William Hampson

William Hampson (born 14 March 1854 in Bebington, Merseyside (formerly: Cheshire), England – died 1 January 1926 in Holland Park, London, England) was the first person to patent a process for liquifying air.

William Hampson was born on 14 March 1854, the second son of William Hampson of Puddington, Cheshire, England. After graduating from Manchester Grammar School, he won a scholarship to Trinity College at Oxford University, which he entered in October 1874. There he studied classics, graduating with a second class degree. He then joined the Inner Temple in London to qualify as a barrister (trial attorney).

There is no record of Hampson's enrolment in a course of physics or engineering; he therefore seems to have educated himself in science and engineering.

In 1895, Hampson filed a preliminary patent for an apparatus to liquify air. His apparatus was simple: A compressor raised the pressure of a quantity of air to 87–150 atmospheres. The high-pressure air was then passed through cylinders that contained material which removed water and carbon dioxide from the air. The dried air then passed through a copper coil and exited through a nozzle at the end of the coil, which reduced the air's pressure to one atmosphere. After expanding through the nozzle, the air's temperature would drop greatly (due to the Joule-Thomson effect). The cold air then flowed back over the coil, chilling the air that was flowing through the coil. As a result, within 20–25 minutes, the apparatus would begin to produce liquified air. The apparatus typically measured approximately one cubic metre.

Hampson made a preliminary filing for a patent on his liquefaction process on 23 May 1895; Carl von Linde, a German engineer, filed for a similar patent on 5 June 1895.

Hampson's method of liquifying gases was adopted by Brin's Oxygen Company of Westminster, London, England (renamed the "British Oxygen Company" in 1906). In 1905, the company acquired Hampson's three patents on the liquefaction and separation of atmospheric gases.

From Brin's Oxygen Company, which retained Hampson as a consultant, Hampson provided William Ramsay with the liquid air that allowed Ramsay to discover neon, krypton, and xenon, for which Ramsay received the Nobel Prize in chemistry of 1904.

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