William Dittmar

Prof William Dittmar FRS FRSE LLD (1833–1892) was a German-born scientist renowned as a chemical analyst. He was based largely in Britain. He did much analytical work on the findings from the Challenger expedition.

He was the first to confirm the Principle of Constant Proportions, a theory first conjectured in 1865 by Johan Georg Forchhammer regarding the major ions of sea-water: that whilst salinity varied across the oceans, the ratios of ionic abundance remained constant. As a result the Principle is often called "Dittmar's Principle" or "Forchhammer's Principle". His research also included calculations of the atomic weight of platinum.

He was born in Umstadt near Darmstadt in western Germany on 14/15 April 1833, the son of Fritz Dittmar an Assessor at Umstadt. In 1848 he was apprenticed as a pharmacist at the Hof Apotheker in Darmstadt.

In 1857 went to work in the illustrious Bunsen laboratory in Heidelberg, and his focussed changed to chemical analysis. Here he met Henry Enfield Roscoe who brought him back to Britain with him to work as his assistant at Owen's College in Manchester, Roscoe then being Professor of Chemistry there. In 1861 he received a post as Chief Laboratory Assistant in the Chemistry Department of Edinburgh University and stayed there until 1869.

In 1863 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, his Proposer being Lyon Playfair, 1st Baron Playfair. He served as a Counillor to the Society 1868-9. In 1882 he was also elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of London.

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