Chester's
Visitors
through
the
Ages:
4
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
n
1696,
a
mint
was
set
up
in
Chester.
This
was
part
of
an
effort
to
completely
renew
the
nation's
currency,
and
the
man
put
in
charge
in
London
was
one Isaac
Newton (later
knighted
for
these
efforts,
but
not
for
his
science). To take charge of the Chester mint he appointed the great scientist and astronomer Edmond Halley (he of comet fame), who spent two years at the mint in Chester Castle (the site is marked on the signs put up by English Heritage- just behind the Half Moon tower). Halley was a remarkable man. It was he who persuaded Newton to write his most famous work, the Principia and the Royal Society to publish it. In fact, Halley paid for the publication himself. He arrived in Chester fresh from salvage work in a diving bell he invented, and left in 1698 to captain a Navy ship (the only civilian ever to do so) in two voyages around the Atlantic, mapping magnetic variations, and then in the English channel mapping tides (his tidal chart was the first of its kind by over 100 years), later succeeding John Flamsteed to become the second Astronomer Royal. While in Chester he wrote several letters to the Royal Society, printed in Philosophical Transactions describing, among other things, the Roman altar found in Eastgate Street. He added, "The Stone of this place, which is soft, reddish, grit, and very friable, with shining particles intermixt, is very apt to decay with the weather, so that all Old Buildings are very much defaced thereby, and the Walls which are Built thereof, are so frequently out of repair that they have Officers on purpose, whom they call Murengers, who do gradually refit them, where they are most worn out; in some places the Stone is in a manner moulded away like Sammel Bricks in a Wall, leaving the Mortar standing. In these Stones, and the Quarries from whence they came, I have diligently sought for Shells or other Animal Substances, such as are often found in other places, but hitherto have found no such things: But the Stone is generally intersperst with Pebbles and small Flints, which, as the Stone decays, do discover themselves within it, as if they had been lodged in the Sand, whereof the Stone consists before its Induration" He also describes a hailstorm which affected North Wales, West Kirkby on the "Wirall", and parts of the North of England, observations of an eclipse of the Moon, experiments showing the effect of altitude on air pressure conducted on Mount Snowdon: "I have not time nor Paper to describe this horrid spot of Hills, the like of which I never yet saw", and the sight of a rare triple rainbow from the walls in 1697: An account of the Appearance of an extraordinary Iris seen at Chester, in August last, by E. Halley: "On the Sixth Day of August last, in the Evening, between Six and Seven of the Clock, I went to take the Air upon the Walls of Chester, when I was surprized by a sudden Shower, which forced me to take Shelter in a Nich that afforded me a Seat in the Wall, near the North East Corner thereof. As I sat there, I observed an Iris, exceedingly vivid, as to its Colours, at first on the South Side only, but in a little Time with an entire arch..." A double rainbow is quite common, but the third rainbow is actually around the sun and is very difficult to see. Halley's third rainbow was of a different type- the water in the Dee estuary was calm enough to act as a mirror, producing an image of the sun below the horizon. The third rainbow was the primary rainbow from the image of the sun, as Halley concluded. He later went on to investigate the mathematical details of rainbows. The 'Nich' wherein Halley sat to observe this phenomena was formerly situated next to the Phoenix Tower but was removed during one of the periodic restorations of the city walls. However, you may see a picture of it here. After two years at the mint at Chester, Halley was given the command of a warship, the Paramore Pink, by William III. This was not as strange as it sounds, for Halley had been working on determining the longitude using variation of the compass and this was the main purpose of the voyage, although he was also required by William III to "attempt the discovery of what land lies to the south of the western ocean"... Halley had examined reports of a comet approaching Earth in 1531, 1607 and 1682. He concluded that these three comets were actually the same comet returning over and over again, and predicted the comet would come again in 1758 but he did not live to see it as he died in 1742. You can read more of his remarkable life at here. Today, incidentally, Britain's currency- and also the coinage and banknotes of many other countries- is produced at only one location, the Royal Mint at Pontyclun in South Wales. George
Skene (1695-1756), Laird
of
Skene,
rode
from
Edinburgh
to
London
in
1729
accompanied
by
his
brother,
a
friend,
and
a
servant.
Later in life he became
Rector
of
the
University
of
Aberdeen
(1737-45)... Right: a detail from the earliest known oil painting of Chester, painted by Pieter Tillemans in the first half of the eighteenth century- contemporary with Skene's and Quartermaine's accounts George
Quartermaine,
a
servant
of
St.
John's
College,
Oxford,
accompanied
the
President
of
the
college
to
Edinburgh
and
back
in
1737,
keeping
brief- largely unpunctuated-
notes
throughout
the
journey.
They
visited
Chester
in
August,
on
their
way
north: Cheshire has for centuries been reknowned for the excellence of its cheese. The Countess Constance of Cheshire (reign of Henry 2nd, 1190), despite being the wife of Ranulf de Blundeville, 6th Earl of Chester and the King's daughter-in-law, kept a herd of cows, and made good cheeses, three of which she presented to the Archbishop of Canterbury. “A Cheshire man sailed into Spain What is the connection between the Cheshire Cat (she of the grin) and Cheshire cheese? Go here to find out... or on to Thomas Pennant's 18th century traveller's tales of Chester... |
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