Thomas Richardson (chemist)

Thomas Richardson FRS FRSE MRIA AICE (1816–1867) was an English industrial chemist, and industrial historian.

Born on 8 October 1816 in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, he was educated there. Around 1830 he went to Glasgow University, to study Chemistry under Prof Thomas Thomson. Richardson then went to the University of Giessen, where, under Prof Justus von Liebig, he carried out researches on the composition of coal and the use of lead chromate in organic analysis, gaining a doctorate (Ph.D). He later went to Paris with Thomson, and completed his studies under Jules Pelouze.

On his return to Newcastle, Richardson became a specialist in manufacturing chemistry, taking out a number of patents for processes. In 1840 he began, at Blaydon, near Newcastle, to remove the impurities, consisting chiefly of antimony, from "hard" lead, and thus to convert it into "soft" lead, by means of a current of air driven over the molten metal; the impurities were oxidised, floated to the surface, and were then skimmed off. Practical improvements introduced into the process by George Burnett soon after led to the annual importation of several thousand tons of Spanish hard lead into the Tyne district, where it was purified. John Percy brought forward evidence that Richardson was not the inventor of this process, quoting a letter from James Leathart, and stating that a patent for it was granted to Walter Hall in 1814.

In 1844 Richardson began at Blaydon the manufacture of superphosphates, as suggested by Liebig, and already begun in 1842 in the south of England, by John Lawes. In 1848 he patented a method for condensing "lead-fume" by means of steam, originally suggested by Richard Watson. In the winter session of 1848 he became lecturer on chemistry in the Newcastle school of medicine and surgery. After the temporary disruption of the school in 1851, he joined the school continued by the majority of the lecturers, which became connected in the same year with the University of Durham.

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