Stephen Charles Triboudet Demainbray (1710 – 20 February 1782) was an English

natural scientist Natural science is one of the branches of science concerned with the description, understanding and prediction of natural phenomena, based on empirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such as peer review and repea ...

and

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either ...

, who was Superintendent (or King's

Astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either ...

) at the

King's Observatory The King's Observatory (called for many years the Kew Observatory) is a Grade I listed building in Richmond, London. Now a private dwelling, it formerly housed an astronomical and terrestrial magnetic observatory founded by King George III. T ...

in Richmond, Surrey (now in London) from 1768 to 1782.

Early life and education

Demainbray was born in the parish of St Martins, London in 1710.Lysons, D.: ''The Environs of London: volume 3: County of Middlesex'', entry
Northall (Northolt)
, pp. 306–319; 1795. Retrieved 18 February 2016. His parents, (Charles) Stephen Demainbray (d.c. 1710) and Mary, daughter of Rev Alexander Descairac, were married on 21 September 1699 at St Mary Magdalen Old Fish Street, London. His father, who had come to

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

from

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

following the revocation of the

Edict of Nantes The Edict of Nantes () was signed in April 1598 by King Henry IV and granted the Calvinist Protestants of France, also known as Huguenots, substantial rights in the nation, which was in essence completely Catholic. In the edict, Henry aimed pr ...

, died soon afterwards and he was brought up by his uncle, Captain Peter Demainbray (d. 1733) who placed him at

Westminster School (God Gives the Increase) , established = Earliest records date from the 14th century, refounded in 1560 , type = Public school Independent day and boarding school , religion = Church of England , head_label = Hea ...

. There he studied under Dr Desaguliers, who taught him mathematics and

natural philosophy Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe. It was dominant before the development of modern science. From the ancient wo ...

. After that he went to the Leiden University.

Career

From 1740 to 1742 Demainbray lectured in experimental philosophy in

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian on the southern shore of t ...

. The 1745 Jacobite Rising brought him to take arms for the government for four years, and he was a volunteer at the

Battle of Prestonpans The Battle of Prestonpans, also known as the Battle of Gladsmuir, was fought on 21 September 1745, near Prestonpans, in East Lothian, the first significant engagement of the Jacobite rising of 1745. Jacobite forces, led by the Stuart exile C ...

. In 1746 he resumed his lectures, and worked on the influence of electricity on vegetables. Three years later, he began travelling throughout Britain and Europe, lecturing in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...

and

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

. In 1753, he was invited to

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

by the Prince of Wales, later

George III George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of the two kingdoms on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great Br ...

, and the Duke of York. He returned to England in 1755 and read a public course of lectures in the concert-room in Panton Street, and later gave private courses to members of the royal family, including the future King

. In 1768, he was appointed Superintendent of the

(or King's

) in Richmond, which King

had commissioned from

Sir William Chambers __NOTOC__ Sir William Chambers (23 February 1723 – 10 March 1796) was a Swedish-Scottish architect, based in London. Among his best-known works are Somerset House, and the pagoda at Kew. Chambers was a founder member of the Royal Academy. Bio ...

. He arranged for George III to see the

Transit of Venus frameless, upright=0.5 A transit of Venus across the Sun takes place when the planet Venus passes directly between the Sun and a superior planet, becoming visible against (and hence obscuring a small portion of) the solar disk. During a tr ...

on 3 June 1769. He held that appointment until his death on 20 February 1782. His assistant there was James Stephen Rigaud, who married Demainbray's daughter Mary in Richmond in 1771.

Personal life

In London on 22 February 1726, in a clandestine marriage, Demainbray married his first wife, Mary Worsham (d. 1755 Montpelier, France) and they had five children. Only their daughter Mary survived to adulthood; she married James Stephen Rigaud. In 1755 he married, at

St Anne's Church, Soho Saint Anne's Church serves in the Church of England the Soho section of London. It was consecrated on 21 March 1686 by Bishop Henry Compton as the parish church of the new civil and ecclesiastical parish of St Anne, created from part of the pari ...

, his second wife, Sarah Horne (a sister of

John Horne Tooke John Horne Tooke (25 June 1736 – 18 March 1812), known as John Horne until 1782 when he added the surname of his friend William Tooke to his own, was an English clergyman, politician, and philologist. Associated with radical proponents of parl ...

), and fathered a further four children including Stephen George Francis Triboudet Demainbray.

Legacy

Demainbray's instruments were combined with the King's collection and given to King's College London and then, in 1927, to 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 ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Demainbray, Stephen Charles Triboudet 1710 births 1782 deaths 18th-century British astronomers 18th-century British scientists British Army personnel of the Jacobite rising of 1745 English people of French descent Leiden University alumni Natural scientists People educated at Westminster School, London People from London