Credit: ©The Royal Society
    Image number: RS.13549

    Safety lamp

    Date
    1817
    Creator
    Unknown, Engraver
    Object type
    Library reference
    RCN29807
    Material
    Technique
    Dimensions
    height (print): 209mm
    width (print): 130mm
    Subject
    Content object
    Description
    Three figures showing a design for a Stephenson-type safety lamp for illumination in coal mines. The lamp was intended to prevent a fire-damp explosion being triggered by a naked flame. Figure 1 is the lamp in elevation, open to show the internal glass cylinder. Figure 2 elevation of the lamp enclosed in its carrying case. Figure 3 a detail of the base of the lamp, opened to admit air.

    Plate 1 from the monograph Report upon the claims of Mr. George Stephenson, relative to the invention of his safety lamp…by R.W. Brandling (Newcastle, for Emerson Charnley, etc., 1817).

    Inscribed above: ‘PLATE 1’

    The accompanying text contains testimony by Nicholas Wood, then of Killingworth Colliery: ‘In the year 1815, about or before the month of August, Mr Stephenson communicated with Mr Wood about the construction of a lamp…which could consume the fire-damp without exploding…Mr. Wood was with Mr Stephenson when he ordered the lamp. It was made after a plan made by Mr. Wood, according to Mr. Stephenson’s ideas and direction. This lamp was received from the maker on the 21st of October, and was the same as Fig. 1 plate 1 except in shape…’

    George Stephenson (1781-1848) British colliery and railway engineer, trialled his safety lamps at Killingworth Colliery, North Tyneside, England, in 1815. The lamp was the subject of a dispute over priority of invention with Sir Humphry Davy. Stephenson’s lamp featured perforated plates, rather than the gauze in Davy’s design.

    Nicholas Wood (1795-1865) British civil and mining engineer assisted in George Stephenson’s lamp experiments and suggested design improvements. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1864.
    Associated place
    <The World>
       > Europe
          > United Kingdom
    Powered by CollectionsIndex+/CollectionsOnline