AN IN- PROVED METHOD OF PREVENTING. THE PUTREFACTIVE DECOMPOSITION OF VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL SUBSTANCES, AND UTILIZING THE SAME FOR AGRICUL TURAL PURPOSES
Year: 1866

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to James Davis, of 5, Sussex Road, Southsea, in the
County of Southampton, Civil Engineer, for the Invention of "AN IN-
PROVED METHOD OF PREVENTING. THE PUTREFACTIVE DECOMPOSITION OF
VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL SUBSTANCES, AND UTILIZING THE SAME FOR AGRICUL
TURAL PURPOSES."
Sealed the 14th August 1866, and dated the 31st March 1866.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said James Davis at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the
81st March 1866.
I, JAMES DAVIS, of 5, Sussex Road, Southsea, in the County of Southamp-
ton, Civil Engineer,, do hereby declare the nature of the said Invention for
"AN IMPROVED, METHOD OF PREVENTING THE PUTREFACTIVE DECOMPOSITION OP
VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL SUBSTANCES, AND UTILIZING THE SAME FOR AGRICULTURAL
PURPOSES," to be as follows:-
This Invention consists in treating the substances with the savour of salt,
commonly known by the name of chlorine, chloric acid, or hydrochloric acid,
by adding to the substances, either in the liquid or solid form, and whether
lying in a quiet state or running in drains, culverts, cesspools, tanks, urinals,
waterclosets, privies, or any other places in which atmospherical air has
access, a sufficient quantity of the savour to neutralize all the free alkalies
present, and such further portions as may be needful to leave the substances

page_text: slightly acidulous, so as to prevent the substances assuming the putrefactive
character thereafter.
I afterwards utilize the same either by irrigation, allowing the matter to
run on the land in the semi-liquid state, or I permit the substances so treated
to gravitate and subside, and after they have been subjected to the process of
drying I cause them to be thoroughly and completely amalgamated either
with or without the addition of other mamurial substances mixed with them.
I also use the savour absorbed or not by charcoal for the purpose of acting
as a disinfectant. generally.
SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said James Davis in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 21st
September 1866.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE, PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JAMES
DAVIS, of -5, Sussex Road, Southsea, in the County of Southampton, Civil
Engineer, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Thirty-first day of September, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-six, in the twenty-ninth year of Her
reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and grant unto me,
the said James Davis, Her special licence that I, the said James
Davis, my.executors, administrators, and assigns, or such others as I, the
said James Davis, my 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 vend, within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, Australia, New Zealand, the
Canadas, East India, West India Islands, Queensland, Victoria, Gibraltar,
and Malta, an Invention for "AN IMPROVED METHOD OF PREVENTING THE
PUTREFACTIVE DECOMPOSITION OF VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL SUBSTANCES, AND
UTILIZING THE SAME FOR AGRICULTURAL PURPOSES," upon the condition (amongst
others) that I, the said James Davis, my executors or administrators, by
an instrument in writing under my, or their, or one of their 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.

page_text: "
NOW KNOW YE, that I, the said. James Davis, do hereby declare
the nature of my said .Invention, and, in what manner the same is to be
performed, to be particularly described and ascertained in and by the following
statement :..:
My Invention relates to a mode of preventing the putrefactive decomposition
of animal and vegetable substances, and of freeing atmospherical air from
redundency of impure deletereous gases by the application of chlorine, as also
for the conversion of such substances into manures, as herein-after explained.
And in order that my Invention may be fully understood and readily carried
into effect-I will proceed to describe the means to be pursued and which I
have found fully to answer, but before doing so I will premise, my observations
by mentioning a fact which has escaped general observation, namely, that
substances containing amylaceous and nitrogenous, matter in contact with
alkali and the elements of water will when exposed to temperatures ranging
between 53° and 159° Fahrenheit's gradation, undergo spontaneously the slow
process of combustion, in other words, putrefactive decomposition giving off
during the process gases; that are offensive to the sense of smell, and which
either engender disease or confer a fatal character upon that already existing..
Such issues are issues of disruption and waste, no less destructive to health
than. destructive to a due economy of the necessary supplies for the, reproduc-
tion of food for the succour of mankind, and which no recognized plans
hitherto adopted have been able to prevent, but which my Invention is fully
capable of doing.
The principle of my Invention consists in the employment of chlorine or
the savour of salt in any of its known forms brought in contact with the sub-
stantives intended to be acted upon, but that which I prefer as being the
most economical as well as the more readily obtainable is as muriatic or
hydrochloric acid in the concentrated form.in which it is usually found. in
commerce. The savour in this form is capable of preserving all organic sub-
stances for any length of time, and by preventing fermentation in fresh
substances will arrest. decomposition when the articles operated upon have
already undergone a change.
...
The preservation of all organic substances, whether primarily intended to
be used for food, in the arts and manufactures, or ultimately for, agriculture,
by the addition of the savour to prevent their running, into disruption, is there-
form claimed under the present. Patent.
The Invention may be employed,-
1st, by immersing in water containing 5 percent. of the savour, skins of
animals intended to be tanned, dressed, or manufactured into fur; intestines

page_text: of oxen, sheep, pigs, and horses, whether to be employed for the manufacture
of catgut, gold-beaters' skin, or for other purposes; grain and seed of 'all
kinds from which vegetables are to be produced; animals, whole or in parts;
and whether intended for food, dissection, or otherwise'; as also all kinds of
fibrous textures, either in the raw state or manufactured.
2nd, by adding to organic substances deposited in or otherwise running to
waste in drains, culverts, cesspools, tanks, closets, urinals, pipes, . privies,
vessels, or places of any kind or wherever situate, such a portion of the savour
as shall be needful to neutralize all the free alkalies present, and such further
portions as shall cause the acid slightly to predominate, so as to prevent the
assumption of putrid decomposition in such substances thereafter. The sub-
stances so treated may then be submitted to the process of drying, either by
exposure to natural heat and air or by the aid of artificial heat, or they may.
be when freed from the redundency of moisture brought to a portable-con-
dition through being mixed off with a sufficient quantity of bone-dust, soot,
ashes, or a combination of fertilizing substances of any kinds.
"
In the treatment of ordinary town sewage as collected at the outfalls I find
that after first neutralizing the free alkalies therein present, five hogsheads-of
the savour added to a million gallons of the compound is quite sufficient to
keep the organic substances in a perfectly quiet condition and free from dis-
ruption; but as it sometimes happen that excessive-quantities of bone, blood,
and urine abound, substances that engender putrefactive decomposition,
larger quantities of the savour require to be added, and as no positive rule.can
be laid down for universal application, the operator must be left to use-his
own discretion, at the same time he should be apprised of one fact, namely,
that however large the quantity used no evil can accrue therefrom beyond a
slight advance in the money outlay, and which would be more than counter-
balanced by the improved sanitary condition perceptible in the locality.
Moreover, as it would be necessary to add other portions of the savour to the
solid substances after being separated by subsidence or otherwise to prevent
subsequent disruption, the use of the excessive portion as here indicated is
but a gain in time at the sacrifice of place.
The practice I recommend for preventing disruption of sewage substances
is to pass the savour into the lateral sewers, so as to allow it to become
amalgamated with the contents before it reaches the main sewers, because as
no prevention can take place without union; no union can be effectual in its
saving results unless the whole of the decomposable substances be placed
beyond the power of corruption, therefore as no flushing of the mains can

page_text: possibly flush the laterals that lie above their levels. it must be evident that
the starting point should be the laterals, and the pump trough the-fountain
head of action as the householder's only safeguard against corrupted air
vitiating their dwellings..
':
Wherever practicable blood, urine, and alkaline solutions. should be
removed without entering the sewers; the two former, from being rich in
phosphoric acid and nitrogen, are most valuable adjuncts to the manure heap,
but in communion with the latter prove cursed pestilential agents in the
sewers; they will amply repay the cost of treatment and cartage through
adding increased value to the manure heap, beside lessen the danger to
health.
Should it be the object to utilize the sewage the solid substances may be
collected by subsidency, filtration, or otherwise, and after being dried and
mixed off with drying materials, as previously observed, the heap may be
further enriched by the addition of the blood, urine, and alkalies in the above
clause alluded to, and afterwards brought to the condition of a powder
by the further addition of charcoal reduced for the purpose. Here I would
observe that when it is intended to utilize the semi-fluid sewage or the
supernatent water by the irrigation process, that it should, in order to prevent
sterility, be passed over limestone or chalk, in order to free it.from its excess
of non-neutralized 'savour before reaching the land.
3rd, the savour may be employed to saturate charcoal to be used as a dis-
infectant, and for counteracting the escape of ammonical and other gases
from guano and other decomposing substances, also for purifying atmosplierical
air in mines, underground railways, and all other situations, and further for
preventing putridity in putrescible substances of every kind and in every
situation.
Having thus described the nature of my said Invention, and the manner in
which the same is to be performed, I would observe that other portions of
chlorine as well as other absorbants for its distribution may be employed
beside those specified above, also that I do not claim as of
my Invention
any manipulatory process for carrying out the various objects; but what I
claim as of my Invention in the first place is, the absolute use of the savour
in any of its known forms, for the purpose of preventing the putrefactive
decomposition of animal and vegetable substances.
Secondly, the conversion of substances so treated into manures for the uses
of the land.
And, lastly, the use of charcoal as an absorbant and convenient vehicle for

page_text: disseminating the savour, whether applied to the purpose of preventing putre-
factive decomposition or acting as a disinfectant.
.
In witness whereof, I, the said James Davis, have hereunto' set my hand
and seal, this Twenty-first day of September, in the year of our Lord
One thousand eight hundred and sixty-six.'