Rutherford, discoverer of nitrogen

Although the statement that nitrogen was discovered tn 1772 by Daniel Rutherford appears in most histories of chemistry, this Scottish scientist has remained almost unknown to chemists. Nevertheless, the life story and personal character of Dr. Rutherford emerge from the correspondence of his distinguished nephew, Sir Walter Scott, in a most pleasing manner. Both Dr. Rutherford and his father served as physicians to the Scott family, and the great novelist s allusions to them combine admiration, sincere affection, and pardonable family pride. 

Rutherford served as professor of botany at the University of Edinburgh from 1786 to 1819, and was thus contemporary with Joseph Black, Charles Hope, and John Robison. He invented an ingenious maximum and minimum thermometer which is described in many modem textbooks of physics. The tragic circumstances surrounding his sudden death were described by Sir Walter in numerous letters to members of his family. 

In his doctor s thesis Rutherford made a clear distinction between nitrogen and carbon dioxide which most of his contemporaries had failed to observe. Henry Cavendish, however, had made this distinction somewhat earlier, but had failed to publish his results. The names of Priestley and Scheele are also intimately connected with the discovery of nitrogen. 

The correspondence of Sir Walter Scott, his family genealogy, and the ten-volume biography by his son-in-law, J. G. Lockhart, contain frequent allusions to Scott s grandfather, Dr. John Rutherford, one of the founders of the medical school at the University of Edinburgh, and to his uncle, Dr. Daniel Rutherford, who is usually regarded as the discoverer of the element nitrogen. In the genealogy of the Scott family one may read  

By his first wife, Jean Swinton, Professor John Rutherford had a son, John, who died young, and a daughter Anne, who married0 Walter Scott, writer to the Signet, and became the mother of Sir Walter Scott Bart. He married, secondly, on the 9th August, 1743, Anne M Kay, by whom he had five sons and three daughters.. . . Daniel Rutherford, second son of Professor John Rufcher- 

---

Daniel Rutherford, 1749-1819, Scottish physician, botanist, and chemist. Discoverer of nitrogen. Professor of botany at Edinburgh, President of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. 

Nov. 3, 1749 Don Antonio de Ulloa describes platinum. Birth of Daniel Rutherford, the discoverer of nitrogen, at Edinburgh. 

Rutherford must be regarded as an independent discoverer of nitrogen but he did not give it a distinctive name and regarded it as common air charged with phlogiston. 

Rutherford, Daniel (1749-1819) Scottish chemist who was one of the discoverers of nitrogen gas. 

Although not known as early as carbon, tin, and lead, the Group 5A elements were all discovered before the founding of the United States. Antimony was known to the ancients and was a protected secret of the alchemists. Similarly, arsenic is mentioned in the mystical literature of alchemy, but its discovery is often attributed to Albertus Magnus because of his definitive descriptions of the element. Phosphorus was isolated by Brandt from human urine for a century before it was discovered in bones and in phosphate rock. Bismuth was probably known well before GeoflFrey described it so thoroughly, but he is usually listed as its discoverer. Nitrogen was discovered by Rutherford. 

---