IMPROVEMENTS IN TREATING, DEODORIZING, AND DISINFECTING SEWAGE AND OTHER OFFENSIVE MATTER, WHICH SAID IMPROVEMENTS ARE ALSO APPLICABLE TO DEODORIZING AND DISINPECTING IN GENERAL
Year: 1854

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Robert Angus Smith, of Manchester, in the County
of Lancaster, Doctor of Philosophy, and Alexander McDougall, of the
same place, Manufacturing Chemist, for the Invention of "IMPROVEMENTS
IN TREATING, DEODORIZING, AND DISINFECTING SEWAGE AND OTHER OFFENSIVE
MATTER, WHICH SAID IMPROVEMENTS ARE ALSO APPLICABLE TO DEODORIZING AND
DISINPECTING IN GENERAL."
Sealed the 4th April 1854, and dated the 20th January 1854.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Robert Angus Smith and
Alexander McDougall at the Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with
their Petition, on the 20th January 1854.
We, ROBERT ANGUS SMITH, of Manchester, in the County of Lancaster,
Doctor of Philosophy, and ALEXANDER MCDOUGALL, of the same place,
Manufacturing Chemist, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention
for "IMPROVEMENTS IN TREATING, DEODORIZING, AND DISINFECTING SEWAGE AND
OTHER OFFENSIVE MATTER, WHICH SAID IMPROVEMENTS ARE ALSO APPLICABLE TO
DEODORIZING AND DISINFECTING IN GENERAL," to be as follows:-
The substances, &c. to be acted on, are all materials which give out
offensive or injurious exhalations or effluvia, either of sulphuretted hydrogen or
phosphuretted hydrogen, or other organic or inorganic substances, in gases or
effluvia from any source or in any position where they can be treated.

page_text: The substances to be used or employed for the purpose of removing the
offensive or injurious effluvia are sulphurous acid, either alone or in com-
bination. We prefer the combination which sulphurous acid makes with lime
and magnesia or magnesian limestone acted on by sulphurous acid. Next
carbolic acid, either alone or in combination, forming carbolates used either
alone or in conjunction with the sulphurous acid or sulphites before mentioned,
all or either, used either in an acid or alkaline state as may be convenient.
The mode of using these substances is as follows:- Examples. The refuse
of towns will be treated with all or any of the above-mentioned substances or
materials, either in heaps as solid matter or manure, or in the state of sewage
water, however carried off, treating it either in the sewers themselves or in
receptacles made for the sewage water, either in public or private sewers or
receptacles. The offensive smell of bone works, and all works and places where
animal matter becomes offensive, and where injurious or offensive vapours
arise, gas water, for example, may be treated thus; not confining ourselves to
any mode of applying the substance or substances, as it may be found desirable
to act on various stages of the coal or gas during the making, or purifying,
and on various stages of the products of distillation of coal.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Robert Angus Smith and Alexander McDougall in the
Great Seal Patent Office on the 19th July 1854.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, ROBERT
ANGUS SMITHI, of Manchester, in the County of Lancaster, Doctor of Philo-
sophy, and ALEXANDER MCDOUGALL, of the same place, Manufacturing Chemist,
send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Twentieth day of January, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-four, in the seventeenth year of
Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto us,
the said Robert Angus Smith and Alexander McDougall, Her special license
that we, the said Robert Angus Smith and Alexander McDougall, our execu-
tors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as we, the said Robert Angus
Smith and Alexander McDougall, our executors, administrators, and assigns,
should at any time agree with, and no others, from time to time and at all
times thereafter during the term therein expressed, should and lawfully might
make, use, exercise, and yend, within the United Kingdom of Great. Britain

page_text: and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, an Invention for "IM-
PROVEMENTS IN TREATING, DEODORIZING, AND DISINFECTING SEWAGE AND OTHER
OFFENSIVE MATTER, WHICH SAID IMPROVEMENTS ARE ALSO APPLICABLE TO DEODORIZING
AND DISINFECTING IN GENERAL," upon the condition (amongst others) that we,
the said Robert Angus Smith and Alexander McDougall, by an instrument in
writing under our hands and seals, 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 Robert Angus Smith and Alexander
McDougall, 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 objects are the removal of all offensive smells from sewage and other
offensive matter, and the separation or preservation of such parts of the same as
are useful as manure. Offensive smells arise from the evolution of sulphuretted
hydrogen or phosphuretted hydrogen, or other inorganic or organic substances,
gases, or effluvia. We removo such offensive smells by the use of sulphurous
acid, which when brought into contact with the offensive gases causes their
immediate decomposition and consequent destruction of the smell. As it is
more convenient to use the sulphurous acid in combination, we prefer as a base
an alkaline earth, and of such bases we prefer magnesia and lime. It has
been found that magnesia has the property of rapidly separating the two
substances which constitute manure in urine, sewage, and other organic refuse
matters, but it was not used for that purpose because of its inefficiency as a
deodorizer. These substances are phosphoric acid and ammonia, with which
the magnesia combines to form the ammonio-phosphate of magnesia, a scarcely
soluble compound, of great value as a manure, and well known to chemists.
The facts relating to the action of magnesia on substances containing phos-
phoric acid and ammonia have been for some years familiar to chemists, and
therefore we do not claim its use as our Invention in the combinations specified.
It sometimes happens that after the sulphite or sulphurous acid has done its
part in deodorizing, a slight residual smell is perceived, which we remove by
the use of carbolic acid, either in a free state or in combination. When such
substances are to be disinfected, we use a mixture of sulphite of magnesia and
lime, or a mixture of both and carbolate of magnesia and lime, the latter in
very small proportion, which accomplishes the double purpose of removing all
smell and precipitating in a condition most suitable for manure the phos-

page_text: phoric acid and ammonia contained in the substances operated upon. We
propose the use of our preparation in all stables, cowhouses, piggeries, privies,
urinals, ash pits, and other places where organic matter becomes offensive; by
its use the offensive smells will be removed, and the manure preserved and
greatly increased in value. We also propose the use of our preparation in
gas works and other places where it will act in removing sulphuretted hydrogen,
ammonia, and other offensive gases. In the application of our Invention to
the sewage- of a town, if the object be merely the removal of the offensive
smell, it will be sufficient to introduce the preparation into the sewers
through the grids or other openings to the surface, but if it be also desired to
preserve the manure, it will be necessary to provide reservoirs or receptacles
(to be used alternately), in which the sewage may be allowed to stand while
the matters which have been precipitated by the action of the disinfectant
shall have time to subside, when the clear water standing above the deposit
may be allowed to run off. It is desirable to have two or more reservoirs,
that one or more may be receiving the sewage or other matter, while the
precipitated manure is being removed from the other. In some cases it may
be found convenient to have the reservoirs of such area as to secure a very
gentle current, and so permit the deposition to take place without the necessity
of stopping the inlet to allow of subsidence..
Having thus particularly described and set forth our improvements in
treating, deodorizing, and disinfecting sewage and other offensive matter,
which said improvements are also applicable to deodorizing and disinfecting
in general, we desire it to be distinctly understood that we claim the novel
and peculiar treatment above named, and the operation, employment, or use
of the agents or substances so applied in the above-named process or processes,
for the purpose of removing offensive or injurious effluvia.
In witness whereof, we, the said Robert Angus Smith and Alexander
McDougall, have hereunto set our hands and seals, this Seventeenth
day of July, in the year of our Lord One thousand eight hundred and
fifty-four
ROBT ANGUS SMITH. (L.S.)
A. MCDOUGALL.
(L.S.)