Abstract
John Couch Adams was one of the leading mathematical astronomers in the country and at a very young age (27 in 1846) and a junior Fellow in his college, was a pivotal figure in the hotly disputed discovery of Neptune. Born within one of the more remote areas of England, Cornwall, the region of his birth and his Cornish upbringing were fundamental in understanding the circumstances which would frame his life. His parents were tenant farmers living through a period of decline in rural England and the family income had to stretch to accommodate a burgeoning large family. During his early years Adams attended a local village school, where it was quickly evident that he had mathematical talent. Bookish in nature, he outstripped his tutors’ abilities and was sent to a family run school in Plymouth to further his education during his teenage years. It was clear to the family and close acquaintances that Adams should attend Cambridge University, the leading centre for mathematical studies in Britain and that in itself held challenges due to the expense involved. The large and impecunious family drew together and unstintingly utilised every possible source of income they could to invest in his future by making Cambridge possible for him.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Correspondence to or from John Couch Adams is from – AM: Adams family papers, Cornwall Record Office, Kresen Kernow, Redruth.
Adams, J.C., 1851. On the Total Eclipse of the Sun, 28 July 1851, as seen at Frederiksvaern. Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society. Vol. xxi. (1852).
Adams, G., 1892. ‘Reminiscences of our Family’ reprinted in H. M. Harrison, Voyager in Time and Space: The Life of John Couch Adams, Cambridge Astronomer. (Lewes, Sussex: The book Guild, 1994).
Baily, F., 1836. On a remarkable phenomenon that occurs in total and annular eclipses of the Sun. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 4, Issue 2, 9 December 1836, Pages 15–19.
Boase, H. S., 1832. Contributions towards a knowledge of the geology of Cornwall. Transactions of the Royal Geological Society Cornwall, 1832, vol. 4, p. 233.
Clerke, A.M., 1901. John Couch Adams. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press.
Callaway, E., 2015. UK mapped out by genetic ancestry, Nature. March 2015.17136.
De Maurier, Daphne, (1936) The Jamaica Inn. Gollancz, UK.
Duchy of Cornwall Act, (1844) UK Government Legislation, http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/Vict/7-8/65/contents (accessed 2019).
English, H., 1826. A compendium of information relating to companies formed for working British mines. London.
Harrison, H.M., 1994. Voyager in Time and Space. The Life of John Couch Adams, Cambridge Astronomer. The Book Guild, Sussex, England. p. 11.
Hutchins, R., 2004. John Couch Adams. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press.
Kennett, C., 2017. An 18th-century astronomical hub in west Cornwall, The Antiquarian Astronomer, Issue 11, June 2017.
Kennett, C., 2015. An astronomer’s summer outing to the Lizard, Cornwall, 1769, The Antiquarian Astronomer, issue 9, July 2015.
Lease of Badharlick Estate 19 Aug 1889. Conditions for leasing on a yearly tenancy. Cornwall Records Office catalogue number DD AM44.
Moseley, B., (2016) Old Devonport: Devonport Mechanics Institute. http://www.olddevonport.uk/Mechanics%20Institute.htm (accessed 2019).
Naylor, S., (2002) The field, the museum and the lecture hall: the spaces of natural history in Victorian Cornwall. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers NS 27 494–513 2002.
Robbins, A., 1883. Launceston Past and Present. Published by Walter Wershell.
Sheen, B., 2013. Neptune: towards understanding how Adams’s upbringing enabled him to predict, then miss the discovery of the century. The Antiquarian Astronomer. Issue 7, p. 71–81.
Parshall, K. H., 2006. James Joseph Sylvester: Life and Work in Letters. Johns Hopkins University Press.
Pearse, J., c1860. reprinted from the recollections of the Pearse’s and the Pethybridge’s of Devon and Cornwall in the 19th Century. Unpublished and in Sheen, B. private collection. With the kind permission of the authors Cecilia Jevons and Christopher Knight.
Vernon, K., 2004. Universities and the State in England, 1850–1939. Woburn Education Series. pp. 14–15.
Warwick, A., 2003. Masters of Theory: Cambridge and the Rise of Mathematical Physics. University of Chicago Press, 2nd Ed, p 87.
Will of Grace Couch, 26 Jun 1820. Cornwall Records Office catalogue number DD AM180.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the owners of Lidcott Farm for their support and access to the manganese mine on Laneast Downs. Descendant Norma Foster has been very generous with her time and discussions over her family knowledge of the Couch Adamses. The authors also thank Dr. Maarten Roos of Lightcurve Films for a still from his online film “Searching for Neptune”, the Curator and Staff of St Lawrence House Museum, the Librarians past and present of the Royal Astronomical Society (Peter Hingley and Sian Prosser), the Librarians of St John’s College, (Kathryn Mckee, Adam Crothers and Fiona Colbert) and Mark Hurn Librarian of the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge. The author, Brian Sheen appeciated the conversations he had with Les Sleep, the Laneast descendent of Richard Sleep, John Couch Adams’s first teacher. Finally, many thanks go to all those who have supported us in so many ways over many years; Richard Baum, Allan Chapman, Cliff Cunningham, Roger Hutchins, Davor Krajnović, James Lequeux, William Sheehan, Robert W. Smith, Trudy E. Bell, Kenneth Young, and Craig B. Waff.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Sheen, B., Kennett, C. (2021). John Couch Adams: From Cornwall to Cambridge. In: Sheehan, W., Bell, T.E., Kennett, C., Smith, R. (eds) Neptune: From Grand Discovery to a World Revealed. Historical & Cultural Astronomy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54218-4_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54218-4_3
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-54217-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-54218-4
eBook Packages: Physics and AstronomyPhysics and Astronomy (R0)