by B. B. Woodward, rev. R. C. Cox
© Oxford University Press 2004 All rights reserved
Moseley, Henry (1801-1872), mathematician and writer on mechanics, was born on 9 July 1801, the son of Dr William Willis Moseley, who kept a large private school at Newcastle under Lyme, and his wife, Margaret Jackson. He was educated at the grammar school in Newcastle under Lyme, and when about fifteen years old he attended a school at Abbeville, France. In 1818 he studied at a naval school in Portsmouth; while there he wrote his first paper, on measuring the depth of the cavities seen on the surface of the moon, which was published in the Philosophical Magazine of that year. In 1821 he was admitted to St John's College, Cambridge, graduating BA, as seventh wrangler, in 1826, and proceeding MA in 1836.
Moseley was ordained deacon in 1827 and priest in 1828, and became curate at West Monkton, near Taunton. There he devoted himself to mathematics and wrote his first book, A Treatise on Hydrostatics (1830). On 20 January 1831 he was appointed professor of natural and experimental philosophy and astronomy at the newly established King's College, London, where he was instrumental in establishing the department of practical science and engineering. He held the post until 12 January 1844, when he was appointed one of the first of her majesty's inspectors of normal schools. He was also chaplain of King's College from 31 October 1831 to 8 November 1833.
On 23 April 1835 Moseley married Harriet, daughter of William Nottidge, of Wandsworth Common, Surrey; they had a son, Henry Nottidge Moseley. As one of the jurors of the International Exhibition of 1851 he came under the notice of the prince consort, and in 1853 he was presented to a residential canonry in Bristol Cathedral; in 1854 he became vicar of Olveston, Gloucestershire, and he was appointed chaplain in ordinary to Queen Victoria in 1855.
Moseley wrote a number of journal articles, chiefly on statics, as well as the article on definite integrals in the Encyclopaedia metropolitana (1837), and a book entitled The Mechanical Principles of Engineering and Architecture (1843), which was reprinted in America for the use of the military school at West Point, and was also translated into German. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in February 1839. He was also a corresponding member of the Institut de France, a member of the Council of Military Education, and vice-president of the Institution of Naval Architects. He received an honorary DCL from Oxford in 1870. He was active in the promotion of working-class education, and an advocate of the development of commercial or middle schools, to be established on a scientific rather than a literary basis. He died at Olveston on 20 January 1872. He was survived by his wife.
B. B. WOODWARD, rev. R. C. COX
Sources
Crockford (1872)
Transactions of the Institution of Naval Architects, 13 (1872), 328-30
Venn, Alum. Cant.
C. Knight, ed., The English cyclopaedia: biography, 6 vols. (1856-8) [suppl. (1872)]
CGPLA Eng. & Wales (1875)
Archives
Hove Central Library, Sussex, letters to William Pole
UCL, letters to Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge
Likenesses
Maull & Polyblank, sepia photograph, RS
Wealth at death
under £25,000: treble probate, 1876, CGPLA Eng. & Wales (1872)
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