Gas lighting is the process of burning piped natural gas or coal gas for illumination. Before the economicalization of electricity for general public use, it was the most popular means of lighting in cities and suburbs. Early gas lights had to be lit manually but soon gas lightings could light themselves.

History

What a striking contrast between the appearance of the brilliantly illuminated streets at this time, compared with the days of Henry V. It is recorded, that in 1417, Sir Henry Barton, mayor of London, ordained 'lanterns with lights to bee hanged out on the winter evenings between Hallowtide and Candlemasse.' Paris was first lighted by an order issued in 1524; and in the beginning of the sixteenth century, the streets being infested with robbers, the inhabitants were ordered to keep lights burning in the windows of all such houses as fronted the streets. In 1668, when some regulations were made for improving the streets of London, the inhabitants were reminded to hang out their lanterns at the usual time; and in 1690 an order was issued to hang out a light, or lamp, every night as soon as it was dark, from Michaelmas to Christmas. By an act of the common council in 1716, all housekeepers, whose houses fronted any street, lane, or passage, were required to hang out, every dark night, one or more lights, to burn from six to eleven o'clock, under the penalty of one shilling. In 1736, the lord mayor and common council applied to parliament for an act to enable them to erect lamps; and in 1744 they obtained farther powers for lighting the city. Birmingham was first lighted by lamps in 1733, so that in this improvement it preceded the metropolis.

It may not be disagreeable to our readers to trace the brilliant lights by which the streets are illuminated, from the obscure recesses of nature, and to show by what steps that which was once thought simply an object of curiosity, has been applied to a practical purpose of the most useful and agreeable kind.

The inflammable gases were known originally for their direful effects rather than their useful qualities. Miners were acquainted with two of them, called the choke damp and the fire damp, long before the establishment of the Royal Society; but the earliest printed account of either occurs in its Transactions, in the year 1667. The paper in which it is contained, is entitled, "A Description of a Well and Earth in Lancashire taking Fire, by a Candle approaching to it. Imparted by Thomas Shirley, Esq an eye-witness."

Dr. Stephen Hales was the first person who procured an elastic fluid from the actual distillation of coal. His experiments with this object are related in the first volume of his Vegetable Statics, published in 1726. From the distillation of "one hundred and fifty-eight grains of Newcastle coal, he states that he obtained one hundred and eighty cubic inches of air, which weighed fifty-one grains, being nearly one third of the whole." The inflammability of the fluid he thus produced was no part of his inquiry; and though it is now deemed its most useful and important property, appears to have excited no attention till several years after.

In the "Philosophical Transactions" for 1733, some properties of coal-gas are detailed in a paper called, "An Account of the Damp Air in a Coal-pit of Sir James Lowther, sunk within Twenty Yards of the Sea." This paper, as it contains some striking facts relating to the inflammability and other properties of coal gas, is deserving of particular attention.

The principal properties of coal-gas are here related with remarkable minuteness and precision; and as the writer exhibited them to different members of the Royal Society, and showed that after keeping the gas sometime, it still retained its elasticity and inflammability, it is remarkable, that the philosophers of the time undertook no experiments with the view of applying it to useful purposes.

Dr. John Clayton, in an extract from a letter in the "Philosophical Transactions" for 1735, calls gas the "spirit" of coal; and came to a knowledge of its inflammability by an accident. This "spirit" chanced to catch fire, by coming in contact with a candle, as it was escaping from a fracture in one of his distillatory vessels. By preserving the gas in bladders, he frequently diverted his friends, by exhibiting its inflammability. This is the nearest approach to the idea of practically applying this property.

The subject attracted the attention of Dr. Richard Watson, who published the results of his researches in the second volume of his "Chemical Essays." He dwells upon the elasticity and inflammability of coal-gas; and remarked, that it retains these properties after passing through a great quantity of water.

The man who first applied the inflammability of gas to the purposes of illumination, was Mr. Murdoch. This gentleman, residing at Soho, near Birmingham, that hot-bed of ingenuity and mechanical science, on occasion of the celebration of the peace of 1802, covered the works of Soho with a light and splendour that astonished and delighted all the population of the surrounding country. Mr. Murdoch had not attained to this perfection without having had many difficulties to encounter. In the year 1792, he used coal gas for lighting his house and offices, at Redruth, in Cornwall; and in 1797 he again made a similar use of it at Old Cunnock, in Ayrshire. At Soho, he constructed an apparatus which enabled him to exhibit his plan on a larger scale than any he had heretofore attempted. His experiments were then seduously continued, with the able assistance of Mr. Southern and Mr. Henry Creighton, with a view to ascertain not only the best modes of making, but also of purifying and burning gas, so as to prevent either the smell or the smoke from being offensive.

Previous to the public display made of the illuminating properties of gas, at Soho, it had been applied to similar purposes, by a M. Le Bon, of Paris. A friend of the gentlemen at Soho, wrote from Paris a letter, dated November 8, 1801, to that establishment, informing them, that a person had lighted up his house and gardens with the gas obtained from wood and coal, and had it in contemplation to light up the city of Paris. This is an important fact in the detail of the history of gas-lighting; and we should be glad of further information respecting the steps which led M. Le Bon to the results which he appears to have obtained, and also respecting the fortunes which subsequently attended the invention in France. However, M. Le Bon's exhibitions have a remarkable connexion with the progress of the invention in England: they seem, indeed, almost to have diverted it from its natural course, which certainly would have led from the illumination at Soho to its public adoption.

In 1804, Dr. Henry delivered a course of lectures on chemistry, at Manchester, in which he showed the mode of producing gas from coal, and the facility and advantage of its use. Dr, Henry analyzed the composition and investigated the properties of carburetted hydrogen gas. His experiments were numerous and accurate, and made upon a variety of substances; and having obtained the gas from wood, peat, different kinds of coal, oil, wax, &c. he endeavoured to estimate the relative quantity of light yielded by each.

In 1805, Mr. Samuel Clegg, to whom the world is much indebted for the improvements he subsequently introduced into the manufacture of gas, having left Soho, directed his attention to the construction of gas apparatus. The first he erected was in the cotton mill of Mr. H Lodge, near Halifax, in Yorkshire. Mr. Josiah Pemberton, one of those ingenious men happily not rare in the centre of our manufactures, whose minds are perpetually employed on the improvement of mechanical contrivances, and who, as soon as they have accomplished one discovery, leave others to reap the benefit, and themselves pursue the chase alter new inventions, had for some time been experimenting on the nature of gas. A resident of Birmingham, his attention was probably roused by the exhibition at Soho; and such was the fertility of his invention, and his practical skill as a mechanic, that it has been observed by those who know him, that he never undertook to make an article without inventing an improvement in its construction. About 1806, he exhibited gas-lights in a variety of forms, and with great brilliance, at the front of his manufactory in Birmingham.

In 1808 he constructed an apparatus, applicable to several uses, for Mr. Benjamin Cooke, a manufacturer of brass tubes, gilt toys, and other articles. In 1808, Mr. Murdoch communicated to the Royal Society a very interesting account of his successful application of coal gas to lighting the extensive establishment of Messrs. Phillips and Lea. For this communication, Count Rumford's gold medal was presented to him. Mr. Murdoch's statements threw great light on the comparative advantage of gas and candles, and contained much useful information on the expenses of production and management.

Early in 1809, Mr. Samuel Clegg communicated to the Society of Arts his plan of an apparatus for lighting manufactories with gas, for which he received a silver medal. In this year also, Mr. Clegg erected a gas apparatus in Mr. Harris's manufactory at Coventry.

It was natural to suppose that all these circumstances should eventually produce an impression on the country; consequently about this time much attention was excited towards gas-lighting, and much utility anticipated from a general application of it to public purposes. In this year 1809, accordingly, the first application was made to parliament for an act to incorporate a company, with the view of carrying on its processes more effectually and beneficially. The movers in this project were some of the more intelligent and persevering subscribers to a New Light and Heat Company, projected by Mr. Winsor. They were opposed by some on the ground of their designs being visionary and fraught with danger; and by Mr. Murdoch on the plea of priority of invention, which entitled him to exclusive privileges if he chose to avail himself of them. This gave rise to a long and minute investigation of the subject before a committee of the House of Commons. The application terminated unsuccessfully; and the testimony of Mr. Aceum, exposed him to the animadversions of Mr. Brougham. In 1810, however, the application was renewed by the same parties, and though some opposition was encountered, and considerable expense incurred, the bill passed, but not without great alterations; and the London and Westminster Chartered Gas-Light and Coke Company was established. The proceedings of this company after the act was obtained comprise a most important period in the history of this invention. During the first few years of their operations large sums of money were expended in experiments, and very few beneficial results were obtained. The undertaking was complicated and difficult, and not only required the guidance of experience, but the assistance of a scientific education and a fertile invention. These requisites were found in the person of Mr. Samuel Clegg, under whose able direction and superintendence the principal works of the company, at their different stations, were erected. From this period various improvements were gradually introduced into almost every part of the apparatus. In 1816, Mr. Clegg obtained the patent for his horizontal rotative retort; his apparatus for purifying coal gas with cream of lime; for his rotative gas meter; and self-acting governor; and altogether by his exertions the London and Westminster Company's affairs assumed a new and flattering aspect.

For reasons which are not assigned, in 1817, Mr. Clegg retired from the service of this establishment.

In this year, 1817, at the three stations belonging to the Chartered Gas Company, twenty-five chaldron of coal were daily carbonized, producing 300,000 cubic feet of gas, which was equal to the supply of 75,000 Argand lamps, each yielding the light of six candles. At the City Gas Works, in Dorset-street, Black-friars, the quantity of coal daily carbonized amounted to, three chaldron, which afforded a quantity of gas adequate to the supply of 1,500 Argand lamps; so that twenty-eight chaldron of coal were daily carbonized at that time, and 76,500 lights supplied by those two companies only.

At this period the principal object of attention in the manufacture of gas was its purification. Mr. D. Wilson, of Dublin, took out a patent for purifying coal gas by means of the chemical action of ammoniacal gas. Another plan was devised by Mr. Reuben Phillips, of Exeter, who obtained a patent for the purification of coal gas by the use of dry lime. Mr. G. Holworthy, in 1818, took out a patent for a method of purifying it by causing the gas, in a highly-condensed state, to pass through iron retorts heated to a dark red. For this object and several others, having in view improvements upon the ordinary method, many other patents were procured.

Oil gas now appeared in the field as a rival of coal gas. In 1815, Mr. John Taylor had obtained a patent for an apparatus for the decomposition of oil and other animal substances; but the circumstance which more particularly attracted the public attention to be directed to oil gas was the erection of the patent apparatus at Apothecary's Hall, by Messrs. Taylors and Martineau; and the way was prepared for an application to parliament for the establishment of an Oil Gas Company by sundry papers in journals, and by the recommendations of Sir William Congreve, who had been employed by the Secretary of State to inspect the state of the gas manufactories in the metropolis. This application, made in the year 1825, proved unfortunate.

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Gaslight is also the name of several movies. The verb, "to gaslight", or "gaslighting", following the premise of the movie, has come down to us as any attempt by one or more people to subtly convince someone else that they are losing their grasp on reality, through physical trickery or mind games, in order to gain some advantage over them.