Items in the History of Science Museum, Oxford

Items in the History of Science Museum, Oxford

Items from Buxton Collection
Inventory Number: 94229

https://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/collections/imu-search-page-simple/results/?TitCollectionGroup_tab=Buxton Collection&querytype=field&thumbnails=on

Glass Dome for Parts of Difference Engine, by Charles Babbage

Loose Components of Parts for First Difference Engine

Parts of First Difference Engine, by Charles Babbage,

MSS Buxton

Manuscripts collected by Harry Wilmot Buxton (1805-1880), lawyer and scientific amateur, chiefly papers of Charles Babbage (1791-1871), mathematician and inventor, 1817-69; also some papers of John Lee (1783-1866), lawyer, antiquary, and astronomer, and of Sir John Ross (1777-1856), navigator and explorer; together with a few papers of Buxton himself, and later items, mostly relating to Babbage

Presented by Miss E. M. Buxton in 1994; initially deposited on loan by the Executors of the late Dr L. H. Dudley Buxton in 1939

summary list

1          Bound collection of papers and correspondence of John Lee (originally John Fiott), mostly re his early continental travel, 1814-66; preceded by Buxton’s biographical memoir of Lee

2          Bound collection of papers and correspondence of Sir John Ross, mostly personal, but also re his plans for the relief of Sir John Franklin, 1813-56 [one of the Franklin papers is bound in MS Buxton 1]

3          Transcriptions [by Buxton] of three writings by Charles Babbage: ‘The science of Number reduced to Mechanism’ (unfinished), an untitled account of the conception and early development of the difference engine (original 1822), and ‘On the mathematical powers of the Calculating Engine’ (original 1837)

4          Bound collection of printed papers by and belonging to Charles Babbage, chiefly privately-printed pamphlets and reprinted articles re the Scheutz calculating machine, the difference engine, Babbage’s mechanical notation, and the analytical engine, their original dates 1822-56; prefaced by a printed ‘List of Mr. Babbage’s Printed Papers’, [c.1864]

5          Printed pamphlet Sir H[arris] Nicolas, Statement of the Circumstances Respecting Mr. Babbage’s Calculating Engines, 1843

6          Printed pamphlet Charles Babbage, A Chapter on Street Nuisances, 3rd edition, 1864

7          Bound collection of MS writings by Charles Babbage, mainly re his calculating engines, 1822-69, including: ‘On the mathematical powers of the Calculating Engine’, 1837, ‘Of the Analytical Engine’, 1869, ‘Skeleton of Principles and Grammar of Mechanical Notation’, 1844-50, ‘Sketch of the principles of the Analytical Engine’, 1841, ‘The Analytical Engine’, 1869, and an untitled account of the conception and early development of ‘my calculating engine’ [the difference engine], 1822

8          Transcriptions [by Buxton] of various notes and unfinished writings by Babbage [mostly from originals in preceding]

9          Charles Babbage, ‘The Science of Number reduced to Mechanism’, [1839] (unfinished); early notes and drawings on the difference engine, beginning with the heading ‘Engine for table of differences’, [1821-22]

10-11   Corrected galley-proofs of Charles Babbage, Passages from the Life of a Philosopher, [published 1864], and miscellaneous notes

12        Further corrected galley-proofs of same, together with miscellaneous Babbage papers, including transcriptions of letters from Sir James South, J. F. W. Herschel, and E. Ryan, (originals 1826), and draft or copy of letter from Babbage to [Sir William Fairbairn], 1855

13        Charles Babbage, ‘The History of the Origin and Progress of the Calculus of Functions during the years 1809 1810 …….. 1817’, a narrative of the early mathematical discussions and correspondence of his Cambridge circle of friends, especially in the Analytical Society (founded 1812) and then after leaving Cambridge, including transcriptions of correspondence with Edward F. Bromhead, J. F. W. Herschel, W. H. Maule, and others

14        Calculation tables for loads at various prices, n.d.

15        Three books of tables calculated and printed on Scheutz machines, 1857, 1859, and 1862

16-17   MS of Buxton’s ‘Memoir of the life and labours of the late Charles Babbage Esq F.R.S. …’, [1870s, unpublished until 1988]

18        Offprint of L. H. Dudley Buxton, “Charles Babbage and his Difference Engines”, from Transactions of the Newcomen Society, 1933-34 (paper given 1933)

19        Correspondence about Babbage, and about the deposit of the Buxton collection in the Museum, 1934-39

[A Babbage letter of uncertain provenance is MS Gunther 57. The Museum’s other Lee papers are part of the Gunther collection, MSS Gunther 9-10, 16, 23, 35, 36-38, 39-41, 53, 92. Babbage’s technical notebooks and engineering drawings are in the Science Museum, London]