IMPROVEMENTS IN THE PURIFICATION OF GAS ORDINARILY USED IN ILLUMINATING, AND IN THE REDUCTION OF ORES AND SMELTING OF METALS BY MEANS OF SUCH GAS SO PURIFIED
Year: 1863

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to George Bower, of St. Neots, in the County of
Huntingdon, Gas Engineer, and Alexander Dick, of Alfred Street, City
Road, in the County of Middlesex. Chemist, for the Invention of "IM-
Sealed the 2nd November 1863, and dated the 7th May 1863.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said George Bower and
Alexander Dick at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with their
Petition, on the 7th May 1863.
We, GEORGE BOWER, of St. Neots, in the County of Huntingdon, Gas
Engineer, and ALEXANDER DICK, of Alfred Street, City Road, in the County
of Middlesex, Chemist, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE PURIFICATION OF GAS ORDINARILY USED IN ILLUMINATING,
AND IN THE REDUCTION OF ORES AND SMELTING OF METALS BY MEANS OF SUCH GAS
SO PURIFIED," to be as follows :-
This Invention consists in treating ordinarily purified gas or gas in the
state now ordinarily employed for illuminatiug purposes by passing such
gas over or through heated metallic sponge, by which means the gas is
freed or purified from the sulphurous compounds therein.
This Invention further consists in the reduction of ores and smelting of
metals by means of gas which has been passed over or through a metallic
sponge in the manner above described, by which products are obtained of a
greatly superior quality to those obtained by the ordinary processes.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said George Bower and Alexander Dick in the Great Seal Patent
Office on the 6th November 1863.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, GEORGE
Bowen, of St. Neots, in the County of Huntingdon, Gas Engineer, and
ALEXANDER DICK, of Alfred Street, City Road, in the County of Middlesex,
Chemist, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Seventh day of May, in the year of our Lord One
thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, in the twenty-sixth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto us,
the said George Bower and Alexander Dick, Her special license that we, the
said George Bower and Alexander Dick, our executors, administrators, and
assigns, or such others as we, the said George Bower and Alexander Dick, our
executors, administrators, or assigns, should at any time agree with, and
no others, from time to time and all times thereafter during the term therein
expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, excrcise, and vend, within
the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel Islands,
and Isle of Man, an Invention for "IMPROVEMENTS IN THE PURIFICATION OF
GAS ORDINARILY USED IN ILLUMINATING, AND IN THE REDUCTION OF ORES AND SMELTING
OF METALS BY MEANS OF SUCH GAS SO PURIFIED," upon the condition (amongst
others) that we, the said George Bower and Alexander Dick, our executors
or administrators, by an instrument in writing under our hands and seals, or
under the hand and seal of one of us, should particularly describe and
ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same was
to be performed, and cause the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent
Office within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the
said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that we, the said George Bower and Alexander Dick,
do hereby declare the nature of our said Invention, and in what manner
the same is to be performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in
and by the following statement, that is to say :-
Our said Invention consists in the employment of heated iron sponge for
the purpose of decomposing and removing sulphurous compounds which may
be contained in coal gas. The commonly purified coal gas retains small
quantities of sulphurous compounds, particularly of sulphuret of carbon, which
render it unfit to be employed for metallurgical purposes.

page_text: By our Invention all sulphur compounds and impurities are decomposed
and removed by the action of heated metallic iron in a porous state.
In carrying this mode of purification into practice impure or ordinarily
purified coal gas is passed through a heated retort or other vessel containing
rich iron ore or oxide of iron in pieces, the reduction of the orc or oxide to
metallic iron sponge will take place as the gas passes over and through it, and
the sponge thus produced and heated will serve for the decomposition of the
sulphur compounds, forming sulphuret of iron and other combinations of
sulphur with iron.. The gas may be purified or not purified by any of the
usual processes, and the retort or vessel being of any convenient form or shape
may be heated by either setting it in the same furnace as the gas retorts or by
a separate fire. It must be understood that the temperature of the iron sponge
when employed as above may be kept either high or low, according to the
composition of the gas operated upon and the nature of iron ore employed.
Gas manufactured for lighting purposes should undergo the processes
ordinarily employed for purification before being further purified according to
this Invention, whilst gas for metallurgical operations, where the presence of
ammonia, carbonic acid, et cetera, are of no consequence, may or may not
undergo a previous purifying or cleaning process before being employed.
Having now described and particularly ascertained the nature of our said
Invention, and the manner in which the same is or may be used or carried
into effect, we would observe in conclusion that what we consider to be novel
and original, and therefore claim as the Invention secured to us by the herein-
before in part recited Letters Patent, is,―
First, the application and use to and in the smelting of ores and reduction
of metals of gas which has been purified in the manner herein-before described.
Second, the peculiar mode of purifying gas intended to be employed for
metallurgical purposes as herein-before described.
In witness whereof, I, the said George Bower, on behalf of myself
and the said Alexander Dick, have hereunto set my hand and
seal, this Third day of November, One thousand eight hundred and
sixty-three.
GEO. BOWER.
(L.S.