Dear Tyndall
Edward Scheutz1 and Mr Gravatt2 breakfast with me tomorrow (Sunday) at 9½ to examine my models3 and also the Calcg machines of Lord Stanhope.4
The Trigonometrical machine of Sir Saml Morland5 has also turned up.
I shall be glad if you can join them
Very Truly Yours | C Babbage
Dorset St | Manchr Sq. W | 21 Feb 1857
RI MS JT/1/B/1
RI MS JT/1/TYP/1/136
Edward Scheutz: Edvard Scheutz (1822–81), a Swedish inventor who with his father George Scheutz (1785–1873) built a difference engine in the 1830s and 1840s based on Babbage’s design. See K. Freeman, ‘Scheutz, George’, in L. Day and I. McNeil (eds), Biographical Dictionary of the History of Technology (London: Routledge, 1996), p. 627.
Mr Gravatt: William Gravatt (1806–66), an English civil engineer and scientific instrument maker, assisted Per George Scheutz in promoting his difference engine in London. D. Greenfield, ‘Gravatt, William’, in P. S. M. Cross-Rudkin, et. al. eds, Biographical Dictionary of Civil Engineers in Great Britain and Ireland, 3 vols (London: Thomas Telford Publishing, 2008), vol. 2 (1830–90), pp. 346–8.
my models: Babbage designed two calculating machines (a difference engine and an analytical engine), but they were too big to build in his lifetime. His design for the analytical engine led to the design of modern computers.
Calcr machines of Lord Stanhope: Charles Stanhope (1753–1816), third Earl Stanhope, a British statesman who studied mathematics and electricity, and invented two calculating machines. He was elected FRS in 1772 (ODNB).
Trigonometrical machine of Sir Saml Morland: Samuel Morland (1625–95), an English mathematician and inventor, built several calculating machines, including one that performed trigonometric functions (ODNB).
Please cite as “Tyndall1341,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on