James Alfred Ewing
Encyclopedia
Sir James Alfred Ewing KCB
Order of the Bath
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...
FRS
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"...
FRSE
Royal Society of Edinburgh
The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity, operating on a wholly independent and non-party-political basis and providing public benefit throughout Scotland...
MInstitCE
Institution of Civil Engineers
Founded on 2 January 1818, the Institution of Civil Engineers is an independent professional association, based in central London, representing civil engineering. Like its early membership, the majority of its current members are British engineers, but it also has members in more than 150...
(27 March 1855 - 7 January 1935) was a Scottish
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
physicist
Physicist
A physicist is a scientist who studies or practices physics. Physicists study a wide range of physical phenomena in many branches of physics spanning all length scales: from sub-atomic particles of which all ordinary matter is made to the behavior of the material Universe as a whole...
and engineer
Engineer
An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...
, best known for his work on the magnetic
Magnetism
Magnetism is a property of materials that respond at an atomic or subatomic level to an applied magnetic field. Ferromagnetism is the strongest and most familiar type of magnetism. It is responsible for the behavior of permanent magnets, which produce their own persistent magnetic fields, as well...
properties of metals and, in particular, for his discovery of, and coinage of the word, hysteresis
Hysteresis
Hysteresis is the dependence of a system not just on its current environment but also on its past. This dependence arises because the system can be in more than one internal state. To predict its future evolution, either its internal state or its history must be known. If a given input alternately...
.
It was said of Ewing that he was 'Careful at all times of his appearance, his suits were mostly grey, added to which he generally wore - whatever the fashion - a white piqué stripe to his waistcoat, a mauve shirt, a white butterfly collar and a dark blue bow tie with white spots.' he was regarded as brilliant and successful, but was conscious of his dignity and position. On appointment to head the newly created Admiralty codebreaking department, the Director of Naval Intelligence, Henry Oliver
Henry Oliver
Admiral of the Fleet Sir Henry Francis Oliver, GCB, KCMG, MVO was a British naval officer.-Naval career:...
, described him as 'too distinguished a man to be placed officially under the orders of the Director of Intelligence or Chief of Staff'. His first wife, Annie, was an American, a great great niece of George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...
.
Early life
Born in DundeeDundee
Dundee is the fourth-largest city in Scotland and the 39th most populous settlement in the United Kingdom. It lies within the eastern central Lowlands on the north bank of the Firth of Tay, which feeds into the North Sea...
, Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
, Ewing was the third son of the Reverend James Ewing a minister of the Free Church of Scotland
Free Church of Scotland (1843-1900)
The Free Church of Scotland is a Scottish denomination which was formed in 1843 by a large withdrawal from the established Church of Scotland in a schism known as the "Disruption of 1843"...
. He was educated at West End Academy and the High School of Dundee
High School of Dundee
The High School of Dundee is an independent, co-educational, day school in the city of Dundee, Scotland which provides both primary and secondary education to just over one thousand pupils...
, Ewing showed an early interest in science and technology.
Ewing won a scholarship to the University of Edinburgh
University of Edinburgh
The University of Edinburgh, founded in 1583, is a public research university located in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The university is deeply embedded in the fabric of the city, with many of the buildings in the historic Old Town belonging to the university...
where he studied under William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin
William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin
William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin OM, GCVO, PC, PRS, PRSE, was a mathematical physicist and engineer. At the University of Glasgow he did important work in the mathematical analysis of electricity and formulation of the first and second laws of thermodynamics, and did much to unify the emerging...
and Peter Guthrie Tait
Peter Guthrie Tait
Peter Guthrie Tait FRSE was a Scottish mathematical physicist, best known for the seminal energy physics textbook Treatise on Natural Philosophy, which he co-wrote with Kelvin, and his early investigations into knot theory, which contributed to the eventual formation of topology as a mathematical...
before graduating in engineering. During his summer vacations, he worked on telegraph cable laying expeditions, including one to Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
, under Thomson and Fleeming Jenkin
Fleeming Jenkin
Henry Charles Fleeming Jenkin was Professor of Engineering at the University of Edinburgh, remarkable for his versatility. Known to the world as the inventor of telpherage, he was an electrician and cable engineer, economist, lecturer, linguist, critic, actor, dramatist and artist...
.
Japan
In 1878, on Fleeming Jenkin's recommendation, Ewing was recruited to help the modernisation of Meiji Era JapanJapan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
as one of the o-yatoi gaikokujin
O-yatoi gaikokujin
The Foreign government advisors in Meiji Japan, known in Japanese as oyatoi gaikokujin , were those foreign advisors hired by the Japanese government for their specialized knowledge to assist in the modernization of Japan at the end of the Bakufu and during the Meiji era. The term is sometimes...
(hired foreigners). Serving as professor of mechanical engineering
Mechanical engineering
Mechanical engineering is a discipline of engineering that applies the principles of physics and materials science for analysis, design, manufacturing, and maintenance of mechanical systems. It is the branch of engineering that involves the production and usage of heat and mechanical power for the...
at the Tokyo Imperial University, he was instrumental in founding Japanese seismology
Seismology
Seismology is the scientific study of earthquakes and the propagation of elastic waves through the Earth or through other planet-like bodies. The field also includes studies of earthquake effects, such as tsunamis as well as diverse seismic sources such as volcanic, tectonic, oceanic,...
.
Ewing made two special friends at Tokyo University soon after arriving: Basil Hall Chamberlain
Basil Hall Chamberlain
Basil Hall Chamberlain was a professor of Tokyo Imperial University and one of the foremost British Japanologists active in Japan during the late 19th century. He also wrote some of the earliest translations of haiku into English...
and Lieutenant Thomas Henry James R.N. who taught navigation. He was also in close contact with Henry Dyer
Henry Dyer
Henry Dyer was a Scottish engineer who contributed much to founding Western-style technical education in Japan and Anglo-Japanese relations.- Early life :...
and William Edward Ayrton
William Edward Ayrton
-See also:*Henry Dyer*John Milne*Anglo-Japanese relations...
at the Imperial College of Engineering
Imperial College of Engineering
The Imperial College of Engineering was founded as a university at Tokyo in 1873, though its predecessor the existed from 1871. The name "Kobu Daigakko" dates from 1877. In modern-day parlance it would have been called an institute of technology....
(Kobu Dai Gakkō).
In Tokyo, Ewing taught courses on mechanics and on heat engine
Heat engine
In thermodynamics, a heat engine is a system that performs the conversion of heat or thermal energy to mechanical work. It does this by bringing a working substance from a high temperature state to a lower temperature state. A heat "source" generates thermal energy that brings the working substance...
s to engineering students, and on electricity and magnetism to students of physics. He carried out many research projects on magnetism and coined the word 'hysteresis'. His investigations into earthquakes led him to help T. Lomar Gray
Thomas Lomar Gray
Thomas Lomar Gray was a Scottish engineer noted for his pioneering work in seismology.-Early life:Born in Lochgelly, Fife, Scotland, Gray graduated in 1878 from the University of Glasgow with a B.Sc. in engineering...
and John Milne
John Milne
For other uses, see John Milne .John Milne was the British geologist and mining engineer who worked on a horizontal seismograph.-Biography:...
of the Imperial College of Engineering to develop a seismometer
Seismometer
Seismometers are instruments that measure motions of the ground, including those of seismic waves generated by earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and other seismic sources...
. All three men worked as a team on the invention and use of seismographs, though Milne is generally credited with the invention of the first modern horizontal-pendulum seismograph.
Ewing joined Gray and Milne in founding the Seismological Society of Japan
Seismological Society of Japan
The or SSJ is a learned society with the goal of advancing the understanding of earthquakes and other seismic phenomena.-History:...
(SSJ) in 1880.
Return to Dundee
In 1883, Ewing returned to his native DundeeDundee
Dundee is the fourth-largest city in Scotland and the 39th most populous settlement in the United Kingdom. It lies within the eastern central Lowlands on the north bank of the Firth of Tay, which feeds into the North Sea...
to work at the recently established University College Dundee
University of Dundee
The University of Dundee is a university based in the city and Royal burgh of Dundee on eastern coast of the central Lowlands of Scotland and with a small number of institutions elsewhere....
as its first Professor of Engineering. He was appalled by the living conditions he found in many of the poorer areas of the town which he felt compared unfavourably with those in Japan. He worked fervently with local government and industry to improve amenities, in particular sewer
Sanitary sewer
A sanitary sewer is a separate underground carriage system specifically for transporting sewage from houses and commercial buildings to treatment or disposal. Sanitary sewers serving industrial areas also carry industrial wastewater...
systems, and to lower the infant mortality rate. Some of the letters Ewing wrote at this time are now held by Archive Services, University of Dundee
University of Dundee
The University of Dundee is a university based in the city and Royal burgh of Dundee on eastern coast of the central Lowlands of Scotland and with a small number of institutions elsewhere....
along with some of his other papers.
A reminder of Ewing's connection with both University College and the city of Dundee
Dundee
Dundee is the fourth-largest city in Scotland and the 39th most populous settlement in the United Kingdom. It lies within the eastern central Lowlands on the north bank of the Firth of Tay, which feeds into the North Sea...
is the University of Dundee
University of Dundee
The University of Dundee is a university based in the city and Royal burgh of Dundee on eastern coast of the central Lowlands of Scotland and with a small number of institutions elsewhere....
's Ewing Building which was built in 1954 and named in his honour.
The Ewing Building is currently used by the University's School of Engineering, Physics and Mathematics.
University of Cambridge
In 1890, Ewing took up the post of Professor of Mechanism and Applied Mechanics at the University of CambridgeUniversity of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...
, initially at Trinity College
Trinity College, Cambridge
Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Trinity has more members than any other college in Cambridge or Oxford, with around 700 undergraduates, 430 graduates, and over 170 Fellows...
, though he later moved to King's College
King's College, Cambridge
King's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. The college's full name is "The King's College of our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge", but it is usually referred to simply as "King's" within the University....
. At Cambridge, Ewing's research into the magnetisation of metals led him to criticise the conventional account of Wilhelm Weber
Wilhelm Eduard Weber
Wilhelm Eduard Weber was a German physicist and, together with Carl Friedrich Gauss, inventor of the first electromagnetic telegraph.-Early years:...
. In 1890, he observed that magnetisation lagged behind an applied alternating current
Alternating current
In alternating current the movement of electric charge periodically reverses direction. In direct current , the flow of electric charge is only in one direction....
. He described the characteristic hysteresis curve and speculated that individual molecules act as magnets, resisting changes in magnetising potential. (Note: According to the book Sir Alfred Ewing: A Pioneer in Physics and Engineering (1946) by Professor Bates, the discovery of magnetic hysteresis probably occurred before Ewing. However, Ewing re-discovered it, studied it in detail and coined the word hysteresis
Hysteresis
Hysteresis is the dependence of a system not just on its current environment but also on its past. This dependence arises because the system can be in more than one internal state. To predict its future evolution, either its internal state or its history must be known. If a given input alternately...
).
Ewing also researched into the crystalline structure of metals and, in 1903, was the first to propose that fatigue failures
Fatigue (material)
'In materials science, fatigue is the progressive and localized structural damage that occurs when a material is subjected to cyclic loading. The nominal maximum stress values are less than the ultimate tensile stress limit, and may be below the yield stress limit of the material.Fatigue occurs...
originated in microscopic defects or slip bands in materials. In 1895 he was awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Society for his work on Magnetic Induction in Iron and other Metals.
Ewing was a close friend of Sir Charles Algernon Parsons
Charles Algernon Parsons
Sir Charles Algernon Parsons OM KCB FRS was an Anglo-Irish engineer, best known for his invention of the steam turbine. He worked as an engineer on dynamo and turbine design, and power generation, with great influence on the naval and electrical engineering fields...
and collaborated with him on the development of the steam turbine
Steam turbine
A steam turbine is a mechanical device that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam, and converts it into rotary motion. Its modern manifestation was invented by Sir Charles Parsons in 1884....
. During this time, Ewing published The Steam Engine and other Heat Engines around this time. In 1897 he took part in the sea-trials of the experimental vessel Turbinia
Turbinia
Turbinia was the first steam turbine-powered steamship. Built as an experimental vessel in 1894, and easily the fastest ship in the world at that time, Turbinia was demonstrated dramatically at the Spithead Navy Review in 1897 and set the standard for the next generation of steamships, the...
, which set a new speed record of 35 knots.
In 1898, Ewing took his wife and children to Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
for a mountaineering
Mountaineering
Mountaineering or mountain climbing is the sport, hobby or profession of hiking, skiing, and climbing mountains. While mountaineering began as attempts to reach the highest point of unclimbed mountains it has branched into specialisations that address different aspects of the mountain and consists...
holiday with the family of noted Professor of Electrical Engineering at King's College
King's College London
King's College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. King's has a claim to being the third oldest university in England, having been founded by King George IV and the Duke of Wellington in 1829, and...
, John Hopkinson
John Hopkinson
John Hopkinson, FRS, was a British physicist, electrical engineer, Fellow of the Royal Society and President of the IEE twice in 1890 and 1896. He invented the three-wire system for the distribution of electrical power, for which he was granted a patent in 1882...
. All five of the Hopkinson brothers were members of the Alpine Club and soon initiated Ewing into the sport of rock climbing. On 27 August, John Hopkinson set out with his son Jack and two of his three daughters to climb. Ewing decided not to go with them as he was feeling a little stiff after his climb the previous day. The party never returned, and was found the next morning, all four bodies roped together five hundred feet below the summit.
In 1898 Ewing was elected to a Professorial Fellowship at King's College.
Admiralty
On 8 April 1903, The TimesThe Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
announced that the Board of Admiralty selected Ewing for the newly created post of Director of Naval Education (DNE) in Greenwich
Greenwich
Greenwich is a district of south London, England, located in the London Borough of Greenwich.Greenwich is best known for its maritime history and for giving its name to the Greenwich Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time...
.
Ewing's first wife, Annie (née Washington) died in 1909 and, in 1912, he married Ellen, the surviving daughter of his old friend and patron, John Hopkinson.
As reward for his services, Ewing was made Companion of the Order of the Bath
Order of the Bath
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...
in 1906 and then Knight Commander of the Bath in 1911.
During World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, from 1914 to May 1917, Ewing managed Room 40
Room 40
In the history of Cryptanalysis, Room 40 was the section in the Admiralty most identified with the British cryptoanalysis effort during the First World War.Room 40 was formed in October 1914, shortly after the start of the war...
, the Admiralty intelligence department of cryptanalysis
Cryptanalysis
Cryptanalysis is the study of methods for obtaining the meaning of encrypted information, without access to the secret information that is normally required to do so. Typically, this involves knowing how the system works and finding a secret key...
, responsible predominantly for the decryption of intercepted German naval messages. In this capacity, he achieved considerable fame in the popular press when Room 40 deciphered the Zimmermann Telegram
Zimmermann Telegram
The Zimmermann Telegram was a 1917 diplomatic proposal from the German Empire to Mexico to make war against the United States. The proposal was caught by the British before it could get to Mexico. The revelation angered the Americans and led in part to a U.S...
in 1917 (which suggested a German plot to assist Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
in annexing the southwestern United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
). The publication of the Zimmermann Telegram is generally credited as the trigger event which brought American into the Great War.
University of Edinburgh
In May 1916 Ewing accepted an invitation to become Vice-Chancellor of Edinburgh University, in the course of which he instituted an extensive series of effective reforms and which he held until his retirement in 1929. In 1927 he gave a lecture to the Edinburgh Philosophical Institution which contained the first semi-official disclosure of the work done by Room 40.Sir Alfred Ewing died in 1935.
Honours
- Fellow of the Royal Society of EdinburghRoyal Society of EdinburghThe Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity, operating on a wholly independent and non-party-political basis and providing public benefit throughout Scotland...
(1878); - Fellow of the Royal SocietyRoyal SocietyThe 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"...
(1887); - John Scott Medal (1907);
- CBOrder of the BathThe Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...
(1907); - KCBOrder of the BathThe Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...
(1911); - President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (1924–1929);
- Albert MedalAlbert Medal (RSA)The Albert Medal of the Royal Society of Arts was instituted in 1864 as a memorial to Prince Albert, who had been President of the Society for 18 years. It was first awarded in 1864 for "distinguished merit in promoting Arts, Manufactures and Commerce"...
of the Royal Society of ArtsRoyal Society of ArtsThe Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufacturers and Commerce is a British multi-disciplinary institution, based in London. The name Royal Society of Arts is frequently used for brevity...
(1929); - President of the British Association for the Advancement of ScienceBritish Association for the Advancement of Scienceframe|right|"The BA" logoThe British Association for the Advancement of Science or the British Science Association, formerly known as the BA, is a learned society with the object of promoting science, directing general attention to scientific matters, and facilitating interaction between...
(1932); - The James Alfred Ewing Medal of the Institution of Civil EngineersInstitution of Civil EngineersFounded on 2 January 1818, the Institution of Civil Engineers is an independent professional association, based in central London, representing civil engineering. Like its early membership, the majority of its current members are British engineers, but it also has members in more than 150...
has been awarded for specially meritorious contributions to the science of engineering in the field of research since 1938.