Correspondence map
Interact with the map by zooming, clicking hotspots, and selecting items to see more details. Hit play on the timeline to show correspondence over time.
Benjamin Gompertz
John Frederick William Herschel
Mary Shelley publishes Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus
1818
Autograph letter signed by sender. Would like to become an F.R.S. Charles Babbage has procured a form and BG would be pleased if John Frederick William Herschel would subscribe his name. Hopes he is well.
13 May 1818 Sender: Benjamin Gompertz Reference number: HS/8/136John Frederick William Herschel serves on the Board of Longitude
1819
John Frederick William Herschel publishes in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society.
1820: John Frederick William Herschel publishes “On the action of crystallized bodies on homogeneous light, and on the causes of the deviation from Newton's scale in the tints which many of them develope on exposure to a polarised ray” .
John Frederick William Herschel serves his first term as Foreign Secretary of the Royal Astronomical Society
1820
John Frederick William Herschel and Charles Babbage travel through France to Italy and Switzerland.
1821
John Frederick William Herschel publishes in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society.
1821:
John Frederick William Herschel publishes “On the aberrations of compound lenses and object-glasses" in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society.
John Frederick William Herschel receives the Copley Medal of the Royal Society for his papers printed in the Philosophical Transactions
1821
Death of Sir William Herschel FRS
25 August 1822
John Frederick William Herschel receives the Bakerian Medal of the Royal Society.
1823:
John Frederick William Herschel gives the Bakerian lecture “On certain Motions produced in Fluid Conductors when transmitting the Electric Current”.
Autograph letter signed by sender. Is applying for the position of actuary at the Law Life Assurance Society and would be glad of a letter of recommendation from John Frederick William Herschel; please direct a letter to Messrs. Peace as soon as possible.
31 May 1823 Sender: Benjamin Gompertz Reference number: HS/8/137
Draft letter. Received the letter. Hopes he will be successful in his application for the position of Actuary to the Law Life Society. Has a high opinion of his mathematical papers and has used his system in his own works.
1 June 1823 Sender: John Frederick William Herschel Reference number: HS/8/138
Copy of draft letter, copied as part of the correspondence project led by Colonel John Herschel FRS following the death of his father. Received the letter. Hopes he will be successful in his application for the position of Actuary to the Law Life Society. Has a high opinion of his mathematical papers and has used his system in his own works.
1 June 1823 Sender: John Frederick William Herschel Reference number: HS/20/163John Frederick William Herschel moves to 56 Devonshire St., Portland Place, London
1824
John Frederick William Herschel serves as Secretary of the Royal Society
30 November 1824
John Frederick William Herschel invents the actinometer to measure the heating power of the Sun’s rays
1825
John Frederick William Herschel publishes in the Philosophical Transactions
1826:
John Frederick William Herschel publishes “On the parallax of the fixed stars”.
Joseph Nicéphore Niépce presents his photographs in England for the first time
1827
John Frederick William Herschel and Margaret Brodie Stewart are married in London
3 March 1829
John Frederick William Herschel is elected Foreign correspondent of the Académie des sciences
1830
Birth of Caroline Emilia Mary Herschel, daughter of John Frederick William Herschel and Margaret Brodie Stewart
31 March 1830
John Frederick William Herschel is nominated for the presidency of the Royal Society, loses by 8 votes to the Duke of Sussex
30 November 1830
