John George Children
John George Children ( born May 18, 1777 Tonbridge, Kent; † January 1, 1852 in Halstead, Kent ) was a British chemist, mineralogist and zoologist. The botanist Anna Atkins was his daughter.
Life and work
John George Children was the only child of the banker George Children (1742-1818) and his wife Susanna Marshall Jordan. He studied at Eton School and studied from 1794 at Queens ' College, Cambridge, but interrupted his studies in 1798 due to the death of his wife from. He toured Europe and the United States and dealt with mineralogy, chemistry and galvanism. With the financial support of his father, he raised himself in Ferox Hall, a laboratory one, in which he experimented together with Humphry Davy and William Hyde Wollaston.
1807 Children was a member of the Royal Society and the Linnean Society. In 1813 he constructed the largest ever galvanic battery. 1815 Children traveled to Spain and visited the mercury mines in Almaden.
After the bankruptcy of his father in 1816 Children were forced to look for a job. In the same year he got a job as a librarian in the " Department of Antiquities " of the British Museum. As followers of William Elford Leach, he was from 1823 to 1840 keeper of the zoological collection of the museum. He helped the Zoological Journal issue, whose first edition appeared in 1825.
From 1826 to 1827 and from 1830 to 1837 he was secretary of the Royal Society and from 1837 to 1839 and its vice-president. In 1833, he was the founding president of the Royal Entomological Society of London, and from 1838 to 1844 Vice- President of the Botanical Society of London.
Writings
John George Children published some articles in the Philosophical Transactions.