​Caroline Herschel:
The First Lady of The Heavens
Profile of a Great Mind
Humans have turned to the heavens with wonder since long before recorded history, yet as recently as 1750, astronomy was still a field very much in its infancy. With an almost boundless vista to study and complexities that are even yet barely glimpsed, stargazers needed a combination of the right tools and a methodical scientific approach to make the progress that their field badly needed. Working tirelessly with her brother, William, German Astronomer Caroline Herschel brought just such a precise and methodical approach to one of science's most exact disciplines. Through steady dedication to stargazing and recording of their observations, the siblings massively expanded humanity's knowledge of the skies and the comets, stars and nebulae within them.
Caroline Herschel' s success, despite the primitive equipment available to her and her lack of any formal astronomy training is testament to her sheer devotion and strength of character. Her great efforts and her strong bond with her brother led them both to make important discoveries- fruits of one of history? s greatest minds- not convinced? Perhaps Lizzie Henry's profile of the lady herself will change your mind and prove that Caroline Herschel really was one of history's Greatest Minds.
Caroline Herschel,
Astronomer.
Born: 16th March 1750
Died: 9th January 1848
Known for:
1 . Co-discovering (with her brother, William) over 2400 astronomical objects over twenty years,
2. Co-discovery (with her brother) of eight comets between 1786 and 1797,
3 . Discovery of the Comet now known as Comet C/1786 P1 (Herschel)
(See Ref 1 and 2 below).
4. The first woman officially recognized in a government position in the UK (as assistant to her brother, on the payroll of King George III),
5. Co-discovered fourteen nebulae and calculated the locations of hundreds more,
6. Began a catalogue of star clusters and nebular patches.
7. Compiled a supplemental catalogue to "Flamsteed's Atlas" ,
which included 561 stars, as well as a comprehensive index to it.
Brief Bio:
Born in Germany as Karoline Lucretia Herschel on March 16, 1750, Herschel was one of the ten children of Anna Ilse Moritzen and Issak Herschel. She grew up in Hanover, the only girl among five surviving children of the military musician Isaak Herschel and his wife Anna Ilse Herschel. The family was very musical, and her older brother, William, eventually moved to England to work as a music teacher and organist. Against the wishes of her mother, who would have preferred her to be a seamstress, Caroline, like her brothers, received musical training and became a concert singer. At the age of 22, Caroline moved with her brother William to train as a singer. In England she sang as a soprano in a number of performances. However, in his mid-30s, William Herschel's interest in astronomy took off and, thereafter, everything else became a lower priority for him. Caroline worked as his assistant, perhaps somewhat reluctantly at first, helping him to polish mirrors while building his own telescope. However, it was not long before Caroline,too, became wholeheartedly devoted to astronomy.
In addition to running the household and her appearances as a singer, Caroline now devoted herself to astronomy; for example she helped Wilhelm produce reflecting telescopes. Her main duty consisted in grinding and polishing the mirrors; a task that required absolute accuracy. Besides such practical activities however, she occupied herself with astronomical theory. She mastered algebra and formulae for calculation and conversion as a basis for observing the stars and measuring astronomical distances. William discovered the planet Uranus in 1781 , and was subsequently knighted and appointed court astronomer to King George III.
Between 1786 and 1797 Caroline too enjoyed success, when she co-discovered eight comets. She worked through entire nights with her brother observing the heavens, noting the positions of the stars as he called them to her from the other end of the giant telescope that they had built themselves. She evaluated the nocturnal notations and recalculated them, wrote treatises for the journal Philosophical Transactions, discovered fourteen nebulae, calculated hundreds more, and began a catalogue for star clusters and nebular patches. In addition she compiled a supplemental catalogue to Flamsteed? s Atlas which included 561 stars, as well as a comprehensive index to it. For this work she was paid the highest tribute by Gauss and Encke, among others. Nonetheless, she remained the (perhaps excessively) modest woman she had always been.
One notable observation came on 21st December 1788, when Caroline observed a comet that was seen later that night by her brother and, subsequently, by astronomers at the Greenwich and Paris Observatories. Orbits for the comet were calculated by other scientists in 1789 and in 1922, but it was not until the comet reappeared, in July 1939, that the object's true path could be ascertained.
​
American Astronomer Leland E. Cunningham linked the July 1939 comet reported by Roger Rigolett with that earlier discovered by Caroline Herschel. In 1974,the final piece of the puzzle fell into place, when US-based British Astronomer Brian G. Marsden used 75 known positions of the comet, from both its apparitions in 1788 and in 1939-40, factored in perturbations by planets and calculated the orbit period of the comet now known as Comet 35P/Herschel?Rigollet as 155 years.
In 1822, a few short weeks after her brother's death, Caroline Herschel returned to her home-city of Hanover, which she had left as a young woman almost fifty years earlier. The world's most important scientists sought her out in her simple house on Marktstraße and she continued her astronomical studies, to verify and confirm William's findings. However, her observations were hampered by the architecture in Hanover and, as she aged, her work was further hampered by her own physical limitations. Thus she spent most of her time there "working on a catalogue of nebulae to assist her nephew John Herschel in his work" (source: Wikipedia).
Caroline Herschel was awarded numerous honors - for example in 1828 the gold medal of the Royal Astronomical Society, of which she was named an honorary member in 1835. In 1838 the Royal Irish Academy of Sciences in Dublin appointed the 88-year-old Caroline Herschel to its number. And in 1846, at the age of 96, she was awarded, on behalf of the King of Prussia, the gold medal of the Prussian Academy of Sciences. None of the comets she discovered was named after her, but a crater of the moon bears the name "C. Herschel" after her; this is small crater approximately 13 and a half km wide on the western part of the moon's Mare Imbrium.
Caroline Herschel died peacefully in Hanover on 9 January 1848. She is buried at 35 Marienstrasse in Hanover at the cemetery of the Gartengemeinde, next to her parents and with a lock of William's hair. Her tombstone inscription reads, "The eyes of her who is glorified here below turned to the starry heavens." With her brother, she discovered over 2400 astronomical objects over twenty years.
Key Articles by Caroline Herschel include:
"An Account of a new comet in a letter from Miss Caroline Herschel to Charles Blagden, M. D. Sec. R.S." , Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond., Vol 77, pages 1 -3 , Pub: 1st Jan 1787, http://rstl.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/77/1
​
More Information Online:
The C. Herschel crater can be found in the moon' s "LQ04 Quadrangle" close to the "Dorsum Heim"
ridge, at 32.0°N 29.8°W. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Herschel_(crater) . Information on the comet 35P/Herschel?R igollet can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/35P/Herschel%E2%80%93R igollet
Information on Caroline Herschel can be found here: http://www.encyclopedia.com/people/science-and-technology/astronomy-biographies/ caroline-lucretia-herschel ,
here:
"The Comets of Caroline Herschel (1750-1848), S leuth of the Skies at Slough" , by Roberta J . M. Olson and Jay M. Pasachoff, Pub: Culture and Cosmos, Vol.16, nos. 1 and 2, 2012, https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1212/1212.0809.pdf
& here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caroline_Herschel
Some of Ms Herschel's letters can be found in this book by her Nephew, John Herschel' s wife (credited as "Mrs John Herschel" ): http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/52923 . Information on Caroline's brother, Frederick William Herschel can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Herschel , whilst information on Caroline's nephew, Sir John Frederick William Herschel can be found here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Herschel
Some information on "The Atlas Coelestis" , also known as "The Celestial Atlas of John Flamsteed" , or, Flamsteed? s Atlas can be found here:
http://publicdomainreview.org/collections/the-celestial-atlas-of-flamsteed-1795/
The full document has been digitized by the National Library of Australia here:
http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-230764841 /view
References/ Other Sources:
1 . "An Account of a new comet in a letter from Miss Caroline Herschel to Charles Blagden, M. D. Sec. R.S." , Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond., Vol 77, pages 1 -3 , Pub: 1st Jan 1787, http://rstl.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/77/1
2. "Learned modesty and the first lady's comet: a commentary on Caroline Herschel (1787) "An account of a new comet"" , by Emily Winterburn, Published Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, Series A, Mathematical and Physical Sciences, 6th March 2015, DOI: 10.1098/rsta.2014.0210, http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/roypta/373 /2039/20140210.full.pdf
3 . "List of Officers for the ensuing year: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society" , Volume 1 , Issue 9, 8th February 1828, Pages 64, Published: 8th February 1828, https://doi.org/10.1093 /mnras/1 .9.64 , https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/1 /9/64/999260
4. Herschel Museum of Astronomy: http://herschelmuseum.org.uk/
Profiles of More Great Minds:
​
Will be added to thegreatestminds.co.uk periodically.
Profiles of Marie Curie and Louis Pasteur, along with a slightly expanded version
of this article can be found in The GreatestMinds Book:
"Marie Curie & the Ibexes" - [Coming to Amazon SOON] .
A Profile of "Carl Linnaeus : Biology's Unlikely Revolutionary"
is available free now [HERE]
​
More from this Author & Illustrator:
​
Can also be found in The GreatestMinds Book "Marie Curie & the Ibexes"
COMING TO AMAZON'S KINDLE STORE SOON.
​
Other Notes:
Images: Produced by V. Neblik for TheGreatestMinds.co.uk using historic images of Caroline Herschel from Wikipedia here- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caroline_Herschel#/media/ File:ETH-BIB-Herschel,_Caroline_(1750-1848)-Portrait-Portr_11026-092-SF.jpg
According to Wikipedia information, accessed November 2017, the image of Caroline Herschel was taken from E-P ics Bildarchiv online http://doi.org/10.3932/ethz-a-000110923ETH-BIBLIOTHEK and is a public domain image from the collection of the ETH-Bibliothek. It was published on Wikimedia Commons as part of a cooperation with Wikimedia CH. Corrections and additional information are welcome., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=59410659
​
​
This article and pictures (c) The Greatest Minds Ltd, London, 2017 & 2018 | All Rights Reserved.
The moral right of Lizzy Henry and Victoria Neblik to be acknowledged as the author and illustrator, respectively, of this article has been asserted by them, in accordance with the Copyrights, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
