Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1885-09-04

Although the Smithsonian Institution
! and its magnificent annex of the Nationa
Museum at Washington are visited yearly
by many thousands of people, and theil
operations have been extended into every
attainable branch of scientific investiga.
ton, but little is known to the general
public concerning James Smithson, whose
princely bequest endowed and laid the
foundation of this great national estab-
lishment. As matter of fact. however,
the stlictest and most thorough investiga-
ton has failed to elicit much material for
Mr.. Smithson's biography, and what
little has been gathered is far from salts
factory, considering the anomaly for an
Englishman who never visited America,
or, so far as can be ascertained, had any
thing in common with our country and
people, bequeathing the whole of his pro-
perty ''to the United States of America,
to found at Washington, under the name
of the Smithsonian Institution, an estab-
lishment for the increase and diffusion of
knowledge among men,"
According to Mr.. William J. Rhees,
chief clerk and historiographer of the in
stitution, it has not been possible to as
certain the year, date and place of Mr.
Smithson's nativity. Presumably, how
ever, he was born in 1854, and was the
natural son of Hugh Smithson, first Duke
of Northumberland, his mother being
known as Mrs. Elizabeth Macie, of the
Hungerford family, in Wiltshire. Of his
early life nothing is known anterior to
his graduation from Pembroke College in
1876 as flames Lewis Macie," which
name he retained for fourteen wears,
when he assumed that of James Smith
son. He was literally provided for by
his father, the Duke of Northumber-
land
He never married, but, being possessed
OF wealth, which left his action free, he
devoted himself wholly to original re-
search in the field of science. Deprived
by the bar sinister from claiming the
family name and honors, he sought to-
win fame solely on his own merit, al
though he could not refrain from claim
ing the nobility Of his ancestry. This is
evidenced by the following expressive
and prophetic sentence found in one of
his manuscripts:
"The best blood OF England flows IN
my veins; on my fathers side / am a
and on my mothers l
am related to kings; but this avails me
not My name shall live in the memory
Of man when the titles of the Northum-
berlands and the Percys are extinct and
In 1887 he was admitted fellow of the
Royal Society, and took lodgings in Ben
tinck street, the locality famous as the
and Fall of the Roman Empire" His
chambers were the rendezvous of authors,
artists and savants, in whose society he
5ook great delight. For purposes of scien-
life inquiry he eng ed in extensive tours
If Europe, making minute observations
On climate, physical features and the
geological structures of the localities
visited. He was an accomplished chem
st and specially devoted to the science of
These sojourns abroad gave
him cosmopolitan character, illustrated
Dy one of his sayings: The man of
science is of no country; the world is his
country, all mankind his countrymen."
The exemplifcation of this idea is shown
II his own life: Born in England,
most of his life in France and
Germany, dying and being buried in
italy, and bequeathing his name and for
une to the United States of America.
Mr.. Smithson's contributions to scien
ifc literature consist OF twenty-seven
papers, eight OF which were published in
he Philosophical Transactions of the
ROYAL Society,"" from 1871 to 1917, and
nineteen printed in "Thomson's Annals
If Philosophy" from 1919 to 1925. 1t is
he contributed other matter to
scientific and literary journals, but no
race of them has as yet been discovered.
IN one of his essays he divides the sources
If knowledge into: First, observation
second, reasoning; third, information,
md fourth, conjecture. He died at
Genoa, Italy, June 81, 1929, aged rs
years, and was buried in the Protestant
An imposing monument
marks his grave, erected by his nephew
md protege, Henry Hungerford, Esq.
Mr.. Smithson received large estate
rom his half-brother, Colonel Henry
Louis Dickinson (also a natural son of the
Duke of Northumberland) which was
1eld in trust for the benefit of the son of
his son and his mother He was de-
yotedly attached to his nephew, and left
aim his whole fortune. Contingent upon
he death without issue of this young
man, Mr.. Smithson made the remark
able provision for the establishment of
he Smithsonian Institution in the United
States. The will provided that, in case
If the death of the nephew-known
as Henry James Hungerford or Henry
James Dickinson, and later as Baron
Eunice de la Bateet-or of the death of
MS child or children, whether legitimate
Or illegitimate, if any, the entire estate
should pass to the United States for the
named. The income from the
estate was paid to young Hungerford,
who led rowing life in Europe, without
settled habits or occupation, until he
died, at the Royal Hotel in Pisa, Italy, in
1885, under thirty years OF age, never
having married, and leaving no heirs
who. even under the broad provisions of
Mr.. Smithson's will, could inherit this
fortune. His mother, Mrs. Mary Ann
Coates, who had married Frenchman
named Theodore de la Bateet, made
claim to a portion of the income from the
estate, and was allowed all annuity of
some $500. She died in 1861, and the
principal from which this annuity was de-
rived was returned to the United States
in 1864, amounting to $4,000.
The first knowledge of the Smithson
beauest was made known to our govern
ment in 1885, and the facts were laid be-
fore Congress in q message from President
Jackson, who stated he had no authority
to take steps to accept the trust. The
Senate Judiciary ommittee examined
the matter and reported that the United
States could claim the bequest i'll the
British courts as trustee for the purpose