Credit: © The Royal Society
Image number: RS.10400
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Meteor observed in London
Date
1742
Creator
William Gordon (British) , Naval officer
Object type
Archive reference number
Material
Dimensions
height (drawing): 45mm
width (drawing): 193mm
width (drawing): 193mm
Subject
Description
Four figures showing a meteor seen over London, England. The author noted that “On Friday the 10th of December 1741 about 1 p.m. coming by water from the city to Whitehall and near to Hungerford Stairs, there appear’d to me between Vauxhall & Lambeth a body of fire, it sprung upwards in its ascent all most perpendicular to the horizon to the height ...of 35 degrees, in the space of a few seconds, and nearly in the form of a boy’s Kite, projecting a long tail...”
Figure from the paper “A Letter from Capt. William Gordon to Capt. Samuel Mead, F.R.S., inclosing an account of the Fire-Ball seen Dec. 11 1741”, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, vol. 42 1742-1743, pp.58-60. With a pencilled instruction to the printer: “to be cut in wood.”
William Gordon was not a Fellow of the Royal Society.
Figure from the paper “A Letter from Capt. William Gordon to Capt. Samuel Mead, F.R.S., inclosing an account of the Fire-Ball seen Dec. 11 1741”, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, vol. 42 1742-1743, pp.58-60. With a pencilled instruction to the printer: “to be cut in wood.”
William Gordon was not a Fellow of the Royal Society.
Associated place