The thing that set the Observatory apart, of course,
was the people. With a staff of over 200 during its heyday, it was the unique mix of
skills and personalities that made the place what it was and enabled it to enjoy a
world-wide reputation for excellence.
But how did an establishment, known as the Royal Greenwich
Observatory, come to be situated in 380 acres of Sussex countryside just outside a village
with a decidedly French-sounding name?
***
When the Royal Observatory had been founded in 1675, Greenwich had been a
village in open countryside, several miles outside London. With the growth of the capital,
however, the area became urbanised and gradually deteriorated as an observational site.
Smoke from factories and houses, along with mercury vapour street
lighting, meant that by the end of the second world war, the only option was for the
Admiralty, which in those days was responsible for the running of the Observatory, to
re-locate it.
After what are described as ‘extensive investigations’, Herstmonceux
in Sussex, ten miles north of the resort of Eastbourne, was selected as its
new home. Because of the importance of the establishment, and the fame of
Greenwich, it was re-named the Royal Greenwich Observatory, Herstmonceux. To those who
worked there and their colleagues in the astronomical community around the globe, it
became known simply as ‘the RGO’.
In retrospect the site now seems an odd choice. In the past three
decades virtually all new observatories have been sited on mountain tops, where the
‘seeing’ qualities are excellent and the number of clear nights per year is far
greater than at lower levels. By contrast, Herstmonceux is nearly at sea level and lies
adjacent to marshland, the mists from which sometimes made observing a problem. Even so,
it probably enjoys more clear nights than any other site in the UK.
***
Whatever the site may have lacked from a climatic point of view, it
more than made up for aesthetically. The 15th century brick castle,
nestling between two gentle hills, provided the perfect environment for the astronomers
and their colleagues.
Herstmonceux
Castle was one of the first large brick buildings in the country. The name is derived
from the Saxon word ‘herste’ meaning ‘a clearing in the woods’ and by
which name both the manor and the family which lived there was known. A marriage between
the de Herst and the de Monceux families in the twelfth century gave us the present name
of Herstmonceux.
Originally constructed in 1441, the castle fell into decay and the
interior was gutted in 1777. The ruins became a popular attraction until acquired by
Colonel Lowther who began the reconstruction and renovation of the interior in 1911. The
castle later passed into the hands of Sir Paul Latham who completed the restoration. Once
purchased by the Admiralty, it became the home for the Observatory’s library,
refectory, offices, the director’s residence and provided accommodation for
astronomers and visitors.
***
Before we go any further, perhaps it is useful to look briefly at what the
Observatory’s role was in those days. Its original purpose had been to map
the heavens in order to improve navigation at sea. Over the years, this work on pure
positional astronomy had led to investigations into the nature of objects such as stars
and galaxies themselves, spawning the science of astrophysics.
Positional work still played an important part of
course, with the annual publication of the Nautical, Air and Star Almanacs by the Nautical
Almanc Office (NAO). These were published in collaboration with the United States Naval
Observatory for use by astronomers, navigators and surveyors. Information included daily
positions of the Sun, Moon, planets and natural satellites. The NAO was also responsible
for supplying astronomical data for civil and legal purposes.
Other aspects of the Observatory’s work included investigating the
earth’s magnetic field, determining the rotation of the earth and the measurement of
time.
Greenwich Mean Time was, and still is, known the world over and it was
the RGO’s responsibility to provide a national time service and to
generate the familiar six ‘pips’ which were then broadcast by the BBC. It was
because of this connection with time keeping that the Ministry of Defence’s
Chronometer Department, responsible for the servicing and repair of Naval
chronometers and RAF navigator’s watches, was also attached to the Observatory.
The many departments, in turn, were supported by mechanical, electrical
and electronic workshops and laboratories, a drawing office and the usual administrative
services that any large organisation requires. So the work of the RGO encompassed a number
of different disciplines, each of which had to be accommodated at Herstmonceux.
***
The move from Greenwich was not achieved overnight, of
course. In fact it took ten years, mainly due to the post-war shortages of manpower,
building equipment and an initial lack of local housing for the staff. A group of Nissan
huts provided temporary accommodation and the Astronomer Royal, Sir Harold Spencer
Jones, moved into the Castle in 1948. No significant building work started until
1953 and it wasn’t until 1957 that the scientific staff left Greenwich and started
work in offices within the castle.
During the war many of the departments had been evacuated from the
capital, including the Time Department and the office of the Astronomer Royal, which were
at Abinger, in Surrey, the Chronometer Department, which went to Bradford, and the
Nautical Almanac Office, which was in Bath. Gradually the different departments and their
staff transferred to Sussex and the establishment became whole again.
In addition to the facilities in the castle, a purpose-built block,
known as the West Building was constructed to house the Nautical Almanac Office,
the Time Department, the computer installation, and various other
offices, workshops and laboratories. On the east side of the estate, on higher ground than
the castle, the Equatorial Group of Telescopes was built.
Named after the ‘equatorial’ type of mounting that each of
the telescopes utilised, this complex consisted of six domes, three of which were linked
by a large building which housed photographic dark rooms, optical laboratories and an
aluminising plant for the telescope’s mirrors. The other three domes were accessed by
raised walkways and the whole complex was situated within an enclosure with flint-knapped
walls and a large ornamental pond.
***
The reason this strange edifice had been constructed was the concern by
the locals as to the impact on the environment the arrival of the Observatory was going to
have. When the first small dome was erected to house the solar telescope, local residents
expressed their dismay at this strange building. The outcry led to a severe delay in the
design and construction of the Equatorial Group. The Fine Arts Commission was called in to
give its views and the result was an attractive, but in some ways impractical, enclosure.
The architect had a difficult task: he was expected to construct six
large domes for the telescopes, together with all necessary servicing facilities,
and to make the resulting construction elegant and attractive. This he did very
successfully but the night observers who subsequently worked in it would have preferred
simpler designs more suited to their professional needs.
For example, one of the domes had its entrance only a few yards from
the ornamental pond, and directly facing it. The story goes that one student, tired after
a long night’s observing, stepped out of the dome and failed to turn left or right,
with the inevitable result.
It was also at the Commission’s suggestion, that each of
the domes was clad in copper so that, with the passage of time, they would
gradually turn green and "blend in with the Sussex countryside".
Once the design had been settled, work was able to progress and the
buildings were completed around 1956. The telescopes which had previously been at
Greenwich, and which had been removed from their domes for safety during the war, were
carefully installed in their new homes and by 1957 most of them were operational again.
The telescopes contained within the Equatorial Group were the Thompson
30-inch reflector, the Yapp 36-inch reflector, the Astrographic 13-inch refractor, the
Thompson 26-inch refractor and the ‘Great Equatorial’ 28-inch refractor. A
Schmidt camera was planned for the sixth dome but this was never installed.
***
To the north of the castle lay the Spencer Jones Group of
Meridian instruments. These consisted of the Photographic Zenith Tube (PZT) which
was used for time determination and for measuring latitude variation; the Danjon
Astrolabe, also used for time and latitude determination; and the Cooke Reversible Transit
Circle, used for determining star positions and planetary positions and motions.
Located between the castle and the West Building, the Solar
Dome housed the Newbegin 6¼-inch refractor, the Photoheliograph and an
underground Spectrohelioscope.
Extensive plantations around the estate helped reduce atmospheric
turbulence while the woods and castle moat provided a habitat for a variety of wildlife.
Also within the grounds were a cricket pitch, tennis court, swimming pool and a clubhouse,
the latter built by the staff and including a licensed bar. The cricket pitch, in
particular, saw good use during the time when Sir Richard Woolley, an
ardent player, was the Astronomer Royal. At one match, the RGO took on, and beat, a World
XI, consisting of internationally renown astronomers, most of whom had apparently only
learned the rules of the game a few hours beforehand.
Woolley had taken over as Astronomer Royal from Spencer Jones in 1956.
His intention was to build up the observatory, train new astronomers and thereby promote
modern research into astronomy and astrophysics. He was the guiding light that helped the
RGO establish itself at its new location and build even further on its world-wide
reputation. One of the ways in which this was to be achieved was through the provision of
a very large telescope on the site.
***
Long before the move to Herstmonceux, there had been talk of providing
UK astronomers with a telescope large enough to allow them to compete on equal terms with
their counterparts abroad, especially in the USA where a 200-inch instrument was in
operation, and Russia which was building one of 237-inches.
It was eventually agreed that a 100-inch telescope be
constructed, funded jointly by the Treasury and the Admiralty. The telescope would be for
the use of all UK astronomers and, although located at Herstmonceux, would be administered
by a Board of Management. It was RGO staff, however, who were to subsequently maintain and
operate the telescope.
A 98-inch glass disk, originally intended for a telescope at Michigan
University, was donated to form the prime mirror of the new instrument. After much
discussion and delay concerning the design of the optical systems, mounting and guiding of
the telescope, construction finally got underway. In 1967, Her Majesty the Queen performed
the opening ceremony for the new Isaac Newton Telescope (INT) at
Herstmonceux.
Over the years, the INT was used for a number of research projects.
These included direct and electronographic photography of nebulae, galaxies and quasars,
infra-red spectrometry and direct TV scanning of optical spectra.
***
Meanwhile, the other telescopes continued in regular use and it was not
uncommon, on a warm summer’s night, to hear the strains of music across the air as
one or more of the astronomers kept themselves entertained during a long observing
session, playing tapes of anything from Bach to Led Zeppelin.
Other research work carried out by RGO staff included
the determination of radial velocities, parallaxes and proper motions of stars, the study
of globular clusters and the Magellanic Clouds, the measurement of the chemical
composition of different stars and research into black holes. In 1971 an RGO team
identified the X-ray source known as Cygnus X-1 with a particular star, which was thought
to be part of binary system, the partner of which was most likely a black hole.
Astronomical research is not just carried out at night, of course. The
shelves of the RGO library, which occupied a large portion of the castle, contained every
significant book relating to astronomy that had been published in the past 300 years. The
RGO’s archives also included the correspondence of all the previous Astronomers
Royal. This treasure of astronomical lore attracted researchers and historians of
astronomy who came from all over the world to search the records.
***
The RGO also played a significant role in the training of new,
young astronomers. Woolley was instrumental in ensuring that astronomy was
included on the syllabus at the nearby University of
Sussex, at Brighton. From 1965 it was a recognised subject for MSc and D.Phil degrees
and some RGO staff became visiting members of the faculty.