Oswald J. Silberrad (1878 – 17 June 1960) was a British chemist who specialised in

explosives An explosive (or explosive material) is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An expl ...

, the related field of dye stuffs, and metallurgy.

Life and works

Silberrad was born at

Buckhurst Hill Buckhurst Hill is an affluent suburban town in the Epping Forest district of Essex, England. It is part of the Greater London Urban Area and adjacent to the northern boundary of the London Borough of Redbridge. The area developed following the o ...

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...

and was the younger brother of the writer Una Lucy Silberrad. He studied

chemistry Chemistry is the science, scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a natural science that covers the Chemical element, elements that make up matter to the chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules and ions ...

at the City and Guilds Technical College. From 1898 to 1900 he attended the

University of Würzburg The Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg (also referred to as the University of Würzburg, in German ''Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg'') is a public research university in Würzburg, Germany. The University of Würzburg is one of ...

. On leaving Würzburg he worked at various positions until he joined the United Kingdom Government Explosives Committee. This committee had been set up after the

Boer War The Second Boer War ( af, Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, the Anglo–Boer War, or the South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer Republics (the Sou ...

to investigate the shortcomings of British explosives. In 1901, at the age of 23, Silberrad was appointed chemist to the committee. Later he took the position as head of the committee’s research institute at

Woolwich Woolwich () is a district in southeast London, England, within the Royal Borough of Greenwich. The district's location on the River Thames led to its status as an important naval, military and industrial area; a role that was maintained throu ...

. One of his contributions was to bring

TNT Trinitrotoluene (), more commonly known as TNT, more specifically 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, and by its preferred IUPAC name 2-methyl-1,3,5-trinitrobenzene, is a chemical compound with the formula C6H2(NO2)3CH3. TNT is occasionally used as a reagen ...

into use as an

explosive An explosive (or explosive material) is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An expl ...

for Royal Navy ordnance, thus following a practice that was already well known in Germany. In 1906 he left the institute, and in 1907 founded the Silberrad Research Laboratories, first at 22 Stag Lane,

, and later moved to

Loughton Loughton () is a town and civil parish in the Epping Forest District of Essex. Part of the metropolitan and urban area of London, the town borders Chingford, Waltham Abbey, Theydon Bois, Chigwell and Buckhurst Hill, and is northeast of Chari ...

, where he had a special laboratory block added to his new house. As a consulting chemist, he mainly focused on the study of explosives. He also developed a new

alloy An alloy is a mixture of chemical elements of which at least one is a metal. Unlike chemical compounds with metallic bases, an alloy will retain all the properties of a metal in the resulting material, such as electrical conductivity, ductility, ...

, solving the problem of the erosion of warships'

bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals, such as phosphorus, or metalloids such ...

propellers. In 1921 he campaigned unsuccessfully for a position at the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

. Silberrad is buried at the parish church in

. His home, Dryad's Hall, became that of barrister John Silberrad, and, on his death, was sold out of the family in 2005. The Silberrad Archive, consisting of 176 boxes, is part of the

Science Museum A science museum is a museum devoted primarily to science. Older science museums tended to concentrate on static displays of objects related to natural history, paleontology, geology, industry and industrial machinery, etc. Modern trends in mu ...

Collections, contains collection of papers relating to the work of Silberrad and the Silberrad Research Laboratories. The Archive includes personal and financial records, correspondence, patent material and reports relating to chemical research generally and to explosives and dyes in particular. Research and cataloguing by National Cataloguing Unit for the Archives of Contemporary Scientists (NCUACS) the extent and the range of Silberrad's work over more than fifty years fully appreciated. References * National Cataloguing Unit for the Archives of Contemporary Scientists. ''Oswald Silberrad''. University of Bath

* Sharp, Robert."Oswald Silberrad: The Work of a Forgotten Chemist". ''Ambix'' (50/3) 2003:302-309.

External links

University of BathImage of Dr Oswald John Silberrad in his library, Loughton, Essex, 1947.Oxford Biography Index entry Oswald SilberradArchive of industrial chemist- Oswald Silberrad, Science Museum Collections
British chemists 1878 births 1960 deaths People from Buckhurst Hill People from Loughton {{UK-chemist-stub