Sunday, October 04, 2015

Rocket Spaceflight Accurately Described by Scottish-Canadian Scientist in 1861

          By Henry Stewart

William Leitch (ca. 1861). Image c/o The Space Library.
Author and space historian Robert Godwin has released a paper claiming primacy for Ontario in the historical space race.

His research credits the fifth principal of Queens University in Ontario, Presbyterian minister William Leitch (1814-1864), with being the first trained scientist to have applied scientific principles to accurately describe the rocket as the best device for travelling in space.

As outlined in Godwin's paper, "The First Scientific Concept of Rockets for Space Travel," which is available online for subscribers of the Space Library, Leitch first published his description of the principles of rocketry in an Edinburgh journal in 1861 and also included it in his 1862 book "God's Glory in the Heavens."

Previous histories of spaceflight have maintained that the first scientific concept for rocket-powered space travel was envisioned at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky and Robert Goddard, who both claimed Jules Verne as their inspiration.

But Godwin says William Leitch made his suggestion to use rockets four years before even Jules Verne’s famous “space gun.” 

According to Godwin:
There is no doubt in my mind that Leitch deserves a place of honour in the history of spaceflight. 
The fact that he was a scientist is the key to this story. He wasn't just making a wild guess. Not only did he understand Newton's law of action and reaction, he almost dismissively understood that a rocket would work more efficiently in the vacuum of space; a fact that still caused Goddard and others to be subjected to ridicule almost six decades later. 
And whereas Goddard and Tsiolkovsky got their first inspiration from the science fiction of Wells and Verne, Leitch seems to have been inspired by the advances in powerful telescopes, and the newly spin-stabilised military projectiles being manufactured in London, and Isaac Newton...
The first observatory at Queens, which William Leitch established in 1862. The current Queen's Observatory houses a 14-inch reflecting telescope in a dome on the roof of Ellis Hall and is used primarily for student training and public demonstrations. Photo c/o The Space Library.

But Leitch's proposals slipped through the cracks of history because he died at a young age and the copyright to his writings fell victim to the bankruptcy of his publisher in 1878. According to Godwin:
His suggestion to use rockets in space remained in print for over forty years, but his name had been stripped away from the work. The problem was compounded by the title of his book being changed at the last minute to remove all references to astronomy, which led to it languishing for 150 years in the theology section of libraries. 
But it was still in print when Goddard and Tsiolkovsky made their mark on the field. 
Leitch comprehended everything from the catastrophic implications of cometary impacts to the special relationship between light and time. He was a genius...
Leitch studied at the University of Glasgow in the same classroom as William Thomson, the legendary Lord Kelvin, and even assisted Kelvin in an experiment on electricity. In 1859 Leitch was appointed to the post of Principal of Queen's University in Kingston Ontario. He died in Canada in 1864 and is buried near Canada’s first Prime Minister, whom he evidently knew.

According to Godwin, "he was buried on October 4th of that year: a date which has a certain resonance for space historians,” The first Sputnik was launched in 1957, exactly ninety three years after Leitch's burial.

I also wonder what he would have thought of Elon Musk being a graduate of Queens,” Godwin continued, referring to the CEO of SpaceX, the United States’ leading space company.

A monument to Leitch at the Cataraqui Cemetery in Kingston, Ontario. He is buried near Sir John A. MacDonald, Canada's first prime minister. Photo c/o The Space Library.

Having preached in a parish near St Andrews in Scotland, Leitch’s children became early golf enthusiasts. Leitch’s granddaughter was the legendary golfing champion Cecilia Leitch.“William Leitch was an expert on ballistics and the effect of gravity on trajectories. It must have been in the DNA,” Godwin joked.

Critiques and comments on Godwin's paper have been generally favorable. 

Frank Winter. Photo c/o Frank Winter.
In a four page review available online for subscribers of The Space Library, Frank Winter, the former curator of rocketry of the National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution, in Washington, DC., stated:
We can no longer take it for granted that the consistently cited trio of founders of space flight theory---Tsiolkovsky, Goddard, and Oberth---were the only individuals who seriously thought and wrote about the rocket as the most viable means of achieving space flight...
William Leitch is less well known than the first three, but he should now be included in the overall picture, especially since he pre-dated them."
David Baker. Photo BIS.
On studying Godwin's findings David Baker, the editor of the British Interplanetary Society's (BIS) Spaceflight Magazine said:
Rob Godwin has conducted a valuable piece of outstanding research, revealing for the first time how an intellectual mind from the 19th century anticipated the Space Age and explained how rockets could lift mankind to the stars, long before anyone else had defined it, in simple, lucid and scientifically accurate terms.
This work is a landmark addition to the history of rocketry and Godwin is to be complimented for having himself made another important contribution to the genre.
Michael Ciancone. Photo c/o LinkedIn.
In Houston Texas, Michael L. Ciancone, the chair of the American Astronautical Society (AAS) history committee, commented:
This paper by Robert Godwin puts flesh to the bone of William Leitch, a 19th century scientist and theologian who published some thoughts on rocketry that represent one of the earliest known references to the use of rockets for spaceflight. 
These perspectives are valuable because the history of spaceflight is a tapestry of experiences that contains more than the threads representing the big names in rocketry.
Dave Williams. Photo c/o McGill.
And in Toronto, Ontario, Dafydd "Dave" Williams, the retired Canadian astronaut (STS-90 and STS-118), former director of the space and life sciences directorate at the Johnson Space Center and current president and CEO of the Southlake Regional Health Centre called it:
A very impressive piece of research…& very exciting to learn that these principles of spaceflight were postulated & articulated so far before aerodynamic flight, let alone spaceflight."
Godwin's paper is being presented October 8th, 2015 in North Bay, Ontario as part of the annual World Space Week celebrations and is available online for subscribers of The Space Library.

For further information on the Space Library, William Leitch or to download a copy of Robert Godwin's paper about "The First Scientific Concept of Rockets for Space Travel," please contact Hugh Black at HMB Communications.

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  1. Cool! Interested parties can also read his biography here:

  2. FYI A far more comprehensive biography is on the Space Library with all the details about his space writings.

  3. Sadly, this story is incorrect. William Joe Moore was the first to write of rockets in the context of Newton's Third Law. He did it in 1813, half a century before Leitch wrote his book. One can read about this in the OXFORD DICTIONARY OF NATIONAL BIOGRAPHY online for free. One can also find William Leitch's book GOD'S GLORY IN THE HEAVENS on Google, again for free.

    Leitch's book does not say what this story claims it does. Leitch actually describes rocket travel into space as impossible - he disposes of the notion in a paragraph. He goes on to say that, if a comet - which he incorrectly likens to a rocket - "touched" Earth, it could serve as a vehicle for an imaginary trip through the cosmos. I am reminded of Sagan's "spaceship of the imagination" in COSMOS.

    The word "rocket" occurs on pages 4, 5, and 149, of Leitch's book, which is actually an effort to reconcile science & religion, not a treatise on spaceflight. In most instances, the word "rocket" refers to the comet - either Leitch's mistaken belief that a comet is a rocket or the rocket-like appearance of the comet.

    It is not hard to check whether what I write is accurate - simply Google the sources I reference. Oddly enough, The OXFORD DICTIONARY OF NATIONAL BIOGRAPHY cites papers by Frank Winter, one of the endorsers of this claim, when it describes William Joe Moore's contribution to rocketry.


  4. Fascinating and wildly inaccurate summary of Leitch and my paper by the gentleman above. Where to begin? Firstly, yes, William Moore was one of a long line of rocket engineers who understood Newton, including and most importantly Hale and Congreve. None of the above gentlemen suggested using a rocket to travel into space. The fact that Leitch suggested that a rocket was the ONLY vehicle that was known that could go into space and that it would work BETTER in space is the whole point. A fact that Goddard was still being forced to prove 60 years later. Yes Leitch's book is online for free, that's where I found it. That would be the third edition. Post Jules Verne. I traced it back to its source in 1861 which is NOT online although it is substantially the same and is PRE Jules Verne. A fact relevant to the story. Leitch only "disposes" of the rocket in favour of riding on a comet because in his words he didn't want to "torture his imagination" in trying to figure out how to build a rocket powered vehicle. If the gentleman above had bothered to actually read my paper he would find that I also compared Leitch's writings to Cosmos. Leitch does NOT consider a comet to be rocket-like, other than its appearance which the poster would know if he'd actually read Leitch's carefully. He was an astronomer and scientist who lectured on ballistics and specifically spin-stabilized projectiles and knew exactly what a comet's nature was. And no this man was not like Cyrano de Bergerac, a drunken soldier of fortune who sold his stories for beer money before Newton's day, and whose other methods including smearing himself with lard to get to the moon.

    And Leitch's book may well have been trying to reconcile theology and science, Isaac Newton tried to do the same thing. There are over 80 other citations in my paper which were subjected to the scrutiny of Frank H. Winter curator of Rocketry at the Smithsonian and the world's leading expert on this subject. His four page analysis is also on my website. Mr David Baker, editor of Jane's Defense and now editor of BIS Spaceflight magazine and the most cited person in the world on the history of the Rocket also spent two months looking at my assertions. I was then challenged to prove that Leitch actually understood what he was saying by the Chair of the AAS History committee, so I spent three months uncovering Leitch's entire background, which involved four researchers in Scotland and a half dozen in Canada.
    Whatever the point being made above, I will reiterate. As far as we know Leitch is now the earliest TRAINED SCIENTIST who postulated using a rocket for space flight because he knew no normal aircraft would work (in his day that meant balloon) and that it would work better in space. The fact that he cited Newton and Kepler and understood things like the nature of a vacuum on light, sound and ballistics, that he proposed that asteroids could be used as a sort of colony and that if you travelled at light speed, time would slow down, are incidental. This guy didn't become a University Principal because he was a dummy or some second-rate fiction hack. The fact that his book evidently sold over 500,000 copies and stayed in print for 50 years says it all.


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