have not yet found any sick birds near it. I forgot to mention that I had previously hidden it in Prof. Seely’s room among his fossils. He thought that the students had been filling his room with rotten apples, + he cleared out!46

This short story not only conjures wonderful images of George Minchin sneaking into his colleagues’ rooms, but it brings the College to life and introduces us to some of his friends. William Stocker47 was Professor of Physics and assisted Minchin with his measurements. He was known for his habit of walking long distances, maintaining an average of nearly 3000  miles per year over a 52-year period.48 Minchin was also friends with the College Bursar, John Pasco, former Royal Navy paymaster and founder of the Temperance Tavern in Englefield Green. Professor Harry Seeley was lecturer of geology at Coopers Hill until it closed, and then transferred to King’s College London until his death a few years later. A caricature of him on the students’ 1901 Bal Masqué invitation showed a sequence of fossils, labelled ammonite, lamellibranchiatite, and “Seeleyite.” It is revealing that Prof. Seeley would have immediately jumped to the conclusion that his students had pranked him. But who was ‘His Eloquence,’ the man who brought ladies back to his room after the dance? There is just one other occasion when Minchin used this name, when he alerted Fitzgerald to a forthcoming talk on forestry in Dublin by his good friend W.R. Fisher, an “extremely jovial creature” they called His Eloquence. Although the  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/134, dated December 30th, 1899.  William Nelson Stocker lived to the grand age of 98, and at the time of his death in 1949 had been a Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford, for 72 years. He started at Oxford intending to study classics but ultimately took first class degrees in mathematics and natural science in 1873 and 1874, respectively. On graduation, Stocker became a Demonstrator in the Clarendon Physics Laboratory, where he remained until his appointment to Coopers Hill as Professor of Physics in 1883. Stocker seems to have started well at the Clarendon, but proved unable to maintain his early momentum, becoming swamped by teaching and perhaps lacking the drive to become a top researcher (Robert Fox, “The Context and Practices of Oxford Physics, 1839–77” in Physics in Oxford 1839–1939 ed. R.  Fox & G.  Gooday [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005], 65–66). During that period, in 1878, he successfully competed for an open fellowship at Brasenose that could be held for life (in 1943 he became the last surviving holder of such a life fellowship). “As a teacher, Stocker was correct and clear, rather than inspired, but he never failed to gain the respect and regard of his pupils. With a nature genial and generous, he was nevertheless reserved in act and speech, and never enthusiastic about science or any other subject.” Stocker left Coopers Hill in 1901 (see Chap. 11) and returned to Oxford, where “he was typical of that almost extinct class, the old bachelor don of Victorian days.” “At a College breakfast of the Fellows, the conversation turned on the excellence of Bishop Paget’s sermons, so carefully prepared and so finished in detail. “Ah,” said Stocker, “that’s when I like sermons – when they are finished.”” Quotes from Stocker’s obituary, The Times, August 3, 1949, 7. 48  Coopers Hill Magazine 12, no. 16 (May 1928): 246. 46 47

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two letters Minchin wrote about this event were dated simply February 26 and March 3, Fisher’s lecture on forestry was given to the Royal Dublin Society on the latter date in 1899.49 William Rogers Fisher (1846–1910), Assistant Professor of Forestry at Coopers Hill, had served as a Conservator of Forests and Director of the Dehra Dun Forest Institute in India before joining Coopers Hill. He moved to the University of Oxford when the forestry school was transferred from Coopers Hill in 1905. In Fisher’s obituary, Minchin described his friend’s “extreme simplicity of character” and “disposition to friendliness which no conditions of time or place could restrain.”50

3.7 Marriage Another three words in the story above – “Mrs. Minchin rebelled” – serve to arouse our sympathy for the long-suffering (we imagine) Emma Minchin. George and Emma were married on June 30, 1887 at the parish church of Great Marlow.51 Figure 3.3 shows Minchin from about the same time.52 However, the happy event came as a surprise to his colleagues. Herbert McCleod, Professor of Chemistry, wrote in his diary that he first heard about the wedding on the day itself from the wife of another professor. The next day, McLeod wrote, “The President told me that Minchin was really married yesterday. I thought it was a hoax before.”53 The congratulations from Minchin’s friend and kindred spirit, Carey Foster, managed to combine both scientific and Irish political humour: My dear G.M.M., I heard a while ago that you had entered into combination and were no longer a dissociated atom. Accept my warmest congratulations and my fervent hope that you may appreciate the blessings of home rule more fully from year to year.54

 GMM to GFF, RDS 10/115, dated February 26, and RDS 10/113, dated March 3. In the latter, Minchin asked Fitzgerald to send him the Dublin newspapers’ accounts of Fisher’s talk. W.R. Fisher, “Lecture on Forestry Given Before the Royal Dublin Society, March 3, 1899,” The Economic Proceedings of the Royal Dublin Society 1 (1899–1909): 73–108. 50  G. M. Minchin, “The Late Prof. W.R. Fisher (an appreciation),” Coopers Hill Magazine 8, no. 19 (January 1911): 296–97. 51  “Births, Marriages, & Deaths,” The Morning Post, July 2, 1887, 1. 52   This photograph, dated 1887, also appears in Rollo Appleyard, Pioneers of Electrical Communication (London: MacMillan & Co., 1930), 249. The copy in the Offaly Archives is from the papers of Woodfield House, whose owners were related to Minchin via his cousin Maria Blanche Plunkett-Johnson (Maria’s mother Lizzie Fuller née Hyland was sister to Minchin’s mother Alicia). Minchin visited his cousin at her home Rockfield, Moate, King’s County at least once in 1894 after the first successful measurement of starlight with his photoelectric cell. GMM to OJL, UCL, dated January 12, attributed to 1894 by reference to the announcement of the starlight results in Nature. By kind permission of the Offaly Archives. 53  Diary of Herbert McLeod, July 1, 1887, held at the archives of Imperial College, London. 54  A.H. Fison, “George Carey Foster,” 426. 49

3.7 Marriage

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Fig. 3.3  George Minchin in 1887, aged 42, at the time of his marriage

Emma Fawcett had been born in 1855 on the Isle of Man, the middle daughter of James and Frances Fawcett of Strand Hill, County Leitrim, Ireland. It is not clear how the two met, although Emma’s brother (William) and brother-in-law (Charles Hetherington, husband of Emma’s younger sister Adelaide)55 were both Minchin’s contemporaries at Trinity College.56 The couple spent their honeymoon that summer in Ireland, visiting Emma’s older sister Charlotte, who lived with her husband, John Stamper (an Indian army chaplain), at the elegant Georgian house of Monalin(e), Newtown Mountkennedy, in County Wicklow.57 Emma Minchin “identified herself absolutely with the life of the students and was interested in all their activities, the College dance, the regatta, Speech Day, and other functions.” She was also “always ready with kindly advice” during students’ difficulties and anxieties.58 One of those other functions was to offer dance classes to 20 of the Coopers Hill students.59 Minchin’s laboratory assistant, Rollo

 Births, Marriages, & Deaths, Freeman’s Journal and Daily Commercial Advertiser (Dublin, Ireland), May 1, 1877. 56  Trinity College Dublin admission records for Charles Edward Hetherington in 1864 and William James Fawcett in 1865. IE TCD MUN 23/6, folio 151–175v (1863–1866). 57  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/60, dated September 27, 1887. 58  “The Late Mrs. G.M. Minchin,” Coopers Hill Magazine 12, no. 4 (November 1924): 52. 59  Coopers Hill Magazine 1, no. 10 (February 1899): 135. 55

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Appleyard, remarked that Emma Minchin was “ever patient, ever helpful, ever encouraging him in his work” as she kept the researchers supplied with rations throughout the day.60 Because they could no longer live in the College, the Minchins moved into the neighbouring village, Englefield Green, first into Springfield Cottage and then, between March 1890 and April 1891, to Malahide on Norman Road. The latter move was probably prompted by the need for more space due to the birth on February 7, 1890 of their second child, Una Eleanor Minchin.61 Their son, George Robert Neville Minchin, known as Neville, had been born on September 24, 1888. Soon afterwards, Minchin wrote to ask Fitzgerald if he or Harriette could recommend an “eligible Irish nurse,” since their previous one was leaving.62 Apparently not, because a year later the UK census recorded that their nurse, Sarah Molineux, had been born in London. The children and their father, together with what may be the famed college pony, are shown in Fig. 3.4.

Fig. 3.4  George Minchin with his children Una and Neville in the grounds of the Coopers Hill college in about 1895. (By kind permission of the Offaly Archives)

 Appleyard, “A Tribute to the Memory of George M. Minchin,” 264.  “Births,” Londonderry Sentinel, February 11, 1890. 62  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/66, dated April 5, 1890. 60 61

3.8 Family

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3.8 Family 3.8.1 Una Eleanor According to the census, 11-year-old Una was still living in Englefield Green in 1901. After that, she attended Hillcote School in Eastbourne, before going up to Oxford in 1907 to study at the Society of Oxford Home Students.63 Her parents also moved to Oxford at that time, after the closure of Coopers Hill (see Chap. 11). In later life, as discussed below, Una may have used her middle name like her brother. Una is absent from the 1911 census and there is some indication that she may have travelled abroad. At some point, she presumably studied dance because by 1917 she was a teacher at the avant-garde Margaret Morris School of Dance in London. Morris, a year younger than Eleanor, had founded her innovative dance school in 1910. She ran a theatre in Chelsea and offered summer schools in various British locations and, eventually, in France. Another dancer, Elsa Lanchester, who later became well known in Hollywood as the bride of Frankenstein, wrote in her autobiography that she assisted Una in organizing the 1918 Margaret Morris summer school on the Isle of Wight. Elsa liked Una, whom she described as a Christian Scientist, and the two spent time cycling around the island. However, Lanchester was sent back to London after having been accused of spreading rumours about Morris’ intimate tango dances with her students at the party following the opening show.64 Lanchester wrote that Una “worshiped” Margaret Morris, who was well known for her pacifism as well as her daring lifestyle.65 Perhaps because of this influence, Una did not participate in the war effort until after the Isle of wight summer school in 1918. But, for the last 2 months of that year, she served as an orderly at the Royaumont Abbey hospital to the north of Paris.66 Royaumont was entirely staffed by women and operated under the auspices of the French Red Cross. At its peak, in held 600 beds and it treated nearly 11,000 patients during the conflict.67 These volunteer orderlies tended to be from relatively prosperous families like Una’s. Letters  The Society of Oxford Home Students was the predecessor to St Anne’s College. “New Students,” The Fritillary 42 (December 1907): 716. 64  Elsa Lanchester, Elsa Lanchester, Herself (New York: St. Martin’s, 1983), 42–44. For the detailed story of Margaret Morris and two of her principal dancers, see Richard Emerson Rhythm & Colour: Hélène Vanel, Loïs Hutton & Margaret Morris (Edinburgh: Golden Hare, 2018). A photograph of Una Minchin and Elsa Lanchester at the 1918 Isle of Wight summer school is shown on p. 51 of Rhythm & Colour. 65  Grace Brockington, Above the Battlefield: modernism and the peace movement in Britain, 1900–1918 (New Haven: Yale, 2010), 18–19 & 162–67. 66  UK National Archives record WO 372/23/29063. M-F. Weiner, “The Scottish Women’s Hospital at Royaumont, France 1914–1919,” Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh 44 (2014): 328–36. Eileen Crofton, The Women of Royaumont: a Scottish women’s hospital on the western front (East Linton, Scotland: Tuckwell Press, 1997). 67  Crofton, The Women of Royaumont, 223–25. 63

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home by another orderly, Evelyn Proctor, referred to Una’s role as a principal dancer at the Margaret Morris School – there was nothing she did not know “about stage management and make-up and scenic effects, and her own dancing simply brought down the house.”68 After the war, Una probably returned to the dance school. The 1921 census recorded her as a visitor to Margaret Morris’s new, colourfully decorated premises at 37 Cranley Gardens.69 However, the census form did not indicate an employer, so it is possible that Una was already nursing her mother Emma, who was ill for some years before her death in 1924.70 Unfortunately, by the time of Emma’s death, Una was not on good terms with Margaret Morris. She had written to Morris in 1923 complaining that she had not been paid for 3 years and had been left to “scrape along.” Her complaint went unheeded for another year, at which point, amid staff unrest and financial woes at the school, Una filed a lawsuit for £600 in unpaid salary.71 Morris responded that Una knew that the job was not fully paid because the school did not make money but was worried that Una would resort to “mudslinging.”72 The court awarded Una nearly £425, a sum that would have bankrupted the school. However, she saved it from that fate by accepting just £225.73 Una’s earlier worship of Morris, her pain at her mistreatment, and her ultimate leniency speak to a strong personal relationship with Morris. Una continued to live in London during the late 1920s,74 but sometime between 1921 and 1933, she married Max Steinmann, probably a Swiss national. In the mid-­1930s they lived in the south of France where he was an expert in supplying central heating systems to new villas.75 Margaret Morris and her dancers spent considerable time on the Riviera and elsewhere in France during the 1920s. Even though Morris and Una were estranged, it is possible that she and Max were brought together by this connection.  Quoted in Crofton, The Women of Royaumont, 204. Una Eleanor is mistakenly identified as Irma Eleanor Minchin. 69  In the UK census taken on April 24, 1921, Una Minchin aged 31, single, and born in Englefield Green, was listed as a visitor to Margaret Morris’ school (an earlier pencilled entry ‘boarder’ was crossed out). No occupation or work address was given. The census entry for 37 Cranley Gardens included Morris’ mother and aunt, two dance teachers, and ten students of dancing who ranged in age from fourteen to nearly thirty. Nine of the students boarded at the school. The property was decorated “in brilliant colours in the modern style.” Emerson, Rhythm and Colour, 72. 70  Emma Minchin’s obituary spoke of her protracted illness and stated that Una “was with her to the last.” Coopers Hill Magazine 12, no. 4 (November 1924): 52. 71  Emerson, Rhythm & Colour, 201. 72  Emerson, Rhythm & Colour, 207. 73  Emerson, Rhythm & Colour, 213. 74  Una is recorded in the Electoral Register as living in London in 1924, 1926, and 1928. 75  Royaumont Newsletter 3 no. 7 (May 1933): 6. These newsletters have been digitized by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and are available online at “#Womenswork100: The Scottish Women’s Hospital at Royaumont,” https://www.rcpe.ac.uk/heritage/womenswork100-scottish-­ womens-hospital-royaumont, last accessed May 2023. 68

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Unfortunately for the former dancer, Madame Steinmann suffered greatly from arthritis and spent much of the last 30 years of her life confined to her bed or bathchair, “unable to walk a step.” Travelling by train on a stretcher, Una moved to Zurich with Max in 1937 so she could receive improved treatment for her condition.76 That year, she entered the “How I Spent Coronation Day” essay contest in the Overseas Daily Mail newspaper, winning second place. In what she confessed was “awful sob stuff,” she contrasted her inability to walk to a local inn to listen to the coronation of George VI on the wireless with her attendance at previous coronations. In 1911, she had been in the India Office stand on the Mall for George V’s procession, presumably due to Professor Minchin’s connections. Earlier still, during the coronation of Edward VII in 1902, Una recalled Neville slipping away from their parents to climb on top of a sentry box for a better view.77 After Max’s death, times were difficult for Una Eleanor emotionally and financially. Forty-six years after Minchin’s death, the Royal Society to its credit afforded her financial support from its Scientific Relief Fund.78 After years of sickness and “in great need of kindness and sympathy,” she died near Zurich on June 2, 1964. Her ashes were buried with her husband’s in Oberwinterthur.79 As mentioned at the start of this section, there is uncertainty about which of her given names Una used. Elsa Lanchester and Margaret Morris referred to Una by her first name. However, the article about coronation day (as reprinted in the Royaumont newsletter) was signed “E.S.,” suggesting that by 1937 she was calling herself Eleanor Steinmann.

3.8.2 Neville Like his father, Neville Minchin was something of a character. He was educated at several schools, including Scaitcliffe in Englefield Green, Ascham House in Eastbourne, and Tonbridge, before going up to Christ’s College, Cambridge.80

 Royaumont Newsletter, ns-3 (January 1938): 15. After seeing ten doctors and spending nearly 2 years confined to bed, Una complained that she emerged from the Swiss spa with “three more joints seized by the malady than before.” 77  E.S., “One Whom the King Remembered,” Overseas Daily Mail, August 7, 1937, reprinted in the Royaumont Newsletter ns-3 (January 1938): 6. See also letter on p. 15. 78  Royal Society archive, ref. HF/1/17/5/11/12, dated April 9, 1960. See also J.G.P. Cameron, A Short History of the Royal Indian Engineering College, Coopers Hill (London: Coopers Hill Society, 1960), 16. 79  Royaumont and V.C.  Association of The Scottish Women’s Hospitals News Letter s-2, no. 4 (January 1965): 5 & 8. 80  John Peile, Biographical Register of Christ’s College 1505–1905 vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1913), 2:887. H.E.  Steed, Register of Tonbridge School from 1826 to 1910 (London: Rivingtons, 1911), 358. Bill Boddy [W.B.], “Obituary – Mr. G.R.N. Minchin,” Motor Sport Magazine, October 1977, 1268. 76

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A student at Coopers Hill, Frank McClean (later a pioneering naval aviator81), introduced him to motor vehicles in the late 1890s. As a result, Neville became a motoring enthusiast and pursued a career in the automotive industry that spanned from the dawn of the motor car to its modern ubiquity. Over a 40-year period, Neville owned 154 cars and 13 motorcycles, the first of the latter causing “family rows.”82 He was personally acquainted with many of the motoring pioneers, including William Morris, Charles Rolls, and his friend Henry Royce, to whom Neville’s company supplied electric batteries and related systems. In Under my Bonnet, a combined autobiography and motoring history, Neville recounted tales of the car’s early days, as well as some of his childhood memories of growing up at Coopers Hill.83 Although a highlight was being admired as a baby by Queen Victoria during a chance encounter in Windsor Park, several other anecdotes supply interesting colour for our story. For a child, “a more lovely place [than Coopers Hill] would be hard to imagine and the houses of the various Professors were situated in the grounds.84 It was a paradise for us children…. We youngsters were full of devilment, playing pranks of all sorts.” One of those tricks was “to try and drop pellets of paper torn from prayer books, from the gallery of the college chapel during services” onto the head of Sir Alex Taylor, who “was a small man with a completely bald head.”85 Neville went on to describe how his father set entrance examinations for Woolwich and Sandhurst, and how he received visits from prominent scientists of the day, such as Sir Oliver Lodge, Lord Kelvin and Sir Robert Ball, the genial Irish astronomer, who often stayed with them. His father “used to impress on me the importance of such visitors and the privilege it was for me to know and talk to them.” One such visitor was the local Bishop, who visited the College annually to take services in the Chapel.

 Philip Jarrett, Frank McClean: Godfather to British Naval Aviation (Barnsley, UK: Seaforth, 2011). 82  G.R.N. Minchin, “149 Cars,” Motor Sport Magazine 24 (January 1948): 8. Professor Minchin was not a supporter of the automobile, When the abolition of the speed limit for automobiles was being contemplated, he criticized “‘the tyrants of the road,’ who have bluffed the people out of their right to safety on the highways.” George M. Minchin, “Bluff,” The Nation 4 (January 30, 1909): 676. 83  G.R.N. Minchin, Under My Bonnet (London: GT Foulis & Co., 1950), 13–20 & 178. Although difficult to find, this engaging account of the early days of motoring is entertaining even for those with only a passing interest in the subject. Some of his memories of the history of Coopers Hill should be treated with caution, however. 84  By the time of the 1901 census, the Minchins had moved into one of these villas, built in the college grounds for the professors’ accommodation at the time of the original opening of Coopers Hill in 1871. 85  Minchin, Under my Bonnet, 14–15. 81

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The Bishop played golf and once expressed the desire for a game. My father, an international cricket and lawn tennis player, was also quite good at golf in spite of the fact that he played only with one crooked old cleek which had been given to him. He offered to play but the costume he wore always distressed his fellow Professors and players. While they had bright red coats and brass buttons he would insist on wearing a swallow-tailed coat! Quite all right in the “seventies” or “eighties,” it was not considered suitable for golf in the go-­ ahead “nineties.”86

As a teacher, George Minchin “was good to backward students, helping and coaching them in their work in the kindness of his heart.” Neville recounted a story in which Minchin had tutored extensively the son of an Indian maharaja. Seeking to thank Minchin, who would not accept any payment, the maharaja resorted to an unusual reward: Some months later a man from the railway station came to our house saying that an enormous consignment of live quails was en route to us. It seemed that a small ship had been chartered in Egypt containing a full cargo of quails. It had arrived in the London Docks and the London and South Western Railway had received a large sum to cover the transport charges in England. The small Egham station was inadequate to handle hundreds of crates of quail but extra men were engaged and carts hired from Staines and the deliveries to Coopers Hill started to flow. The vans were drawn by two horses and the red-faced drivers with big flowing moustaches and wearing bowler hats were perched high up where they were able to crack their whips in great style. Our garden was soon covered with crates of live quail; we had no idea how to feed them or what on earth could be done in the circumstances… My father went to the railway company and implored that these deliveries stop, but they said they could not keep the birds: they were consigned, fully paid, to Professor Minchin and he must accept their delivery. How the matter ended I do not remember, but for some time the Coopers Hill woods were well-stocked with quail. For the sake of good relations with India, my father wrote his thanks to the Maharajah. He was nervous lest the gift be repeated, but with an entire shipload, the Maharajah's conscience was clear.87

Three months after Minchin’s death, Neville married Gwendolen Bamford-Slack, the announcement saying that “owing to recent bereavement there was no reception.”88 Shortly afterwards, he drove his Vauxhall car to the Lyons grand prix and narrowly avoided being caught in France when war was declared.89 Neville Minchin emigrated in 1950 to live in some style in South Africa with his second wife, Gladys. He died in that country in 1977.90

 Minchin, Under my Bonnet, 62.  Minchin, Under my Bonnet, 19–20. 88  “Marriage: Mr. Neville Minchin and Miss Bamford-Slack,” The Times, June 22, 1914, 11. 89  Minchin, “149 Cars,” 9. 90  Tom Clarke, “A silver lady under my bonnet: Neville Minchin, an appreciation,” reproduced in the Magazine of the New Zealand Rolls Royce and Bentley Club, issue 12–1, 2012, 7–13. See also Bill Boddy, “Neville Minchin – a great motorist,” Motor Sport Magazine (January 1998): 104–5. 86 87

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3.9 Sports and Daily Life Despite the foregoing, Minchin did not have a high opinion of golf as a sport. He was, however, a proponent of physical fitness, and played cricket for the Gentlemen of Ireland, with notable skill as a bowler.91 At Coopers Hill, he also occasionally rowed92 and excelled at squash racquets. Of course, he represented the College at cricket and joined the 1877 ‘Coopers Hill Rovers’ tour of Ireland.93 For relaxation on vacation, he occasionally fished.94 But his prowess at lawn tennis made Minchin especially popular. Coopers Hill had several tennis courts, some reserved for the professors’ use, and Minchin played: … lawn tennis with [the students], remarkably well, so that a gallery assembled to watch the play. In those days, tennis consisted in play mostly on the back line, and rallies were very long. Minchin was very agile, running to and fro, and returning the ball with accuracy … After an afternoon’s exercise of this kind, a bath was necessary; then he would return refreshed to his mathematics or his laboratory.95

In his early years at the College, Minchin boasted to Fitzgerald, who clearly also played the game, that he was “now simply invincible at Lawn Tennis.”96 This was no idle boast. With his doubles partner Henry H. Green, “perhaps the greatest athlete ever at Coopers Hill,” Minchin won the open pairs competition in the 1883 Devonshire Lawn Tennis Tournament.97

 “Mr. G.  M. Minchin F.R.S.,” The Times, March 27, 1914, 13. Frank Rawson’s recollections, Coopers Hill Magazine 9, no. 3 (August 1913): 37–38. 92  Including a pairs race that became something of a legend, that pitted himself and Arthur Brooke (College Chaplain) in one boat against John Pasco (Bursar) and Thomas Eagles (Instructor in Architectural Drawing and Captain of the Volunteer Corps) in the other. After Minchin caught a crab early in the race, he and Brooke ultimately won the race. Coopers Hill Magazine 9 no. 3 (August 1913): 35. This would have been in Minchin’s first year at Coopers Hill because the 1876–77 College calendar showed that Charles Crosslé (co-contributor with Minchin to the 1879 Parting Words to Boys Leaving School) subsequently replaced Brooke as Chaplain. 93  “Cricket,” Bell’s Life in London and Sporting Chronicle, August 25, 1877, 5. 94  Particularly with Arthur Panton. GMM to GFF, RDS 10/120, dated June 6 & RDS 10/8 undated, both probably from 1880. 95  Lodge, Past Years, 143. 96  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/41, undated but probably from late 1879. 97  Henry Hennis (Paddy) Green (d. 1936) was a student at Coopers Hill from 1880–1883. He was also an international standard rugby player (Coopers Hill Magazine 13 no. 4 [October 1938]: 83). Green was still playing tennis in 1910 when he won a doubles tournament in Calcutta (Coopers Hill Magazine 8 no. 19 [January 1911]: 300, and “Lawn Tennis,” The Bystander 26 [April 13, 1910]: 92 with photograph). Newspaper coverage of the 1883 Devonshire tournament identified Green as being from Coopers Hill. His partner was simply identified as “G.M. Minchin,” which is presumably Professor Minchin (“Lawn Tennis Tournaments in Devonshire,” Exeter and Plymouth Gazette, August 24, 1883, 2 and “South Devon Gazette,” Exeter and Plymouth Gazette, August 31, 1883, 6). Minchin also won the club championship with a different partner. 91

3.9  Sports and Daily Life

47

These, then, were the ingredients of Minchin’s daily routine at Coopers Hill – the laboratory, the lecture room, and the tennis court. Like many of his colleagues, Minchin also took advantage of the College’s proximity to London to attend lectures, join meetings of learned societies, and collaborate with colleagues. He was an early riser, usually at his desk or in the laboratory before 6 am. But in due course: a warning bell informs the Professor that a class of students is waiting for a lecture. Then begins a series of forced marches between the black-board in his lecture room, and the electrometer in the laboratory, to try “just one more exposure,” for just one stolen moment. It is a reversible process, however, and now it is from the electrometer that the one moment is stolen in order to continue a discourse upon the dynamics of rotation. Noon at last arrives. The cap and gown are replaced by a straw hat – a somewhat old straw hat – and an immaculate suit of white flannels. … and away go the Professor and his racquet to the lawn-tennis courts. This is not because he is tired of his experiments, but because students are now coming in for their laboratory work. At about 4 o’clock they depart, and the Professor and his racquet return, until dinner-time. Briefly, such was his life, day by day, year by year.98

The anecdotes in this chapter offer an idea of George Minchin’s personality – “a whimsical, paradoxical, emotional Celt, a professed disciple of all the unorthodoxies, who admitted no allegiances to any laws save those promulgated by his own fine intelligence and his own generous heart.”99 Granted, some of his contemporaries’ tributes may have been exaggerated. However, there is a high degree of consistency between the opinions expressed by students, scientific collaborators, friends, and Coopers Hill colleagues during Minchin’s life, at the time of his death, and years afterwards. But more importantly, his own surviving writings reveal a man full of ideas, creativity, and humour at the absurdities of life. His letters to Fitzgerald were often dashed off in a hurry to meet the last post and frequently dated with just the day of the week. But they show a fizzing stream of consciousness as new ideas occurred to him or as he picked away at a particularly puzzling section of a textbook or scientific paper. But, in Alicia Cameron Taylor’s words, this represented his “holiday side.” While the following chapters will touch further on Minchin’s whimsical character in the form of his poems and satires, they will also demonstrate his tangible accomplishments in the fields of education, mathematics, and experimental science. In this way, Minchin exemplified the advice he himself had offered to young men leaving school in an essay entitled “On Bumptiousness,” written soon after joining Coopers Hill. Minchin contended that one type of bumptiousness arose from self-­ conceit, evident in the person who “makes his own understanding the measure of all knowledge.” Or, if they were an educated person, displayed “great devotion to some one branch of knowledge accompanied by great contempt for all others.” Minchin concluded that:

98 99

 Appleyard, “A Tribute to the Memory of George M. Minchin,” 264.  Cameron Taylor, General Sir Alex Taylor, 2:257.

48

3  Is the Monkey Smooth? A Career at Coopers Hill For ordinary people it is a good rule to take at least an intelligent interest in as many different branches of knowledge as possible; for thereby we not only improve our selves, but we avoid giving offence to others; and this cultivation of a wide sympathy with pursuits that are not specially their own, will, I think, he found to be almost always a marked characteristic of those who have attained eminence in the world as managers of men.100

Appleyard, again, captured some of that essence in Minchin himself. Long ago, I regarded him as a man of science. Now I know that it should be said of him that he passed beyond that stage and made his science an art. I have often watched him working out his problems, preparing his books, correcting his proofs. He rarely hesitated. His thoughts and his pen, or finely pointed lead pencil, conspired always to produce something that should be more intelligible than anything that had been done upon the subject. His symbols, his diagrams, his diction, his punctuations, all represented careful thought and the touch of a master. To do well what he did was an unfailing pleasure to him.101

References Appleyard, Rollo. 1930. Pioneers of Electrical Communication. London: MacMillan & Co. Boddy, Bill. 1977, October. [W.B.] Obituary – Mr. G.R.N. Minchin. Motor Sport Magazine, 1268. ———. 1998, January. Neville Minchin – a great motorist. Motor Sport Magazine: 104–105. Brockington, Grace. 2010. Above the Battlefield: modernism and the Peace Movement in Britain, 1900–1918. New Haven: Yale. Cameron Taylor, Alicia. 1913. General Sir Alex Taylor C.G.B., R.E.: his times, his friends, and his work, vol. II. London: Williams & Norgate. Clarke, Tom. 2012. A silver lady under my bonnet: Neville Minchin, an appreciation, reproduced in the Magazine of the New Zealand Rolls Royce and Bentley Club, 12–1: 7–13. Crofton, Eileen. 1997. The Women of Royaumont: a Scottish Women’s Hospital on the Western Front. East Linton: Tuckwell Press. Dickens’s Dictionary of London. 1882. London: Macmillan. Emerson, Richard. 2018. Rhythm & Colour: Hélène Vanel, Loïs Hutton & Margaret Morris. Edinburgh: Golden Hare. Fendley, G. C. 1986. Nanson, Edward John (1850–1936). In Australian Dictionary of Biography, ed. Bede Nairn and Geoffrey Searle, 10:663. Melbourne University Press. Also available online at https://adb.anu.edu.au. Fisher, W.R. 1899–1909. Lecture on Forestry Given Before the Royal Dublin Society, March 3, 1899. The Economic Proceedings of the Royal Dublin Society 1: 73–108. Fison, A.H. 1919. George Carey Foster. Journal of the Chemical Society 115: 412–427. Fox, Robert. 2005. The Context and Practices of Oxford Physics, 1839–77. In Physics in Oxford: laboratories, learning, and college life, 1839–1939, ed. R. Fox and G. Gooday, 24–79. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hornsey, Richard. 2022. Imperial Engineers. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Hunt, Bruce J. 2007. ‘Our Friend of Brilliant Ideas’: G. F. Fitzgerald and the Maxwellian Circle. European Review 15 (4): 531–544.

 George M.  Minchin, “On Bumptiousness,” in Parting Words to Boys Leaving School and Entering upon Life, edited by Maurice Charles Hime (London: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co., 1879), 157–58. 101  Appleyard, “A Tribute to the Memory of George M. Minchin,” 265. 100

References

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Jarrett, Philip. 2011. Frank McClean: Godfather to British Naval Aviation. Barnsley: Seaforth. Kaye, G.W.C. 1910. Some Notes on the Tilted Gold Leaf Electrometer, with Suggestions as to the Manipulation of Gold Leaf Suspensions, Suitable Insulators for Electrometer Work, & c. Proceedings of the Physical Society of London 23: 209–218. Lanchester, Elsa. 1983. Elsa Lanchester, Herself. New York: St. Martin’s. Lodge, Oliver J. 1916. George Minchin Minchin 1845–1914. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A-92 (645): xlvi–l. ———. 1920. George Carey Foster, 1835–1919. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London A96: xv–xviii. ———. 1931. Past Years, an Autobiography. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, Reprinted 2012. McLeod, Herbert. 1871, April 14. Laboratory, C.E. College. BL IOR L/PWD/8/8, 375–387. Minchin, George M. 1879. On Bumptiousness. In Parting Words to Boys Leaving School and Entering Upon Life, ed. Maurice Charles Hime, 155–160. London: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co. ———. 1882a, January 19. The Determination of Electromotive Force in Absolute Electrostatic Measure. Nature 25: 278–280 (with a correction announced on p. 290). ———. 1882b. On the Absolute Sine Electrometer. Report on the Fifty-First Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, York 1881, 558–59. London: John Murray. ———. 1884. Electrostatic Measurement of E.M.F. Nature 29: 501. ———. 1887. The Study of Natural History in Schools. Selborne Society Letters 5: 55. ———. 1888. Individual Character in Birds. The Selborne Magazine for lovers and students of living nature 1: 184–187. ———. 1889. Notes on Natural History. The Selborne Magazine for lovers and students of living nature 2: 103–105. ———. 1899. Geometry Versus Euclid. Nature 59: 369–370. ———. 1908. Owed to Greenhill’s Cat. For private circulation c.1908: Royal Society archive, MS/928/4/2/6. Minchin, G.R.N. 1948. 149 Cars. Motor Sport Magazine 24: 8–9. ———. 1950. Under My Bonnet. London: GT Foulis & Co. New Students. 1907, December. The Fritillary 42: 716. Newsletters of the Royaumont and Villers Cotterets Association of the Scottish Women’s Hospitals have been digitized by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and are available online at “#Womenswork100: The Scottish Women’s Hospital at Royaumont.” n.d.. https://www.rcpe. ac.uk/heritage/womenswork100-­scottish-­womens-­hospital-­royaumont Peile, John. 1913. Biographical Register of Christ’s College 1505–1905. Vol. 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Physical Notes. 1883, July 26. Nature 28: 308. Remodelling of Course of Instruction and Retirement of certain of the Professors and Lecturers. 1901. UK Parliamentary Paper Cd.539. His Majesty’s Stationery Office. Richard Johnson (1840–1894). 1895, February. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 55: 194–195. Steed, H.E., ed. 1911. Register of Tonbridge School from 1826 to 1910. London: Rivingtons. Weiner, M.-F. 2014. The Scottish Women’s Hospital at Royaumont, France 1914–1919. Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh 44: 328–336.

Chapter 4

An Honorary Maxwellian: Colleagues and Electromagnetic Theory

Abstract  This overview of Minchin’s scientific career focuses on his relationships with the group of Maxwellians consisting of George Francis Fitzgerald, Oliver Lodge, and Oliver Heaviside. The issue of whether Minchin was a Maxwellian himself is approached through his review of Heaviside’s Electromagnetic Theory and his letters on the topic to Lodge and Fitzgerald. This chapter then examines the role played by the Trinity College diaspora in Minchin’s election to the Royal Society in 1895 and highlights Minchin’s views of the election process. It also includes a sketch of his professional career, publications, and correspondence on which the present book is based. As to Professor Minchin’s remarks on the archbishop, I must say that I do not think them quite respectful, I really do not. (Oliver Heaviside, The Electrician, July 28, 1883)1

4.1 Publications George Minchin would remain at the Royal Indian Engineering College for almost all his career. Having already reviewed that social context, this chapter will offer an overview of Minchin’s lifetime of scientific work and a discussion of his professional network of friends, colleagues, and collaborators. As examples, it will focus on Minchin’s connections with the group known as the Maxwellians and his election to the Royal Society. Figure 4.1 shows the distribution and types of Minchin’s publications throughout his career. A full list of these publications is provided in Appendix 2. Two underlying constants of Minchin’s career were his research in photo-electricity and his publication of books in applied mathematics. Only in the period 1901–05, when  Oliver Heaviside, “Ohm’s Law. Professor Minchin’s corollary. Erratum. Archbishops.,” The Electrician 11 (July 28, 1883): 253. 1

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Hornsey, The Many-Sidedness of George Minchin Minchin, International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d’histoire des idées 248, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-40243-2_4

51

52

4  An Honorary Maxwellian: Colleagues and Electromagnetic Theory 25

Paper Leer New book New edion

20

Other

Number

15

10

5

0

1910

Years

Fig. 4.1  Minchin’s publication of scientific papers, letters and presentations, books (new and new editions), and other writings (book reviews, patents, general letters, and essays) by time-period (see Appendix 2)

Coopers Hill was in a state of uncertainty and upheaval, did he not publish a new book or revised edition. These books, especially the first, A Treatise on Statics, became the foundation of Minchin’s academic reputation. The statics and dynamics of solids and fluids, geometry, and mathematical drawing were subjects firmly within the domain of a Professor of Applied Mathematics, and so reflected the bread-and-butter of his position at Coopers Hill. They also embodied Minchin’s passion for teaching and the clear communication of scientific ideas. A more detailed examination of Minchin’s work in education will be conducted in Chaps. 5 and 6. In contrast to his textbooks, Minchin’s technical publications covered a wide range of topics in experimental science, mostly concerning physics and electrical engineering, in addition to applied mathematics. Two of the main areas were photo-­ electric cells and measurements of starlight, and wireless communications using Hertz waves. These will be discussed further in Chaps. 8 through 10. Instead, this chapter will centre on the period 1890 to 1895. Two young children made this a busy time in Minchin’s domestic life, but as shown in Fig. 4.1, it also marked the peak of his scientific productivity and culminated in his election to Fellowship of the Royal Society. Many of these papers concerned electromagnetic calculations. It was no coincidence that these years also marked the heyday of the interpretation and reformulation of James Clerk Maxwell’s theories of

4.2 Correspondence

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electromagnetism by the small group of Maxwellians, of whom Minchin’s friends Fitzgerald and Lodge were key participants. Although this period represents just one part of Minchin’s career, the examples of the Maxwellians and Royal Society serve to illustrate both his attitudes to the latest scientific developments and his network of friends and collaborators. A particular focus here is a lengthy review written by Minchin about Oliver Heaviside’s 1893 publication Electromagnetic Theory, which together with the context and associated letters to Fitzgerald and Lodge, offers a window into Minchin’s style of thinking and writing. Further information on his professional network and standing comes from the list of men who supported his Fellowship application in 1893 and 1895.

4.2 Correspondence Information on Minchin’s scientific work comes from three main sources – his publications, the commentaries of others on those works (reviews, citations, etc.), and his letters. By all accounts, Minchin maintained a vigorous correspondence with a wide variety of fellow scientists. Fortunately, while most have been lost, more than two hundred letters from, or mentioning, Minchin have survived. Of these, about 130 are from Minchin to Fitzgerald, commencing in early 1879 and running until January 1900. The Fitzgerald Letters at the Royal Dublin Society2 also contain another 30 or so fragmentary documents written by Minchin, plus correspondence from a variety of other people, including William Monck, Robert Ball, and William Wilson, that related in some way to Minchin. Another 39 letters to Lodge, again written between 1882 and 1900, are preserved in the Oliver Lodge papers in the archives of University College, London. A few mentions of Minchin also appear in reminiscences or obituaries of colleagues and the family correspondence of Alexander Graham Bell, to whom Minchin was related through his mother’s family (Chap. 2). In his letters, Minchin indulged his excitement at new scientific discoveries, theoretical and experimental, plus a stream of ideas for new instruments and experiments. But these are one-sided conversations. Both of Minchin’s children died overseas and childless, so Minchin’s own papers do not seem to have survived.3 It is also apparent that Fitzgerald and Lodge did not save all of Minchin’s correspondence. While some years went by with very few or no letters present in the archive, the letters following an interlude do not usually acknowledge any interruption, implying that there was in fact no gap. The contents of those that do survive are typically mostly technical, with  Available online at https://digitalarchive.rds.ie/collections/  Una had a stepson, who in 1933 was living with his grandparents in Zurich while attending school. It is possible that Minchin’s papers were destroyed in the early 1940s when Neville Minchin lost his house in a fire. Tom Clarke, “A silver lady under my bonnet: Neville Minchin, an appreciation,” reproduced in the Magazine of the New Zealand Rolls Royce and Bentley Club, issue 12–1 (2012), 11. 2 3

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occasional social comments, suggesting that Lodge and Fitzgerald may have only filed selected letters with their professional correspondence. Minchin’s 1881 instruction to Fitzgerald to “keep this letter as it contains in writing for the first time some floating ideas of mine” supports this supposition.4 The personal relationships between each pair of this trio of correspondents were quite distinct. Best known is the cordial and scientifically productive partnership between Lodge and Fitzgerald. Together with Oliver Heaviside and, all too briefly, Heinrich Hertz, this group – known as The Maxwellians – brought into the mainstream the pioneering work of James Clerk Maxwell on the theory of electromagnetic radiation. Relations between Minchin and Fitzgerald were, on the former’s part at least, quite informal. One of Minchin’s earlier letters began “Assinine Φ” and others written in their younger days referred to Fitzgerald as a “contemptuous ass,” an “unappreciative log,” or as an improvement, “infinitely magnetic Φ.” These presumptions would have been unthinkable to all but the best of friends. Minchin’s correspondence with Oliver Lodge was generally more formal and less likely to have been written on whatever scrap paper was to hand. However, he was still not above calling Lodge an “old rascal” and signing his letters with “∞ love.” However, a reticence existed in these letters that was absent from those to Fitzgerald. This difference perhaps acknowledged Lodge’s eminence within Minchin’s immediate scientific community in London, in contrast to the casualness of his youth in Dublin. Unfortunately, we do not know whether Minchin’s informalities were reciprocated by his more famous colleagues. Fitzgerald’s thoughts about his friend are not recorded on account of his early death in 1901. Lodge wrote an obituary for Minchin, which he expanded for his 1931 autobiography, Past Years. As described further below, these rather self-important reminiscences showed a clear, but faintly condescending, affection for Minchin.5

4.3 Fitzgerald and Lodge 4.3.1 George Francis Fitzgerald George Francis Fitzgerald formed the centre of Minchin’s circle of Dublin friends, collaborators, and correspondents. The two men studied together at Trinity College, which Fitzgerald entered at the age of 15 in 1867, the year of both Minchin’s first degree and of the abortive Fenian Rising.6 Fitzgerald’s father served as a church  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/9, dated February 6, probably 1881 by reference to a Nature paper by Lodge, and Fitzgerald’s imminent professorship. 5  It is notable, however, that in nearly one hundred surviving letters to Fitzgerald, Lodge only mentioned Minchin twice. 6  Several sources give his age as 16, but Fitzgerald was entered into the College books on July 1, 1867, about 1 month shy of his sixteenth birthday. IE TCD MUN V 23/6 folio 176 to 200v (1866–1869). 4

4.3  Fitzgerald and Lodge

55

rector, a Trinity College professor, and later became a bishop. His mother was sister to G. Johnstone Stoney, a notable scientist in his own right and inventor of the name ‘electron.’ Schooled at home with his sisters and brothers, one of whom became a professor in Belfast, Fitzgerald was a product of the Irish Protestant upper-­ middle class.7 Fitzgerald graduated with his BA in 1871 having won senior moderatorships in mathematics and experimental science. Following his degree, he undertook the “wide and independent course of reading” that formed the customary preparation for the fellowship exam.8 He received the MA degree in 1874 and, as mentioned in Chap. 2, first attempted the fellowship exam in 1873. He was successful in 1877. Through his letters to Fitzgerald, we see that Minchin kept in touch with Panton and McCay from the same period, and that the group of colleagues grew to include Frederick Trouton, Arthur Rambaut, Richard Johnson, William Wilson, Edward Culverwell,9 Robert S. Ball, and William Monck. Although there is no record of that time from either man, the scientific community at Trinity was relatively small and their common interests undoubtedly brought them together.10 The two men would have attended lectures together, listened to scientific talks at the Undergraduate Philosophy Society11 or met at the University Reading Rooms where Minchin (along with Monck and Johnson) served as a member of the committee.12 Fitzgerald spent his entire career at Trinity College, Dublin. From 1881, he held the Erasmus Smith Professorship of Natural and Experimental Philosophy which, as Minchin wrote, he had won “after a long and searching examination.”13 In 1885, he married Harriette, daughter of John Jellett, Provost of the College who had taught both Minchin and Fitzgerald. They had eight children together, whom Minchin

 Michael Purser, “As We Saw It: the context of the life of George Francis Fitzgerald,” European Review 15, no. 4 (2007): 523–29. 8  Joseph Larmor [J.L.], “George Francis Fitzgerald,” Nature 63 (March 7, 1901): 445. 9  Of Culverwell, Minchin wrote “There’s another very good man in Dublin besides Φιτξ – namely Culverwell. Very similar. Ingenious Physicist & Math[ematician] + a very nice jolly fellow.” GMM to OJL, dated January 7 (attributed to 1886 by reference to the nearly completed volume two of Statics which was published in 1886). Edward Parnall Culverwell was married to one of Fitzgerald’s sisters, Edith. Thom’s Irish Who’s Who (Dublin: Thom & Co., 1923), 52. Correspondence from Minchin to Oliver lodge are preserved in the archives of University College, London (UCL), reference MS Add 89/172. 10  This was before the Experimental Science Association was founded in 1876. 11  As George M Smith, Minchin was listed as an honorary member of the Undergraduate Philosophical Society in 1867. George Francis Armstrong, Aesthetic culture: an address delivered in the Dining Hall of Trinity College, at the opening of the Fourteenth Session of the Undergraduate Philosophical Society of the University of Dublin, November 2 l, 1867 (Dublin: McGee, 1867), 46. Monck and Panton were also honorary members. 12  “University Intelligence,” Freeman’s Journal, November 19, 1873. 13  GMM to GFF, RDS 10/10, dated February 16, presumably 1881. Minchin’s information came from Robert Ball. 7

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variously denoted in mathematical style: “n ϕ, where n is subject to only one condition, viz. n