| Authorised form of name | Wilson; George Fergusson (1822 - 1902); industrial chemist |
| Dates | 1822 - 1902 |
| Nationality | British |
| Place of birth | Wandsworth Common, London, England, United Kingdom |
| Date of birth | 25 March 1822 |
| Place of death | Weybridge Heath, Surrey, England, United Kingdom |
| Date of death | 28 March 1902 |
| Occupation | Industrial chemist |
| Research field | Industrial chemistry |
| Chemistry |
| Activity | Education:
Wandsworth, London, England, United Kingdom
Career:
Joined E. Price & Son in place of his elder brother James, who had gone to Ceylon to assist his brother David in managing the firm's recently acquired coconut plantations (1940); patented a process that enabled cheap, malodorous fats to be used instead of tallow in candle-making (1842); the business was sold for £250,000 during the Panic of 1847 and reformed as Price's Patent Candles Ltd., with George Wilson and an elder brother James as managing directors; introduced moulded coco-stearin lights, derived from coconut oil, as “New Patent Lights”, improving the French patent which resulted in the wide adoption by English manufacturers of the company’s “cloth oil”, or “oleine” (1853); discovered a method of manufacturing pure glycerine, first separated from fats and oils at high temperature, and then purified in an atmosphere of steam. Previously, commercial glycerine had been impure (1854); retired as managing director, moved to Wisley, Surrey, and turned his attention to experimental gardening (1863); continued to act as a manufacturing adviser to Prices (1863-1868).
Memberships:
Royal Horticultural Society
Society of Arts
Linnean Society |
| Membership category | Fellow |
| Date of election | 07/06/1855 |
| Age at election | 33 |
| Proposer | Adam Sedgwick |
| Edward Solly |
| William Jackson Hooker |
| Thomas Sopwith |
| Henry Moseley |
| James Booth |
| Richard Owen |
| Alfred Smee |
| Lyon Playfair |
| William Daniel Conybeare |
| August Wilhelm von Hofmann |
| Charles May |
| Peter Mark Roget |
| Charles Brooke |
| John Frederick William Herschel |
| John Stenhouse |
| Benjamin Collins Brodie Junior |
| Philip James Yorke |
| Relationships | Parents: William Wilson (1772–1860), merchant in Russia and subsequently founder at Battersea of a candle-making firm, E. Price & Son, and Margaret Nimmo Dickson, both of Scottish extraction.
Spouse: (m. 13 August 1862) Ellen Barchard, eldest daughter of Robert Wildman Barchard, a merchant of Wandsworth.
Children: Two sons and a daughter. |
| OtherInfo | Inventor and Improver of Several processes for the Treatment of neutral, vegetable & animal fats & the separation therefrom of fatty acids of great utility in the Arts. Distinguished for his acquaintance with the science of Industrial Chemistry and for his connection with successful plans for the Education of the Working Classes, and the amelioration of their social condition.
In 1903 his garden at Wisley was purchased by Sir Thomas Hanbury and presented to the Royal Horticultural Society.
Particularly successful as a cultivator of lilies, gaining between 1867 and 1883 twenty-five first-class certificates for species exhibited.
The insecticide Gishurst Compound and the leather preservative Gishurstine derived their names from his residence, Gishurst Cottage, Weybridge. |
| Source | Sources:
Bulloch's Roll; DNB
Obituaries:
Proc Roy Soc 1905 vol 75 pp 183-184 signed by M T M
Notes:
Thomas Sopwith has signed the election certificate twice |
| Code | NA6399 |