Berthollet

Berthollet, Claude Louis, was born in 1748 in Savoy. Educated as a physician, he abandoned the profession to study chemistry, and rapidly rose to eminence, being a member of the Academy of Sciences, professor at the Normal and Polytechnic schools, and one of the founders of the Institute. The republic employed him together with Monge in making gunpowder and in plundering the art galleries of Europe. He accompanied Bonaparte to Egypt, and was appointed by him a senator in 1805, but this did not prevent his accepting a peerage under the Restoration. Apart from his theories, not always verified, but clearly argued out in his Chemical Statics, he did much to improve the manufacture of steel, soap, and dyes. He discovered chlorate of potash and fulminating silver, and followed up the investigations of Lavoisier and Priestley. He died in 1822.