Josiah Latimer Clark, or Latimer as he preferred to be known, was a famous Victorian civil, electrical and telegraphic engineer born in Marlow. I must admit I found the information relating to Latimer's achievements came as quite dry reading for those not particularly interested in the more technical aspects of the history of engineering. For this reason, and because we prefer to feature those whose history isn't told elsewhere such as on Wikipedia, I nearly decided not to gather our research on Latimer. But I realised that he was actually a more entertaining individual (as well as a fiercely intelligent and creative one) than any list of his inventions and academic papers can show.
Early Life And Some Narrow Escapes
Latimer was born in Marlow 1822, the son of "Dr" Josiah Clark, High Street lace dealer and grocer. (The Dr title was a nickname only! He was the 7th son of a 7th son, and tradition was such a person had healing powers.) Latimer's brother was the fellow engineer and mathematician Edwin Clark, who features in a post here. Lace dealing was not a flourishing industry any more and the Clarks suffered times of (relative) financial hardship. As such they were probably disappointed that the eldest son Edwin took a considerable time to settle down and make a success of himself. Was Latimer jealous of the opportunities that may have been given to his brother that the family could not afford to give to their other sons? We will never know. He was clearly always an intelligent and thoughtful boy. He attended the private school for young "gentleman" known as Faulkner's school in Marlow where the pupils were generally trained for commercial and clerical pursuits. He was one of the head boys and was remembered as studious, unassuming, and good humoured. After this, he was apparently trained as a chemist, partly in Dublin where he eventually managed a "scientific and manufacturing" chemist business. However he then moved into railway engineering, along with brother Edwin now settled to the career in which he too would excell. Edwin often had the lead role in these years, but he was quick to appoint Latimer to positions within the companies he worked for. When Edwin blagged his way into a job with THE Robert Stephenson, he would appoint Latimer as the assistant engineer supervising the construction of the Brittannia bridge over the Menai Straits. Latimer would subsequently contribute to a short book written by Edwin about their experiences in this sometimes very hair raising construction project. Both brothers nearly lost their lives in an accident there. Latimer had the narrowest of escapes, when some tonnes of equipment fell within inches of him. It was said he survived as he was pushed into a crevice but that some metal buttons on his clothes were flattened to the consistency of gold leaf. Whether he was wearing the buttoned item I'm not sure. If so he must surely have had an escape every bit as miraculous as reported. Either way, Latimer showed the squashed buttons off in the years to come. Later both Edwin and Latimer were poached by the Electric Telegraph co, and when Edwin subsequently resigned as their head engineer, Latimer took up that role, staying there until 1861 (although he remained a consultant afterwards). He then went into partnership with Sir Charles Bright and the two won substantial contracts for laying submarine and land based telegraph cables throughout the then Empire. Latimer thought that "ocean telegraphy was calculated to do universal good, not only pecuniarily but morally".
He spent most of his life now in London but of course he was frequently called abroad, more of which below.
Latimer Has A Good Idea
As Latimer's work in the field of electricity is deservedly well known (he first proposed adopting the terms ohm, volt etc and suggested the adoption of fixed standards for their measure for example) I'm going to concentrate on a few other of the very very many patents and inventions that the busy Latimer created. He really kept the patents department extremely busy, sometimes submitting a plan alone, sometimes jointly with various other scientists and engineers. My favourite is his method for taking stereoscopic photographs using a single rather than two cameras. He was apparently very interested in photography and I wonder what happened to the many experimental pictures he took? Latimer's method was adapted and developed by others but was generally regarded as "ingenious". One reviewer did note that it required any subject to remain still for a long time even by the standards of the time. This the reviewer thought would try the patience of a portrait sitter rather too much so he personally recommended reverting to a two camera method at such times. One obituary of Latimer records the fact he was first person to produce the type image later known as a vignette (or image with a dark edge/border). Its generally reported to be a French innovation but perhaps Latimer is a forgotten pioneer in this regard too.
My second favourite patent taken out by Latimer, was one for "an improved patent for hanging window sashes and blinds especially useful for railway carriages", submitted along with Edward Jacob Hill. This would stay exactly at what position you rolled it down to however much the train jolted apparently. I do not know if Latimer found a commercial partner for developing this particular idea. I think it's amusing that as well as solving the great engineering problems of the day, he still found time to deal with the petty annoyances of the Victorian railway traveller. I've also seen a patent lodged under Latimer's name for a method for passengers to communicate with the guard and driver of a train while travelling (1868)
Pneumatic Dispatch Company
Latimer was one of two chief engineers at the Pneumatic Dispatch Company, (1857) which used a method of Latimer's design, to send documents flying securely through vacuum tubes from one office or nearby building to another. (AKA the Pneumatic Cylinder Dispatch method.) This was a pretty ingenious yet simple system that was reckoned quicker than sending a telegraph message between premises close together. It replaced simply sending a messenger boy with the papers and it was considered more private and confidential. It seems Latimer designed Pneumatic Dispatch to solve a particular problem and that he did not publicly exhibit the idea. But when some French and German engineers exhibited similar systems a few years later, it was indignantly remembered that Latimer had got there first. Latimer first set up a tubeway between the Electrical Company "station" and the Stock Exchange in 1853, which worked via a steam engine powered vacuum only as the messages were required to travel just in one direction. When it proved successful the system was extended and altered to utilise air pressure to make it a two way system. With his co engineer, Latimer's main Pneumatic project was a tube laid between and under Euston Rd and St Martin's Le Grand. It seems to have satisfied it's users but the PDC decided there wasn't much profit to be made in the system overall so they sold it to the Post Office who continued to make use of it for many years.
His best known inventions were in the field of telegraphy, including a method for protecting underwater cables from rusting or otherwise deteriorating. Clarks Compound as it was known extended the life of cables from 5 to 20 years or more. This made a huge reduction in the cost of maintaining such communication lines (1858). When a far flung Marlovian living in a distant part of the empire was able to receive news of England a short time after it happened, you can guarantee it was at least partially due to the efforts of townsman Latimer.
Shipwrecks And Mud Baths
Bright & Clark won contracts to lay cables in the Persian Gulf in 1862, and when Latimer left the Bright partnership in 1866 he continued to specialise in grand scale submarine telegraph operations. (Also as part of Clark & Ford / Warden, Muirhead & Clark / Latimer, Muirhead & Co, and Clark, Staples & Clark engineers to name but a few of his business concerns) It's his work repairing and laying cables in and around the Red Sea later in the 1860s that I've been able to find the most information about in terms of what the experience was actually like for Latimer himself. In no way was he behind a desk in an office supervising things from afar. It was a difficult job and they obviously needed a civil engineer on site to make immediate decisions and adaptions in difficult conditions. The original cable had been partially ripped to shreds by coral in the Red Sea so while Latimer was in charge of repairing what he could, it was also his role to find an alternate overland route to replace as much underwater sections as possible. Poor Latimer was ship wrecked on the way to India for this project, and was severely injured with a broken collarbone and numerous other wounds. He narrowly escaped with his life and was carried ashore unconscious, remaining insensible for several hours. All the equipment on board the ship, and Latimer's workings and documents were lost. Worse still a vessel bringing 273 miles of the necessary cable also floundered on the way to join Latimer and it's Captain and 30 crew members lost their lives. 70 miles of the cable were put over the side in the attempt to stop the ship sinking. Miraculously, most of this was subsequently recovered and sent on it's way in the original and hastily repaired ship with only a minor delay. This was by no means the only hiccup. Latimer also had a vessel stranded on a mud bank in the Red Sea. He recalled that they needed to get the cable onboard to the shore a frustrating distance away. Those who first left the ship sunk to their waists in the mud. Latimer said they had to slide across on all fours "like a turtle" and emerged on the bank coated with mud from head to toe. The scene reminded him of a sketch in Punch and at least he found it amusing in retrospect! Another job was to personally engage with the Sheikhs of Egypt where the new cables would pass through their tribal lands. He secured agreements that the telegraphic workers would not be molested and that the tribes would guard the cables against harm in return for being paid to do so. The first part of the agreement was not always entirely respected shall we say!
Torpedoes And Bullets
Less well known now perhaps, is that Latimer's business was also later known as a manufacturer of torpedoes for which they were contactors for the War Department. In 1887 they were awarded the contract to supply 500,000 cartridges for the Army Ordinance Dept which caused some bemusement. Why was a company listed as a electrical and telegraphic engineering one the winner of a contract to provide bullets? The answer was that Latimer and his partners had bought the patent from Herr Lorenz of Germany for a means of manufacturing the bullets to Army specifications. The required equipment was being installed at their London works. It was a trial contract the War department said, and if Clark, Muirhead & Co fulfilled it well, they would be allowed to bid for larger ones.
Elsewhere we find Latimer perfecting floating docks (to allow easier repair of ships in particular where a "proper" dock was not readily available). He built some for amongst others, the Russian Navy. The British Navy were also much impressed by Latimer's work, which they said had contributed to national security by speeding repairs and cutting costs. The there was his eye catching electric fired 8 day time guns for large scale works, his methods of marking cables with different ridges and lines to allow them to be easily differentiated from one another, and countless other clever ideas and improvements. (He took out at least 150 patents) He was a fellow of The Royal Geographic Society, the Royal Astronomical Society and the Physical Society, President of the Society of Telegraphic Engineers and an associate of the the Institute of Civil Engineers to name just a few.
Closer to home, Latimer's company bid for contracts to supply electric lighting to various towns. This often seems to have been a fraught process with nervous councils reluctant to commit to all of Latimer's suggestions on cost grounds.
In Marlow
How often did the genial Latimer return from London to visit his home town of Marlow and brother Edwin of Cromwell House? It's hard to know but he did give at least a few lectures to the Literary and Scientific Institute and the Mural Improvement Society here in the 1880s at least. As someone who addressed groups of the foremost experts in numerous engineering and scientific fields, securing Latimer to speak to a group of interested amateurs was obviously a coup. His subject? Botany and astronomy. Was there any field Latimer didn't know about I wonder?! At this period he maintained a chiefly summer residence in Maidenhead. Both Latimer and brother Edwin were tremendous bibliophiles and I'm sure they liked to compare notes on this. Latimer was especially interested in just about any publication related to electricity. He is said to have enjoyed spending his last years rearranging and cataloguing his collection which contained at least 6,500 volumes. At least some of this library was presented to the Institute of Electrical Engineers.
Timekeeping
One last of Latimer's developments should be mentioned. This was his "transit instrument for the determination of time". This looks like a small telescope on a stand, and it was used with a guide and annually printed charts to check that your clock or watch was keeping the correct time to within four tenths of a second, as determined by Greenwich Mean Time. It was regarded as invaluable to country clock and watchmakers, and fairly inexpensive at £10. Apparently even a child of "ordinary intelligence" could set up the transit instrument but having read the instructions, this may be a little optimistic I feel.
Farewell
In 1898, Latimer woke suffering from an apparent bout of indigestion. He was at home in London at the time. He took some whisky and after a restless night, got up and seemed a little better. However he then went back to bed and died immediately, age 75. He was survived by his second wife Maria and sons Lyonel and Hugh. His grave is in Kensington Cemetery.
If you wish to consult Latimer's most famous work out of curiousity - "On Electrical Tables and Formulae", produced in partnership with Mr Sabine, it is readily available online. It was a reference work in use for decades.
Written and researched by Kathryn Day.
Further Information:
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SOURCES
Field, C. W. . Europe and America: Report of the Proceedings at an Inauguration Banquet, Given by Mr. Cyrus W. Field, of New York, at the Palace Hotel, Buckingham Gate, on Friday, the 15th April, 1864 : in Commemoration of the Renewal by the Atlantic Telegraph Company ... of Their Efforts to Unite Ireland & Newfoundland, by Means of a Submarine Electric Telegraph Cable. (1864) United Kingdom: W. Brown."
Hansard, T. C. Hansard's Parliamentary Debates. (1887) T.C. Hansard.
Hardwich, T. F., Hadow, E., Dawson, G. A Manual of Photographic Chemistry: Including the Practice of the Collodion Process. (1864) J. Churchill.
Munro, J. Heroes of the Telegraph (1891) Religious Tract Society.
Plarr, Victor Gustave - Men and Women of the Time; a dictionary of contemporaries. (14th Revised Edition 1895), G Routledge & Co.
Woodcroft, B. Alphabetical index of patentees and applicants for patents of invention, (1869) (n.p.).
The Directory of Directors. (1883). Thomas Skinner Directories.
English Patents of Inventions, Specifications: 1853, 1857 & 58, 1868. United Kingdom: H.M. Stationery Office.
The Horological Journal: The Special Organ of the British Horological Institute. (1883). United Kingdom: Published and printed for the Institute by Kent & Company.
Mr. Latimer Clark, F.R.S. Nature 59, 38 (1898). https://doi.org/10.1038/059038a0
The Mechanics' Magazine and Journal of Engineering, Agricultural Machinery, Manufactures and Shipbuilding. (1862). Robertson, Brooman, & Company.
Photographic Notes. (1856). Sampson Low, Son & Company.
Specifications of Letters Patent for Inventions and Provisional Specifications: 1878. (1879). United Kingdom: Published and sold at the Commissioners of Patents Sale Department.
South Bucks Standard, 4th & 11th November 1898. British Library Archive.
The Truth, July 21 1881 - digitised by Google.
Transactions of the Institution of Naval Architects. (1879). Institution of Naval Architects
The Electrical Journal. (1885). United Kingdom: D. B. Adams
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