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Sir,
I must begin my correspondence by expressing my greatest gratitude to you as a most
remarkable Journalist. It is in publications such as your Journal of Natural Philosophy,
Chemistry, and the Arts that I have found immense inspiration. You have taken your duty
wholeheartedly and it is encouraging to observe this great debate concerning the source
of electricity in the Voltaic pile taking place. It is especially pleasing at this time when
the Royal Society seams resolute in stifling differing reasonings.
I am keen to respond to and inform some of your previous contributors of my most
significant development of a completely dry pile. Those of my fellow chemists who do
still pretend in the chemical theory will find my contribution most informative if yet
somewhat uneasy. I have observed this true discovery in action and I see no more fitting
place than your journal to reveal my findings.
It is with my utmost admiration I submit to you Sir, my scientific discovery
Yours truly,
Mr William Grey Duracelle
On the unequivocal production of electricity by mere simple contact
Electricity and this most marvellous debate as to its origin has captivated my life for
more years than I care to remember. What developed as a side interest in my readings and
travels has turned into the sole aim of such activities. It has been a huge honour to have
had the input of many of the finest and highly regarded natural philosophers of our time,
to whom I give most deserved credit. My years of experiments have yielded the true
answer to the question of the source of electricity in Mr Volta’s pile. In two
circumstances I have proven unequivocally that electricity is produced by the mere
contact of two metals between which a completely dry conductor is enclosed.
It is with the works of Professor Alessandro Volta that I must first begin. I was
introduced to the ideas of Volta from a very early age by my Father. He was an
Apothecary by profession but a Chemist by heart. These two men always have been and
shall always remain the biggest influences of my life. Professor Volta is a natural
philosopher of the truest kind. The inventor of the very first electricity-producing pile, he
is a man of strong mind and matter. I did, however, develop a profound desire to learn
more especially about the chemical theory that Volta so profoundly rejected. I also
believed more theories would be in the minds of chemists, I simply had to discover these.
I took leave from my laboratory to travel and broaden my horizons – this travel quickly
became an academic expedition if you will.
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My travels took me to the welcoming parts of the continent. Unlike most chemists I have
been most fortunate in meeting and learning from men of the highest philosophical
calibre. It was on this academic expedition that I came across a rather incomprehensible
article in the little known Journal of the title Riechsangeiger [1]. My translational skills are
far from grand but the writing of this contribution was rather unreadable and to say vague
would be far too polite. However, the science of this man, Johann Wilhelm Ritter, was
like that of which I had never heard before. He had claimed to have built a dry pile
capable of producing electricity from only zinc metal, copper metal and sheep’s leather
free from moisture.
I had to make this dry pile and see this chemistry with my own eyes. My experiment
consisted of constructing three piles, two of the dry nature and one wet Voltaic pile. Each
of the two dry piles were assembled of two types of metal discs, 200 pieces of each
separated by thin layers of leather from the rind of a cow. The structure was of the order:
one disk of metal a, one layer of leather free from moisture, and one disk of metal b. This
order was then repeated as like that of the Voltaic pile. One pile consisted of layers of
zinc and iron metal and the second pile of layers of zinc and gold metal. These structures
were assembled alongside a Voltaic pile of zinc and iron discs separated by parchment
paper soaked in a saline solution.
The results of this experiment were fascinating: all thee piles produced electricity. This
experiment surely in itself proving unequivocally what the most learned of natural
philosophers have always known, that electricity is produced by the mere contact of two
metals alone. Leyden jars were used in the next part of the experiment. They were
charged individually by each of the three piles. It was exhilarating to observe both the
wet and dry piles of the zinc and iron metals charging the Leyden jars to exactly the same
extent. Not only this but the electricity of the two matched each other in terms of shock
size and nature with only the wet pile exhibiting any chemical activity.
There was one distinction made of which those natural philosophers of the chemical
theory will surely concern themselves with. The dry pile of zinc and iron metal took
around 1/3 longer in time to charge the Leyden jar than that of the wet Voltaic kind. This
observation is of lesser consequence to the fact that both charged the jars to the same
degree.
My other secondary observation from my experiment will be of great interest to past
contributors to this Journal. The dry pile of the zinc and gold metal charged the Leyden
jar to at least 1 and a half times the charge that the zinc and iron pile reached. I can assure
readers that this pile gave me quite a more significant shock than I was expecting. I must
commend Mrs. Fairfax Greig from the last instalment, whose contribution on the Theory
of the Hierarchy of Metals was most interesting. I hope her efforts encourage some of my
fellow male chemists to make advancements in this field. I would also like to draw the
attention of Mr Samuel Bell, another one of your contributors, to this point. He referred
in his article that “differing abilities of various metals” may be explained by “differing
chemical reactions.” I urge him to build a dry pile and see for himself, that in no such
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way does a chemical reaction, oxidation or otherwise take place. I encourage him also to
reconsider his view on Mr Wollaston’s suggestion that one metal conducts the electricity
produced by the interaction of the other metal and the fluid. He is clearly misguided by
the dated explanation that Mr Wollaston has pretended. How can this be the case? There
can be no such reaction and conduction when there is not even a fluid present. My results
perfectly disprove yet another suggestion of the chemical theory. Surely the great Mr
Wollaston cannot suggest the metal reacts with dry leather in some kind of dry oxidation
process to produce electricity.
The following days were spent writing up my electricity experiment, an essential part of
being a natural philosopher as most would agree. It was on returning to the wet pile that I
made yet a further discovery. When I connected the “wet” voltaic pile to the Leyden jar,
it successfully passed charge to the jar, albeit to a much lesser extent than that previously.
The importance of such charging was that the “wet” pile had fully dried out over this
period of 8 days and was now totally void of any moisture whatsoever. It would be
impossible for the parchment paper to have retained any of its original solution. What had
started as a Voltaic pile was now a dry pile still capable of producing electricity. This is
yet another further case of a dry pile producing electricity on mere contact of the metals
alone.
This unequivocal production of electricity by mere contact alone must surly quash the
argument of those of the chemical theory. Mr Thomas Busby in the last journal
questioned that no man of science had produced electricity “purely from metals with no
interposing fluid involved.” I have succeeded in this, with not just one but two forms of
the dry pile.
As I have already alluded to, I was once also entertaining the ideas of the chemical
reasoning of the creation of electricity. I now know that the chemical observations of
oxidation and the like are not the cause of this electrical phenomena but simply an effect
of such. The same chemical effects are easily replicated without any kind of electrical
production. By observation of the cases where electricity is produced, one can see that the
electricity serves only to enhance the oxidation process. I understand from the last two
editions of your journal that temperature serves also to produce a similar effect. I have
not had the opportunity to investigate this further as of yet but I commend the work of my
fellow chemists for their observations. It is here where I concur with Professor Volta that
chemical observations such as the evident oxidation of the metals in solution are quite
simply secondary effects. It is with respect that I urge Mr Davy to reconsider or justify in
light of these observations his view that electricity is propagated by a combination of the
contact and chemical process.
I do however agree with Mr Davy on one evident point. It is apparent to me also that the
metal of the discs does have a profound effect on the electricity produced by the pile.
This I argue is due to what I must term a contactability factor intrinsic to each metal type.
Each metal has different properties from metals of another kind. Any man of any
chemical understanding knows that metals become liquid at different temperatures to one
another. I am also aware of the pioneering work of John Dalton on atomic weights of
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metals and other substances. Metals do have many similarities but also significant
differences and I am sure pioneering work of this kind will soon be of great importance in
explaining electrical differences.
It is this pioneering work, for the future of chemistry and natural philosophy that we must
embrace and become more open minded to. Erasmus Darwin claims Volta has an
“unwillingness to advance natural philosophy by adamantly sticking to his theory.”
Thomas Busby also makes clear that “the brilliance of a natural philosopher is wasted on
defending old and outdated theories.” I understand the desire to hold onto one’s original
theory but to do so in ignorance of all other theories is absurd. This is especially true
when evidence such as this dry pile is so evidently contrary to one’s theory. The chemical
theory has become one of such outdated theories. Volta failed to move with the
discoveries but these chemists must now not do the same. I urge my fellow natural
philosophers and chemists to be less obstinate and conservative in their addiction to a
singular theory.
I am confident in my findings that the production of electricity has been unequivocally
shown to be the result of the contact between two metals. There remains much to be
investigated and I am excited at the prospect of getting back to my investigations. I
welcome all learned men of chemistry and natural philosophy to respond to my
contribution. I know this debate shall continue to captivate my attention and I am sure
yours too for much time to come.
Mr William Grey Duracelle
[1]
Volta’s contact tension and the dry pile, p105
Hackmann, Willem