Both of these men were successful chemists who died locally, and both had the distinction of being elected Fellows of the Royal Society.

Baldwin Francis Duppa (1828-1873)

Frank Duppa was the son and heir of Baldwin Francis Duppa of Hollingbourne in Kent a well known landowner and educationalist.  Frank was a cultured man, landowner and justice of the peace.  He was born at Rouen and educated in Rochester and at Hofwyl near Berne.  His father died in 1847 and he inherited his estates but sold them to his uncle and thus became financially independent.  He went up to Queen’s College Cambridge in 1848 but transferred to Trinity Hall the same year.  He became interested in mineralogy but left without taking a degree.  After Cambridge he was admitted to the Middle Temple in November 1850 and became a barrister.  His true interest then appears to have emerged because he entered the Royal College of Chemistry in 1855 becoming a student of Dr August Wilhelm von Hofmann. After leaving the College of Chemistry he worked with William Henry Perkin who had devised a method for creating synthetic perfume and when Perkin retired he set up a private laboratory where he worked with Duppa in the late 1850s and early 1860s creating simulated scents (1). 

Later Duppa was attracted to Bart’s Hospital to learn gas analysis with Edward Frankland, one of the foremost chemists of the day.  Frankland later did most of his work at the Royal Institute of Chemistry and Duppa worked with him there between 1863 and 1867 and “together they laid the foundations for work on the analysis of organic matter and gases dissolved in water, essential for the provision of safe water supplies..they also furthered the work in organic chemistry and organometallic chemistry for which Frankland became famous” (2).  They published a number of papers in the Proceedings of the Royal Society of London and Duppa became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1867.  He was described by Colin Russell in a recent book as “a valued friend (of Frankland) and a brilliant experimental worker”, and his opinion was that “Duppa was surely one of the unsung heroes of organic chemistry” (3). Frank Duppa has also been described as “a pioneer in acetoacetic ester chemistry” (4); so one can see that with his work with Frankland and Perkin, and earlier with Hofmann, he made an important contribution to our very lucrative chemical industry in the mid-Victorian period.

Frank Duppa unfortunately was suffering with TB and eventually retired to live in Kersbrook. He had married in 1869, Adeline Frances Mary Dart, only surviving child of Joseph Henry Dart, of Ringwood, Hants.  Joseph was the eldest son of Joseph Dart of Upper West Terrace (see Joseph Dart page on OVApedia) and his wife’s family connections must have been the reason for their move to Devon.  They had one child, Catherine Mary Duppa, born Sept 1870. Duppa is not listed in the 1871 census and it is likely he was abroad as his doctor had suggested he move to a better climate.  He died on the 10th November 1873 and is buried in East Budleigh churchyard.

In addition to his scientific attainments, he was a man of varied accomplishments, taking a large interest in art, and was a skilled artist.  “He was a kind-hearted, genial man, devoting himself to scientific investigation with an earnestness and single-mindedness altogether unsurpassed.  His manipulative skill and fertility of resource were remarkable, but not less so were his enthusiasm for his integrity as a scientific explorer, as a distinguished amateur man of science” (5).  

1. www.answers.com/topic/william-perkin

2.Technical assistance in the world of London science, 1850–1900,Hannah Gay, Notes and Records of the Royal Society 2008

3.Edward Frankland, Colin A Russell , Cambridge University Press 2003

4.Chemical History, C.A.Russell & G.K.Roberts, RSC Publishing. Cambridge 2006

5.Proceedings of the Chemical Society 1873-74 

Robert Warington (1807 – 1867) 

This account is modified from the Dictionary of National Biography with added additional material. 

Warington’s father was a victualler of ships and Robert was born in Sheerness.  He lived in Portsmouth, Boulogne and other places in his early youth before going to Merchant Taylor’s School in 1818.  In November 1822 he was articled for five years to John Cooper, a lecturer in the medical schools of Aldersgate & Webb streets in London.  Cooper was also a manufacturer of potassium, sodium, iodine and other chemicals.  When London University was opened in 1828 Warington became assistant of Edward Turner the Professor of Chemistry.  He published his first paper in 1831 and on Turner’s recommendation was appointed chemist to Messrs. Truman, Hanbury and Buxton, the brewers, with whom he worked until 1839. 

In 1839 Warington instigated the foundation of the Chemical Society of London (later just called the Chemical Society) and the first meeting was held in 1841 and he was elected honorary secretary, a post he held for 10 years.  In 1842 he was appointed chemical operator and resident director to the Society of Apothecaries, a post he retained until he became ill in 1866.  He was frequently employed as a chemical expert in legal cases.  He continued to research and published work on such diverse topics as the adulteration of tea, glass, distilled water, guano, and on methods of preventing water in aquaria from becoming stagnant.  He was also instrumental in the formation of the Cavendish Society which was set up to facilitate translation and publication of important research in chemistry. 

A major work was the completion of the compilation of the British Pharmacopoeia in 1864 and he was joint editor of the second edition in 1867.  He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1864, and the Royal Society’s catalogue lists 47 papers written by Warington. 

Robert Warington married Elizabeth Jackson in 1836 and they had three children, one of whom was Robert Warington, an agricultural chemist and bacteriologist, who became Professor of Rural Economy at Oxford (1894-97) and who had also been an assistant to William Frankland in the early 1860s and must have known Duppa (see above).  The family were living in accommodation at the Apothecaries Hall in 1851 and 1861 and in 1861 his two sons Robert and George are listed as assistant chemists.  Robert Warington died at Poplar Cottage, Fore Street Hill, Budleigh Salterton on the 17th November 1867.

George Warington succeeded his father at the Apothecaries Hall but soon left to go up to Caius College, Cambridge where he was awarded a scholarship in chemistry and received prizes for moral philosophy and political economy and also became President of the Union.  He wrote two books and took a first in natural science but was forced to return to Budleigh Salterton by lung trouble.  He married Isabella Mann (the daughter of a Thames lighterman) at East Budleigh Church in May 1872 but left for the better climate of South Africa in 1873 where he died in 1874 (6).  His widow Isabella Warington was invited to be the first matron of the Budleigh Salterton Cottage Hospital in 1888 and was highly respected and successful in the post. She accepted no payment during her tenure. After she resigned, she was replaced by Miss Hammick in February 1899 at a salary of £20 per annum (7).

6.  Proceedings of the Chemical Society 1873-74

7. Budleigh Salterton Hospital Minutes

Compiled & Researched by Roger Lendon  © 2009

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