.gif)
William Gascoigne (scientist)
Encyclopedia
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
astronomer
Astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist who studies celestial bodies such as planets, stars and galaxies.Historically, astronomy was more concerned with the classification and description of phenomena in the sky, while astrophysics attempted to explain these phenomena and the differences between them using...
, mathematician
Mathematician
A mathematician is a person whose primary area of study is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with quantity, structure, space, and change....
and maker of scientific instrument
Measuring instrument
In the physical sciences, quality assurance, and engineering, measurement is the activity of obtaining and comparing physical quantities of real-world objects and events. Established standard objects and events are used as units, and the process of measurement gives a number relating the item...
s from Middleton near Leeds
Leeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
who invented the micrometer
Micrometer
A micrometer , sometimes known as a micrometer screw gauge, is a device incorporating a calibrated screw used widely for precise measurement of small distances in mechanical engineering and machining as well as most mechanical trades, along with other metrological instruments such as dial, vernier,...
. He was one of "nos Keplari" a group of astronomers in the north of England who followed the astronomy of Johannes Kepler
Johannes Kepler
Johannes Kepler was a German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer. A key figure in the 17th century scientific revolution, he is best known for his eponymous laws of planetary motion, codified by later astronomers, based on his works Astronomia nova, Harmonices Mundi, and Epitome of Copernican...
which included, Jeremiah Horrocks
Jeremiah Horrocks
Jeremiah Horrocks , sometimes given as Jeremiah Horrox , was an English astronomer who was the only person to predict, and one of only two people to observe and record, the transit of Venus of 1639.- Life and work :Horrocks was born in Lower Lodge, in...
and William Crabtree
William Crabtree
William Crabtree was an astronomer, mathematician, and merchant from Broughton, then a township near Manchester, which is now part of Salford, Greater Manchester, England...
.
Life and work
Gascoigne was born in Middleton, LeedsMiddleton, Leeds
Middleton is a suburb of Leeds south of Leeds city centre, West Yorkshire, England. It originated as an agricultural and pit village in south Leeds and is mentioned as Mildentone and Mildetone village in the 1086 Domesday Book....
in 1612, the son of a minor country gentleman. His father was Henry Gascoigne, Esq., of Thorpe-on-the-Hill in the parish of Rothwell
Rothwell
Rothwell is the name of several places in the United Kingdom:*Rothwell, Lincolnshire*Rothwell, Northamptonshire*Rothwell, West YorkshireRothwell is also the name of one place in Australia:*Rothwell, QueenslandIn names:...
, near Leeds
Leeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
, Yorkshire. His mother was Margaret Jane, daughter of William Cartwright
William Cartwright
William Cartwright was an English dramatist and churchman.-Early life:Cartwright was born at Northway, Gloucestershire, the son of William Cartwright of Heckhampton, Gloucestershire. He was educated at the free school of Cirencester and at Westminster School...
. Little is known of his early life. He claimed he was educated at the University of Oxford
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
, although no record of this has been found.
In the late 1630s, Gascoigne, was working on a Keplerian
Johannes Kepler
Johannes Kepler was a German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer. A key figure in the 17th century scientific revolution, he is best known for his eponymous laws of planetary motion, codified by later astronomers, based on his works Astronomia nova, Harmonices Mundi, and Epitome of Copernican...
optical arrangement when a thread from a spider’s web happened to become caught at exactly the combined optical focal points of the two lenses. When he looked through the arrangement Gascoigne saw the web bright and sharp within the field of view. He realized that he could more accurately point the telescope using the line as a guide, and went on to invent the telescopic sight by placing crossed wires at the focal point to define the centre of the field of view. He then added this arrangement to a sextant modelled on the instrument used by Tycho Brahe
Tycho Brahe
Tycho Brahe , born Tyge Ottesen Brahe, was a Danish nobleman known for his accurate and comprehensive astronomical and planetary observations...
, although Tycho’s sextant was only a naked-eye instrument. Gascoigne's sextant
Sextant
A sextant is an instrument used to measure the angle between any two visible objects. Its primary use is to determine the angle between a celestial object and the horizon which is known as the altitude. Making this measurement is known as sighting the object, shooting the object, or taking a sight...
was five feet in radius, and measured the distance between astronomical bodies to an unprecedented degree of accuracy. Gascoigne then realised that by introducing two points, whose separation could be adjusted using a screw, he could measure the size of the image enclosed by them. Using the known pitch of the screw, and knowing the focal length of the lens producing the image, he could work out the size of the object, such as the Moon or the planets, to a hitherto unattainable degree of accuracy.
Gascoigne met the Lancashire astronomer William Crabtree
William Crabtree
William Crabtree was an astronomer, mathematician, and merchant from Broughton, then a township near Manchester, which is now part of Salford, Greater Manchester, England...
, probably in 1640. After making observations at Gascoigne's home, Crabtree was much taken with these inventions and immediately saw their significance. On his return to his home in Broughton Spout, just outside Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
, he wrote to Gascoigne asking if he might obtain such instruments and also wrote to his friend Jeremiah Horrocks
Jeremiah Horrocks
Jeremiah Horrocks , sometimes given as Jeremiah Horrox , was an English astronomer who was the only person to predict, and one of only two people to observe and record, the transit of Venus of 1639.- Life and work :Horrocks was born in Lower Lodge, in...
about them. He wrote again to Gascoigne on 28 December 1640 saying,
Sadly Horrocks died before he could try out the instruments, but Crabtree and Gascoigne did use them to try to corroborate Horrocks's theories about the elliptical orbit of the Moon.
My friend Mr. Horrox professeth that little touch which I gave him hath ravished his mind quite from itself and left him in an Exstasie between Admiration and Amazement. I beseech you Sir, slack not your Intentions for the Perfection of your begun Wonders.
This invention was later taken up and improved by the scientist and astronomer Richard Towneley
Richard Towneley
Richard Towneley was an English mathematician and astronomer from Towneley near Burnley, Lancashire. He was one of a group of seventeenth century astronomers in the north of England, which included Jeremiah Horrocks, William Crabtree and William Gascoigne, the pioneer astronomers who laid the...
who was the nephew of Gascoigne's friend Christopher Towneley. Towneley later brought the instrument to the attention of Robert Hooke
Robert Hooke
Robert Hooke FRS was an English natural philosopher, architect and polymath.His adult life comprised three distinct periods: as a scientific inquirer lacking money; achieving great wealth and standing through his reputation for hard work and scrupulous honesty following the great fire of 1666, but...
, who used it to calculate the size of comets and other celestial bodies. The micrometer, as it became known, was to lie at the heart of astronomical measurement down to the twentieth century.
In 1642, civil war broke out in England, and Gascoigne received a commission as Providore for Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
in the army of King Charles I
Charles I of England
Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...
. Crabtree lived in Salford, just outside Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
both of which were on the parliamentary side and all correspondence between the two ceased.
Gascoigne died at the Battle of Marston Moor
Battle of Marston Moor
The Battle of Marston Moor was fought on 2 July 1644, during the First English Civil War of 1642–1646. The combined forces of the Scottish Covenanters under the Earl of Leven and the English Parliamentarians under Lord Fairfax and the Earl of Manchester defeated the Royalists commanded by Prince...
, Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
, on 2nd July 1644 as did Charles Towneley
Towneley (family)
The Towneley or Townley family are an English recusant family whose ancestry can be traced back to Norman England. They take their name from Towneley Hall in Burnley, Lancashire, which was the family seat until its sale in 1901.-The Towneleys of Towneley Hall:...
, the father of his friend Richard Towneley.
After Gascoigne's death some of his papers and fragments of correspondence between Crabtree and Gascoigne came into the possession of Christopher and Richard Towneley. They brought them to the attention of John Flamsteed
John Flamsteed
Sir John Flamsteed FRS was an English astronomer and the first Astronomer Royal. He catalogued over 3000 stars.- Life :Flamsteed was born in Denby, Derbyshire, England, the only son of Stephen Flamsteed...
, the first Astronomer Royal
Astronomer Royal
Astronomer Royal is a senior post in the Royal Household of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. There are two officers, the senior being the Astronomer Royal dating from 22 June 1675; the second is the Astronomer Royal for Scotland dating from 1834....
, who came to see Horrocks, Crabtree, and Gascoigne as the founding fathers of British research astronomy and the intellectual heirs of Galileo and Kepler. He began his massive three-folio volume Historia Coelestis Britannica (1725) by printing five pages of their surviving letters and observations, made between 1638 and 1643.
Many of Gascoigne's papers and correspondence were lost during the English Civil War
English Civil War
The English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists...
and later in the Great Fire of London
Great Fire of London
The Great Fire of London was a major conflagration that swept through the central parts of the English city of London, from Sunday, 2 September to Wednesday, 5 September 1666. The fire gutted the medieval City of London inside the old Roman City Wall...
, but most of what is known to remain is kept in the Bodleian Library
Bodleian Library
The Bodleian Library , the main research library of the University of Oxford, is one of the oldest libraries in Europe, and in Britain is second in size only to the British Library...
at the University of Oxford
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
.