Edward Frankland award received Fellow of the Royal Society
Biography
Edward Frankland was born in Catterall, Lancashire and baptised at Churchtown, Lancashire on 20 February 1825. As his baptismal record shows, his birth was illegitimate. His natural father was Edward Chaddock Gorst, the father of John Eldon Gorst. His mother, Margaret "Peggy" Frankland, later married William Helm, a Lancaster cabinet-maker.  "His illegitimacy cast a shadow over all his life since he was pledged to silence as to the identity of his natural father, although a handsome annuity was paid to his mother".From age 3 to 8 Edward lived and was educated in Manchester, Churchtown,: 1  Salford: 3  and Claughton.: 5  In 1833, the family moved to Lancaster: 6  and he attended the private school of James Wallasey, where he first took an interest in chemistry, in particular, reading the work of Joseph Priestley borrowed from the Mechanics Institute Library.: 7 At age 12, Edward moved to the Lancaster Free Grammar School: 11  (later Lancaster Royal Grammar School), that had also educated scientists William Whewell and Sir Richard Owen.
According to Frankland himself, his interest in chemistry was furthered by a case held in the court of Lancaster Castle, which was adjacent to the Free Grammar School (then located on Castle Hill, Lancaster). It was an action brought by the Corporation of Liverpool against Mr. Muspratt for committing a nuisance by allowing muriatic acid gas (HCl) to escape from his chemical works in Liverpool. "I was already much interested in chemistry, my step-father allowed me to stay away from school in order to attend the trial": 17 
Frankland wished to become a doctor, but the cost of training was "absolutely prohibitive". So the only entrance for him was "the back door of a druggist's shop": 21 In 1840, Edward was indentured by his step-father, William Helm as an apprentice to Stephen Ross, a Lancaster pharmacist. and his duties included "mortar and pestle work", pounding and mixing large quantities of chemicals to create medicinal preparations such as ointments.: 24–28 During the latter part of his six-year apprenticeship, Frankland also attended the Lancaster Mechanics' Institute (later to become The Storey, attending classes in a makeshift cottage laboratory made available to local apprentices and other young men by a local doctor, James Johnson.: 124–125  Others in that youthful circle were the scientific writer Robert Galloway (also apprenticed to Ross) and the anatomist William Turner.: 127 
With support and encouragement from Johnson, Frankland acquired, in 1845, a place in the Westminster laboratory of  Lyon Playfair, 1st Baron Playfair. Whilst there, Frankland attended Playfair's lecture course; at the end of it he passed the examination—the only written one he ever sat.In summer 1847 Frankland visited Germany and met some of Playfair's chemistry contacts there, including Robert Bunsen. In August 1847, Frankland accepted a post as science-master at a boarding school (Queenwood College) in Hampshire, but the following summer he opted to return to Germany to be a full-time student at the University of Marburg. Robert Bunsen was an influential teacher at Marburg at the time, and Bunsen's reputation was one of the main attractions for Frankland. The following year Frankland accepted an invitation to move to Justus von Liebig's laboratory at Giessen. By this stage, Frankland already had his own research agenda and had published some original research in chemistry.
In January 1850, Lyon Playfair revealed his intention to resign from his professorship at Putney College for Civil Engineers in London and arrange to have Frankland become his successor. Hence Frankland abruptly terminated his studies in Germany and returned to take up Playfair's former position in England. A year later Frankland became professor of chemistry at a newly established school now known as the University of Manchester. In 1857, he became lecturer in chemistry at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, and, in 1863, professor of chemistry at the Royal Institution, London. For two decades Frankland also had a teaching role at the Royal School of Mines in London; and he taught briefly (from 1859 to 1861) at the Royal India Military College at Addiscombe, Surrey.Edward Frankland was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1853. He was awarded the Society's Royal Medal in 1857 and its Copley Medal in 1894 and was also a member of the X Club. He was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in 1897.Edward Frankland became engaged to Sophie Fick, sister of physiologist Adolf Eugen Fick, from Kassel in October 1849. They had first met on Frankland's 1847 trip. They married on 27 February 1851 at St Martin-in-the-Fields. After Sophie's death from tuberculosis in 1874, in 1875 Edward Frankland married Ellen Frances Grenside. He died in Golaa, a village in the Gudbrand Valley whilst on a holiday in Norway. His body was returned to Britain and he was buried near his home in Reigate, Surrey.: 508 His son Percy Frankland was also a noted chemist and a Fellow of the Royal Society.Frankland's papers are held at the John Rylands Library, Manchester.
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