George Fownes, FRS  was a British chemist

Chemist

A chemist is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties such as density and acidity. Chemists carefully describe the properties they study in terms of quantities, with detail on the level of molecules and their component atoms...

.

He attended the Palace School in Enfield

London Borough of Enfield

The London Borough of Enfield is the most northerly London borough and forms part of Outer London. It borders the London Boroughs of Barnet, Haringey and Waltham Forest...

. He obtained his PhD at Giesen

Giesen

Giesen is a village and a municipality in the district of Hildesheim, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is situated approx. 6 km northwest of Hildesheim, and 22 km southeast of Hanover.The municipality includes five villages:* Ahrbergen...

, in Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

. From 1842 he was chemistry professor at the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, and from 1846 at University College, London. He was also secretary of the Chemical Society of London. In 1844, he published a chemistry textbook. In 1842, he had been awarded the Royal Agricultural Society

Royal Agricultural Society

The Royal Agricultural Society of England was established in the United Kingdom in 1838 with the motto "Practice with Science". The RASE aim is to promote the scientific development of agriculture. The society received its Royal Charter from Queen Victoria in 1840.From its early days the society...

's prize for his essay Food of Plants. In 1844, he received the first Actonian Prize

Actonian Prize

The Actonian Prize was established by the Royal Institution as a septennial award for the "person who in the judgement of the committee of managers for the time being of the Institution, should have been the author of the best essay illustrative of the wisdom and beneficence of the Almighty, in...

 (of 100 guineas) for his essay Chemistry as Exemplifies the Wisdom and Beneficence of God. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society

Royal Society

The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

 in 1845, but that same year resigned from his academic positions due to ill health. For his researches in organic chemistry, he was awarded the Royal Society's Royal Medal

Royal Medal

The Royal Medal, also known as The Queen's Medal, is a silver-gilt medal awarded each year by the Royal Society, two for "the most important contributions to the advancement of natural knowledge" and one for "distinguished contributions in the applied sciences" made within the Commonwealth of...

 in 1847. He spent time in Barbados

Barbados

Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles. It is in length and as much as in width, amounting to . It is situated in the western area of the North Atlantic and 100 kilometres east of the Windward Islands and the Caribbean Sea; therein, it is about east of the islands of Saint...

 from 1847, in an attempt to treat the pulmonary disease afflicting him, but, on his return to England in 1848, he caught a cold and died at his father's house in Brompton, Kent

Brompton, Kent

Brompton is an ancient village near Chatham, in Medway, England. Its name means 'a farmstead where broom grows´. Today Brompton is a small residential area between Chatham Dockyard and Gillingham....

 at the age of 34.

Papers

• “On the Direct Formation of Cyanogen
  Cyanogen
  Cyanogen is the chemical compound with the formula 2. It is a colorless, toxic gas with a pungent odor.The molecule is a pseudohalogen. Cyanogen molecules consist of two CN groups — analogous to diatomic halogen molecules, such as Cl2, but far less oxidizing...
  
   from its Elements,” Rep. Brit. Assoc., 1841, part ii. pp. 52, 53
• “On the Preparation of Artificial Yeast
  Yeast
  Yeasts are eukaryotic micro-organisms classified in the kingdom Fungi, with 1,500 species currently described estimated to be only 1% of all fungal species. Most reproduce asexually by mitosis, and many do so by an asymmetric division process called budding...
  
  ,” Mem. Chem. Soc., i., 1841-43, pp. 100-103
• “On the Preparation of Hippuric Acid
  Hippuric acid
  Hippuric acid is a carboxylic acid found in the urine of horses and other herbivores. Hippuric acid crystallizes in rhombic prisms which are readily soluble in hot water, melt at 187 °C and decompose at about 240 °C...
  
  ,” Phil. Mag., xxi., 1842, pp. 382-384
• “On the Food of Plants” [prize essay], Jour. Agric. Soc., iv., 1843, pp. 498-556
• “On the Existence of Phosphoric Acid
  Phosphoric acid
  Phosphoric acid, also known as orthophosphoric acid or phosphoric acid, is a mineral acid having the chemical formula H3PO4. Orthophosphoric acid molecules can combine with themselves to form a variety of compounds which are also referred to as phosphoric acids, but in a more general way...
  
   in Rocks of Igneous Origin,” Phil. Trans., 1844, pp. 53-56
• “An Account of the Artificial Formation of a Vegeto-alkali” (Furfurol), and “On Benzoline,” Phil. Trans., 1845, pp. 253-268
• “On the Production of Furfurol,” Pharm. Journ., 1849, 113-116
• “On the Equivalent or Combining Volumes of Solid Bodies,” Pharm. Journ., pp. 334-339.

Sources

• Entry for Fownes in the Royal Society's Library and Archive catalogue's details of Fellows (accessed 21 April 2008)

External links

• George Fownes biography from Today In Science History
• The life and work of George Fownes, F.R.S. (1815–49), J. S. Rowe in Annals of Science (1850)
• George Fownes's Chemistry, as exemplifying the wisdom and beneficence of God (1844)