Douglas Denon Heath (1811–1897) was an English barrister and judge, known also as a literary editor, classical scholar and writer on physics.

Life

The second son of George Heath,

serjeant-at-law A Serjeant-at-Law (SL), commonly known simply as a Serjeant, was a member of an order of barristers at the English and Irish Bar. The position of Serjeant-at-Law (''servientes ad legem''), or Sergeant-Counter, was centuries old; there are writ ...

and son of

James Heath James Heath may refer to: * James Heath (historian) (1629–1664), English royalist historian * James Heath (engraver) (1757–1834), English engraver * James P. Heath (1777–1854), U.S. congressman from Maryland * James E. Heath (active since 18 ...

the engraver, and his wife, Anne Raymond Dunbar, he was born in Chancery Lane, London, on 6 January 1811, younger brother of John Moore Heath, and the older brother of

Dunbar Isidore Heath Dunbar Isidore Heath (3 March 1816, in London – 27 May 1888) was an English clergyman prosecuted for heresy in 1861; he was a Cambridge Apostle. Life Dunbar Heath was the third son of George Heath, serjeant-at-law. He was educated at Trinity C ...

, and Leopold Heath. After school at Greenwich, he spent most of 1826-7 with friends of his father's in France, including his godfather

Vivant Denon Dominique Vivant, Baron Denon (4 January 1747 – 27 April 1825) was a French artist, writer, diplomat, author, and archaeologist. Denon was a diplomat for France under Louis XV and Louis XVI. He was appointed as the first Director of the Louvre ...

. He went into residence at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by Henry VIII, King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge ...

, in October 1828, and read for a year with

Henry Malden Henry Malden (1800–1876) was a prominent British academic. Life He was the son of Jonas Malden, a Putney surgeon. Malden attended Preston's School and was a scholar at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he obtained a B.A. in 1822 and an M.A. ...

. Among his Cambridge friends was

James Spedding James Spedding (28 June 1808 – 9 March 1881) was an English author, chiefly known as the editor of the works of Francis Bacon. Life He was born in Cumberland, the younger son of a country squire, and was educated at Bury St Edmunds and Trinity ...

, with whom he visited

William Wordsworth William Wordsworth (7 April 177023 April 1850) was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication ''Lyrical Ballads'' (1798). Wordsworth's ' ...

and Alfred Tennyson. Heath obtained a scholarship at Trinity on 23 April 1830, and two years later graduated

senior wrangler The Senior Frog Wrangler is the top mathematics undergraduate at the University of Cambridge in England, a position which has been described as "the greatest intellectual achievement attainable in Britain." Specifically, it is the person who a ...

, and took the first

Smith's prize The Smith's Prize was the name of each of two prizes awarded annually to two research students in mathematics and theoretical physics at the University of Cambridge from 1769. Following the reorganization in 1998, they are now awarded under the n ...

. In the classical tripos of the same year (1832) he was placed ninth in the first class, in a strong year. He was elected to a Trinity fellowship on 2 October 1832. Heath entered the

Inner Temple The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple, commonly known as the Inner Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court and is a professional associations for barristers and judges. To be called to the Bar and practise as a barrister in England and Wal ...

, and was

called to the bar The call to the bar is a legal term of art in most common law jurisdictions where persons must be qualified to be allowed to argue in court on behalf of another party and are then said to have been "called to the bar" or to have received "call to ...

in 1835. In 1838 his father gained him the reversion of his own post as county clerk of

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a Historic counties of England, historic county in South East England, southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the Ceremonial counties of ...

. In 1846 the courts of the county clerk were abolished; Heath declined to retire on full salary, and took on the work of a county court judge in the Bloomsbury district. On his father's death in 1852, Heath became owner of Kitlands, a small estate near Leith Hill, Surrey. He resided there, and Tennyson, Spedding, and

William Hepworth Thompson William Hepworth Thompson (27 March 18101 October 1886) was an English classical scholar and Master of Trinity College, Cambridge. Early life Thompson was born at York and was privately educated in Buckinghamshire before entering Trinity Co ...

visited.

Marianne North Marianne North (24 October 1830 – 30 August 1890) was a prolific English Victorian biologist and botanical artist, notable for her plant and landscape paintings, her extensive foreign travels, her writings, her plant discoveries and the ...

painted at Kitlands for the collection at

Kew Gardens Kew Gardens is a botanical garden, botanic garden in southwest London that houses the "largest and most diverse botany, botanical and mycology, mycological collections in the world". Founded in 1840, from the exotic garden at Kew Park, its li ...

. Heath was one of the founders and benefactors of the Surrey county school at Cranleigh. He died unmarried at Kitlands on 25 September 1897, and was buried in Coldharbour churchyard. One of the early

Cambridge Apostles The Cambridge Apostles (also known as ''Conversazione Society'') is an intellectual society at the University of Cambridge founded in 1820 by George Tomlinson, a Cambridge student who became the first Bishop of Gibraltar.W. C. Lubenow, ''The Ca ...

, he was the last survivor of that group.

Works

For Spedding, Heath edited the legal remains of Bacon for the seventh volume of the major edition of the ''Works of Francis Bacon'' (1859, ed. Spedding, Ellis, and Heath). The several manuscripts of Bacon's professional writings were carefully collated, and many passages for the first time made intelligible. After retiring from the law, Heath wrote papers on ''Secular Local Changes in the Sea Level'' and the ''Dynamical Theory of Deep Sea Tides and the Effects of Tidal Friction'' ('' Philosophical Magazine'' March 1866 and March 1867). In 1874 he published ''An Elementary Exposition of the Doctrine of Energy'', on the

conservation of energy In physics and chemistry, the law of conservation of energy states that the total energy of an isolated system remains constant; it is said to be ''conserved'' over time. This law, first proposed and tested by Émilie du Châtelet, means th ...

. Heath defended of

Aristotle Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of phil ...

against what he saw as misconceptions by

George Grote George Grote (; 17 November 1794 – 18 June 1871) was an English political radical and classical historian. He is now best known for his major work, the voluminous ''History of Greece''. Early life George Grote was born at Clay Hill near Be ...

and others. He wrote on the ''Arabicus Mons'', and on the ''

Cratylus Cratylus ( ; grc, Κρατύλος, ''Kratylos'') was an ancient Athenian philosopher from the mid-late 5th century BCE, known mostly through his portrayal in Plato's dialogue '' Cratylus''. He was a radical proponent of Heraclitean philosophy ...

'' of

Plato Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...

. He also published papers on the veracity of

Herodotus Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus, part of the Persian Empire (now Bodrum, Turkey) and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria ( Italy). He is known f ...

, and his views were strengthened by a journey up the

River Nile The Nile, , Bohairic , lg, Kiira , Nobiin: Áman Dawū is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa and has historically been considered the longest rive ...

as far as

Dongola Dongola ( ar, دنقلا, Dunqulā), also spelled ''Dunqulah'', is the capital of the state of Northern Sudan, on the banks of the Nile, and a former Latin Catholic bishopric (14th century). It should not be confused with Old Dongola, an ancien ...

in 1874-5.

Notes

;Attribution

External links

* *
Douglas Denon Heath page on the family history website of JJ Heath-Caldwell
{{DEFAULTSORT:Heath, Douglas Denon 1811 births 1897 deaths English barristers 19th-century English judges Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge County Court judges (England and Wales)