2nd Quarter Astronomer Biography

Astronomer Biography: William Rutter Dawes

William R. Dawes was an English astronomer born on March 19, 1799 in London, England. His father was William Dawes, a Royal Marines officer who was also an astronomer. His father wished him to become a clergyman, but the young Dawes decided he would rather pursue the study of medicine. He worked a country practice in Berkshire, but in 1826 he moved to Liverpool following a death in the family.

            In Liverpool, he was influenced by a minister and experienced a shift in interest from medicine to religion. He took charge of a small congregation in Ormskirk, near Liverpool, and it was in Ormskirk where he built an observatory. As a young boy, Dawes had taken an interest in astronomy, and rekindled this curiosity in his observatory. Taking careful use of a five-foot refractor telescope, Dawes studied and measured binary stars in particular. From 1830 to 1833, he recorded observations of one hundred twenty-one binary stars, which were published in 1835. He published observations of about a hundred more in 1851 from his notes in the period from 1834 to 1839.

            Dawes was beset by poor health throughout his life, and in 1839 he experienced an extreme drop in health, likely affected by the shock of the death of his wife earlier that year. This illness forced him to abandon his pastoral duties, and he moved to London to accept a post at George Bishop’s private observatory as an assistant. George Bishop was a wealthy patron of science at the time, having built an observatory in 1836, and allowed Dawes to continue astronomical work for him until about 1844. Bishop’s observatory included a 7-inch retractor telescope, and Dawes used this to further his study on binary stars. The work he collected during this time was published in Bishop’s Astronomical Observations at South Villa in 1852, and also included the recognition of orbital motion in ∈ Hydrae and of third components of Σ 3022 and y Andromedae.

            In 1842, Dawes remarried, and in 1844 he moved to Kent where, with the help of his new wife’s wealth, he was able to build his own observatory, in which he installed a 6.5-inch refractor telescope. In November of 1850, he “discovered’ the rings of Saturn (not knowing that the rings had been officially discovered by W.C. Bond a mere ten days earlier). Since the news had not crossed the Atlantic yet, Dawes was credited with the co-discovery of this phenomenon. This revelation along with his findings on binary stars induced him to win the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1855.

            In 1857 Dawes relocated to Haddenham, Buckinghamshire where he would spend the rest of his life. Despite his degenerating health, he still continued his observations and gave free medical service to the poor in his town. His health took an even graver dive when his second wife died in 1860. Dawes still continued his observations, and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1865. During the 1864 opposition of Mars, Dawes made abundant drawings, which were later used in 1867 by another English astronomer, Richard Anthony Proctor, to make a map of Mars. Dawes died on February 15, 1868, at the age of 68. “Eagle Eye” Dawes, as he was suitably nicknamed for his extensive observations, left behind a legacy that includes an optical phenomenon named after him, the Dawes limit, as well as craters on the Moon and on Mars and a gap within Saturn’s C Ring, all in his name.