Editing Charles Wheatstone (section)

== Life ==
[[File:Plaque to Sir Charles Wheatstones' childhood in Gloucester.jpg|thumb|left|150px|Plaque marking a childhood house in Gloucester]]
Charles Wheatstone was born in [[Barnwood]], Gloucestershire. His father, W. Wheatstone, was a music-seller in the town, who moved to 128 Pall Mall, London, four years later, becoming a teacher of the flute. Charles, the second son, went to a village school, near Gloucester, and afterwards to several institutions in London. One of them was in [[Kennington]], and kept by a Mrs. Castlemaine, who was astonished at his rapid progress. From another he ran away, but was captured at [[Windsor, Berkshire|Windsor]], not far from the theatre of his practical telegraph. As a boy he was very shy and sensitive, liking to retreat into an attic, without any other company than his own thoughts.
[[File:Wheatstone English Concertina.jpg|thumb|right|Wheatstone English [[concertina]]]]
When he was about fourteen years old he was apprenticed to his uncle and namesake, a maker and seller of musical instruments at 436 Strand, London; but he showed little taste for handicraft or business, and loved better to study books. His father encouraged him in this, and finally took him out of the uncle's charge.

At the age of fifteen, Wheatstone translated French poetry, and wrote two songs, one of which was given to his uncle, who published it without knowing it as his nephew's composition. Some lines of his on the [[lyre]] became the motto of an engraving by [[Francesco Bartolozzi|Bartolozzi]]. He often visited an old book-stall in the vicinity of [[Pall Mall, London|Pall Mall]], which was then a dilapidated and unpaved thoroughfare. Most of his pocket-money was spent in purchasing the books which had taken his fancy, whether fairy tales, history, or science.

One day, to the surprise of the bookseller, he coveted a volume on the discoveries of [[Alessandro Volta|Volta]] in electricity, but not having the price, he saved his pennies and secured the volume. It was written in French, and so he was obliged to save again, until he could buy a dictionary. Then he began to read the volume, and, with the help of his elder brother, William, to repeat the experiments described in it, with a home-made battery, in the scullery behind his father's house. In constructing the battery, the boy philosophers ran short of money to procure the requisite copper-plates. They had only a few copper coins left. A happy thought occurred to Charles, who was the leading spirit in these researches, 'We must use the pennies themselves,' said he, and the battery was soon complete.

At Christchurch, [[Marylebone]], on 12 February 1847, Wheatstone was married to Emma West. She was the daughter of a [[Taunton]] tradesman, and of handsome appearance. She died in 1866, leaving a family of five young children to his care. His domestic life was quiet and uneventful.

Though silent and reserved in public, Wheatstone was a clear and voluble talker in private, if taken on his favourite studies, and his small but active person, his plain but intelligent countenance, was full of animation. Sir Henry Taylor tells us that he once observed Wheatstone at an evening party in Oxford earnestly holding forth to [[Henry_John_Temple,_3rd_Viscount_Palmerston|Lord Palmerston]] on the capabilities of his telegraph. 'You don't say so!' exclaimed the statesman. 'I must get you to tell that to the [[Lord Chancellor]].' And so saying, he fastened the electrician on [[Richard_Bethell,_1st_Baron_Westbury|Lord Westbury]], and effected his escape. A reminiscence of this interview may have prompted Palmerston to remark that a time was coming when a minister might be asked in Parliament if war had broken out in India, and would reply, 'Wait a minute; I'll just telegraph to the Governor-General, and let you know.'

[[File:Charles Wheatstone later years.jpg|thumb|left|Wheatstone in later years]]
Wheatstone was knighted in 1868, after his completion of the automatic telegraph.<ref>{{London Gazette| issue=23349 |page=535 | date=4 February 1868}}</ref> He had previously been made a Chevalier of the [[Legion of Honour]]. Some thirty-four distinctions and diplomas of home or foreign societies bore witness to his scientific reputation. Since 1836 he had been a Fellow of the Royal Society, and in 1859 he was elected a foreign member of the [[Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences]], and in 1873 a Foreign Associate of the [[French Academy of Sciences]]. The same year he was awarded the Ampere Medal by the French Society for the Encouragement of National Industry. In 1875 he was created an honorary member of the Institution of Civil Engineers. He was a D.C.L. of Oxford and an LL.D. of Cambridge.

While on a visit to Paris during the autumn of 1875, and engaged in perfecting his receiving instrument for submarine cables, he caught a cold, which produced [[Pneumonia|inflammation of the lungs]], an illness from which he died in Paris, on 19 October 1875 aged 73. A memorial service was held in the Anglican Chapel, Paris, and attended by a deputation of the academy. His remains were taken to his home in Park Crescent, London, (marked by a [[blue plaque]] today) and buried in [[Kensal Green Cemetery]].