Robert Warington

Robert Warington FRS (7 September 1807 – 17 November 1867) was an English chemist considered the driving force behind the creation of the world's first enduring chemistry society, The Chemical Society of London, which later became the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Born on 7 September 1807 in Sheerness, Kent, he was the third son of Thomas Warington (1773-1843), a ship's victualler and wine merchant, and his wife Esther Elizabeth Eaton (1779-1861). One of his uncles was Thomas Warington (1765-1850), the father-in-law of Admiral William Henry Smyth.

After a childhood spent in Portsmouth, Boulogne, and other places, he entered Merchant Taylors' school in 1818 and in 1822 was articled for five years to John Thomas Cooper, a lecturer in the medical schools of Aldersgate Street and Webb Street, and a manufacturer of potassium, sodium, iodine, and other then rare chemical substances. On the opening of the London University in 1828, later University College, London, he was chosen by Edward Turner, the Professor of Chemistry, as his assistant along with William Gregory. In 1831 he was appointed chemist to the London brewers Truman, Hanbury & Buxton, becoming the first qualified chemist to work for a British brewery. From 1842 (upon Hennell's death) until shortly before his death he was the chemical operator at the Society of Apothecaries.

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