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Authorised form of nameIngold; Sir; Christopher Kelk (1893 - 1970); chemist
Dates1893 - 1970
NationalityBritish
Place of birth142 Windsor Road, Forest Gate, Essex, England
Date of birth28 October 1893
Place of death12 Handel Close, Edgware, London, England
Date of death08/12/1970
Occupationchemist
Research fieldOrganic chemistry
Chemistry
ActivityEducation: Sandown Grammar School (BSc); Hartley University College, now University of Southampton (B. Sc. Hons) (1911), University of London (BSc; MSc; DSc)
Career:
Joined the laboratory of Jocelyn Feld Thorpe (FRS 1908) at Imperial College, London, with a brief hiatus during which he conducted research into chemical warfare and the manufacture of poison gas with Cassel Cyanide Company at Glasgow (1918-1920); published fifty-two research papers, was co-author of a 500-page book with Jocelyn Feld Thorpe (1920-1924); Professor of Organic Chemistry at the University of Leeds (1924); carried out a heated debate with Robert Robinson (FRS 1920) on the electronic theoretical approaches to organic reaction mechanisms (1926); returned to London as Professor of Chemistry at University College, in the Department then headed by Professor Frederick George Donnan (FRS 1911) (1930); became Director of the Laboratories upon Donnan’s retirement (1937); presided over various WWII evacuations to University College, Aberystwyth (1939-1945); remained Director until his retirement (1961); died at home from cerebrovascular degeneration and arteriosclerosis.
Honours:
Kt 1958
Medals/Awards:
Meldola Medal (1922)
Faraday Lectureship Prize (1961)
Longstaff Medal (1957)
James Flack Norris Award for physical organic chemistry (1965)
Membership categoryFellow
Date of election15/05/1924
Age at election31
ProposerWilliam Hobson Mills; Thomas Martin Lowry; Robertson Robertson; John Theodore Hewitt; James Walker; William Henry Bragg; Alfred Chaston Chapman; William Arthur Bone; Thomas Henry Holland
Jocelyn Field Thorpe; Herbert Brereton Baker; Gilbert Thomas Morgan; William Henry Perkin; Frederick Soddy; James Charles Philip; George Beilby; William Palmer Wynne; Nevil Vincent Sidgwick; William Jackson Pope
RSActivityMedals and prizes:
Davy Medal 1946; Royal Medal 1952
Council: 1938-1940; 1960- 1962
Lectures:
Bakerian 1938
RelationshipsParents: William Kelk Ingold (1861–1898), commercial traveller, and Harriet Walker (1865–1943), daughter of Christopher Newcomb and his wife, Emma.
Spouse: (Edith) Hilda Usherwood (11 July 1923).
Children: Sylvia (1927); Keith (1929); Dilys (1932).
PublishedWorksRCN 19149
RCN 45819
RCN 45820
RCN 19151
RCN 19150
RCN 19152
OtherInfoContributed to the domain of theoretical organic chemistry; the concepts, classifications, and terminology of theoretical organic chemistry, which Ingold introduced and supported, provided a framework of principles that has opened a prospect and a programme for the unlimited unfolding of the theme ‘how organic chemistry works’, and has influenced profoundly the development of chemistry as a whole.
Known for: Organic reaction mechanisms; Cahn–Ingold–Prelog rules; Hughes–Ingold rules; Thorpe-Ingold effect.
Royal Society Obituary or MemoirClick to view (may be contained within a meeting notice, presidential address or list of death notices)
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Image

Ingold C K, GA WS 2532.jpg

SourceSources:
Bulloch's Roll; DNB
Obituaries:
Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society 1972 vol 18 pp 349-411, plate, by Charles W Shoppee
References:
C W Shoppee, 'The Sign of the Electron-Releasing Effect of the Methyl Group' in NR 1983-84 vol 38 p 297
CodeNA7950
Archives associated with this Fellow
RefNoTitleDate
IM/GA/WS/2532Ingold, Sir Christopher Kelk1946
EC/1924/06Ingold, Sir Christopher Kelk: certificate of election to the Royal Society
MS/922/2Lecture notes of Christopher Kelk Ingold1936-1937
NLB/71/579Copy letter from Francis Alexander Towle, Assistant Secretary of the Royal Society; to Prof. [Christopher] Ingold, FRS, the University, Leeds12 July 1928
RR/65/238Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The behaviour of polar molecules in solid paraffin wax' by R W SillarsSeptember 1938
RR/43/120Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The hydration or combined water of gelatin' by T MoranNovember 1931
RR/43/98Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on two papers 'The mechanism of chemical change. Part II.—Catalysis of the mutarotation of beryllium benzoylcamphor' and 'The mechanism of Chemical change. —Part III. mutarotation of Aluminium Benzoylcamphor' by Thomas Martin Lowry and Ralph C TraillApril 1931
RR/45/28Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The condensation of chloral with urea and phenyl urea' by Frederick Daniel Chattaway and Eric John Francis James[October 1931]
RR/71/215Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The electronic structures of carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide' by W Moffitt1948
RR/66/281Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The exchange reactions between deuterium and hydrogen halides. II. Hydrogen bromide' by H Steiner[October 1939]
RR/65/109Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The primary decomposition of ethane, and the reaction between ethane and nitric oxide' by T J Gray, Morris William Travers and F T WhiteMarch 1938
RR/66/146Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'Diamagnetic anisotropy of organic molecules' by Kathleen Yardley Lonsdale[March 1939]
RR/66/259Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'Exchange reactions between deuterium and hydrogen halides. I. Hydrogen chloride' by H Steiner and Eric Keightley Rideal[October 1939]
RR/70/22Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'Kinetics of the base-catalyzed bromination of ethyl cyclopentanone 2-carboxylate' by Ronald Percy Bell and L A Woodward1947
RR/69/213Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The thermochemistry of carbon: valence states, heats of sublimation and energies of linkage' by L H Long and Ronald George Wreyford Norrish 1946
RR/70/196Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The vibration spectrum and molecular configuration of 1:4-dioxane' by Donald Allan Ramsay24 January 1947
RR/71/35Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The catalyzed dehydration of acetaldehyde hydrate, and the effect of structure on the velocity of protolytic reactions' by Ronald Percy Bell and W C E Higginson[1948]
RR/66/223Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'Dielectric loss due to polar molecules in solid paraffin wax' by D R Pelmore[May 1939]
IM/GA/WRS/8403Ingold, Sir Christopher Kelknd
RR/38/107Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The mechanism of chemical change. I.—Promotion and arrest of the mutarotation of tetra-acetylglucose in ethyl acetate' by Thomas Martin Lowry and G Glyn Owen20 April 1928
RR/44/86Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The significance of the differences between the dipole moments of saturated and unsaturated substances' by Leslie Ernest Sutton1 August 1931
RR/45/66Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The condensation of chloral and bromal with substituted ureas' by Frederick Daniel Chattaway and Eric John Francis James[December 1932]
RR/75/282Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'A thermal method of following fast reactions in solutions' by Ronald Percy Bell and J C Clunie31 October 1951
RR/73/92Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'Polarisability and internuclear distance in the hydrogen molecule and molecule-ion' by Ronald Percy Bell and D A Long20 April 1950
RR/75/188Referee's report by Christopher Kelk Ingold, on a paper 'The role of formaldehyde in the oxidation of ethylene' by A J Harding and Ronald George Wreyford Norrish20 August 1951
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