Fuller Biography on Royal Institution of Great Britain Website

A member of a prominent family of Sussex iron masters with an extensive sugar estate in Jamaica, he attended Eton College between 1767 and 1774. In 1777 he inherited the entire family fortune and thereafter split his time between Rose-Hill, his Sussex house, and London. As a wealthy unmarried man, he was able to indulge his many interests including politics and building a number of follies in Sussex. He was Tory MP for Southampton between 1780 and 1784 and spent an enormous sum to be elected MP for Sussex in 1801. He held the seat until 1812 and pursued a colourful parliamentary career, even by the standards of the time. In 1810, after swearing in a committee, he reportedly called the Speaker ‘the little insignificant fellow in the wig' for which he spent two nights in Parliament's prison. He was a prominent patron of both art (commissioning J.M.W. Turner) and science. For the latter he supported the Royal Institution to which he made considerable loans (later written off), established the Fuller Medal and endowed, with £10,000, the Fullerian Professorships of Chemistry and of Physiology and Comparative Anatomy. Source: Royal Institution

"Mad Jack" The Honest Sussex Squire by Arthur Beckett

The Sussex County Magazine January 1928, No. I Vol. II, pages 24 - 26

This article starts by explaining how Peter Fuller, a mechanic of Tonbridge, was seeking to correct the "wrongful devolution" of John Fuller's estate (in his own interest, I'm sure). Unfortunately, the article does not shed any light on what evidence Mr Fuller had unearthed to support his claim in the eighteen years of research and wheelbarrow full of documents he had collected.

There are, several errors in the article.

• "At the last-named place they built themselves a fine mansion which they called 'Tanners', and there they owned the Waldron iron furnace, by which they added to their riches.", page 24. Waldron Furnace belonged to the Pelham family. The Fullers had an iron furnace at Heathfield.

• "Squire Fuller died on April 11, 1833, at the age of 68..", page 26. Fuller died on April 11, 1834, aged 77 years, 1 month, 22 days. 

• "In addition to his endowments to the Royal Society...", page 26. Fuller endowed the Royal Institution, which is devoted to scientific research and education with two professorships, not the Royal Society. 

What do Mad Jack Fuller, Anorexia Nervosa, and Jack the Ripper have in common?

Sir William Withey Gull.

Gull rose from very humble beginnings to being physician to the Royal Family. He was born aboard The Dove, a canal barge, moored near St Osyth Mill, Saint Leonard, Colchester, Essex on 31 Dec 1816. He was a very wealthy man at the time of his death on 29 Jan 1890. When his will was probated he left an estate valued at just over £340,000 - an enormous sum in those days.
William Withey Gull became a Fullerian Professor of Physiology in 1847 and, in 1848, he gave the Gulstonian lectures (on paralysis) before the Royal College of Physicians.
Gull is also distantly related to Fuller - his daughter Caroline Cameron Gull married Dr. Theodore Dyke Acland who the first cousin three times removed of Fuller’s brother-in-law Sir John Palmer Acland. It was son-in-law Dr Theodore Dyke Acland who, continuing his father Sir Henry Wentworth Dyke Acland’s work, wrote the definitive biography of Dr Gull.
"Sir William Gull coined the name 'anorexia nervosa'. Examples of self-starvation appeared in the Hellenistic era. Holy anorexics abused their bodies, rejected marriage and sought religious asylum where many perished and became saints. The condition then paled into obscurity until the 19th century. Louis-Victor Marce (1828-1864) described such a patient in 1859, but Richard Morton is generally credited with the first medical description of anorexia nervosa in 1689." JMS Pearce, European Neurology, 2004;52(4):191-2. Epub 2004 Nov 10.
His name is given to Gull’s Disease (Myxoedema)– an adult form of hypothyroidism that affects females six times more frequently than males. He conducted extensive research into the causes of paraplegia and categorized it into three distinct types - spinal, peripheral and encephalic. For more on Gull's medical work read Sir William Withey Gull ( 1816 - 1890) by JMS Pearce.
Dr Gull’s service to the Royal Family led to two things – his being created a baronet, and speculation that he was involved with the Jack the Ripper case.
He was created baronet in 1872 after successfully treating the Prince of Wales, Albert Edward (later King Edward VII) for typhoid, the previous year. He was also Queen Victoria’s personal physician. These two patients contributed to his becoming wealthier than any English doctor before him.
Royal and Masonic conspiracies abound in Jack the Ripper theories and have been much played up in fiction written about the "Whitechapel Murders". At the time of the first murder, 4 April 1888, Gull was 72 years old and already suffered partial paralysis from a stroke. Gull died more than a year before the final murder was committed on February 13, 1891.
In 1970, Dr. T.E.A. Stowell theorized that Prince Albert Victor (son of Prince of Wales, Albert Edward and grandson of Queen Victoria) was Jack the Ripper.
"Stowell claimed that Albert Victor had contracted syphilis after a visit to the West Indies, that it had driven him insane, and that in this state of mind he had perpetrated the five "canonical" Jack the Ripper murders. Stowell wrote that following the murders of 30 September 1888, Albert Victor was restrained by his own family in an institution in the south of England, but later escaped to commit the final murder on 9 November. Stowell further claimed that Albert Victor died of syphilis, and gave as his source an account written in private by Sir William Gull, a reputable physician who had treated members of the royal family." Source: Wikipedia
Gull’s role in this account can be easily dismissed – he died two years before the Prince and so did not witness his death.
Unfortunately, many writers refuse to let truth get in the way of a good story, and so the good name of a successful and learned physician, a Fullerian Professor who made great contributions to science, Dr William Withey Gull, has been co-opted in to the realm of thriller fiction.

Centenary of the Royal Institution, June 1899

The Times | May 30, 1899

THE ROYAL INSTITUTION

The celebration of the centenary of the Royal Institution, which will take place next week, is an event the interest and importance of which will be attested by the presence of representative men of science from all parts of the civilized world. Other English scientific organizations may hold a more conspicuous position as official representatives of English science, but there is none so indissolubly associated in the minds of foreigners with the great fundamental triumphs of science in the present century. There is no research into the constitution of matter, no investigation of the laws of light, no extension of the observations of the astronomer, no new application of electricity to the ever-increasing number of industrial problems,which does not inevitably carry the mind of the instructed inquirer back to the Royal Institution...

The domestic record of the Royal Institution from the time when, in Davy's words, it definitely took the " form of a body for promoting experimental science and for diffusing every species of philosophical knowledge " contains few events of surpassing interest. Financial crises have been not infrequent, and sometimes acute, but have never proved fatal. Increased prosperity was hoped for as a result of the modification of its constitution by Act of Parliament in 1810, but its first endowment some 23 years later was none the less welcome. This consisted of a sum of £10,000 from John Fuller, and rumour says that it was a token of gratitude because the lecture theatre of the Institution was the only place where he could overcome the insomnia from which he habitually suffered. With two-thirds of the money professorships of chemistry and physiology were to be endowed, while the remaining portion went to form an accumulating fund, the interest on which, when the capital amounted to £10,000, was to be applied to the general purposes of the Institution. Since then it has received many legacies and donations. Money left by Mr. Alfred Davis in 1870 enabled the chemical laboratory to be rebuilt in accordance with modern requirements; in 1892 Mr. T. G. Hodgkins, of Setauket, Long Island, gave $100,000 for the " investigation of tho relations and co-relations existing between man and his Creator " ; and in 1896 Dr. Ludwig Mond founded and endowed the Davy-Faraday Research Laboratory, which is contiguous to the Royal Institution and under the superintendence of its managers.

Willie the Gardener

Sir William Lawrence Bragg was the youngest recipient ever of a Nobel Prize when he shared the honour with his father Sir William Henry Bragg in 1915. The Nobel Prize was for Physics although both father and son where made Fullerian Professors of Chemistry (William Henry Bragg in 1923, William Lawrence Bragg in 1953).

Excerpt from What Mad Pursuit by Francis Crick (Basic Books, 1988):

"The current Cavendish Professor was Sir Lawrence Bragg (known to his close friends as Willie), the formulator of Bragg's law for X-ray diffraction..... Bragg was one of those scientists with a boyish enthusiasm for research, which he never lost. He also was a keen gardener. When he moved in 1954 from his large house and garden in West Road, Cambridge, to London, to head the Royal Institution in Albemarle Street, he lived in the official apartment at the top of the building. Missing his garden, he arranged that for one afternoon each week he would hire himself out as a gardener to an unknown lady living in The Boltons, a select inner-London suburb. He respectfully tipped his hat to her and told her his name was Willie. For several months all went well till one day a visitor, glancing out of the window, said to her hostess, 'My dear, what is Sir Lawrence Bragg doing in your garden?' "

(with thanks to Pastor Doug Kramer)

Mad Jack Fuller's Obituary

Gentleman's Magazine
July 1834 pp 106 - 107

JOHN FULLER, Esq.
April 11. In Devonshire place, aged
77, John Fuller, Esq. of Rose Hill, Sus-
sex, formerly M.P. for that county.
This gentleman was the son of John
Rose Fuller, esq. He succeeded in es-
tate his uncle Rose Fuller, Esq. M.P.
for Rye (ob. 1777) who was the younger
son of Mr. Thomas Fuller, the purchaser
of the estate, and builder of the house,
Rose Hill, by Elizabeth, daughter of Mr.
Rose, of Jamaica.
Mr. Fuller was first elected to Parlia-
ment for Southampton in Feb. 1780, and
having been rechosen at the general elec-
tion of the same year, he sat for that town
until the dissolution in 1784. He served
the office of Sheriff of Sussex in 1797.
In 1801, on the elevation to the peer-
age of the Rt. Hon. T. Pelham (by the
title of Earl of Chichester), Mr. Fuller
became a candidate for the representation
of the county of Sussex, and was success-
ful after an arduous contest with Col.
Sergison, which lasted sixteen days, and
cost him 20,000 l. in addition to a sub-
scription purse for 30,000 l. made by the
county. He was re-chosen in 1802, 1806,
and 1807, and sat until the dissolution of
1812. He generally voted with Mr. Fox;
and is said to have indignantly refused
the offer of a peerage from Mr. Pitt,
deeming it a trial of his integrity. It is
related that he threw the Minister's
into the fire, in the presence of a large
party of friends, declaring "I was born
Jack Fuller, and Jack Fuller I will die!"
In 1810, during the inquiry on the
Walcheren expedition, Mr. Fuller got
embroiled in an insane contest with the
supreme authority of the House of Com-
mons. On the 22d of Feb. he was re-
peatedly called to order; but on the 27th
no appeal from the Speaker or remon-
strances from his friends, could restrain
him within the bounds of propriety.
The House was in consequence resumed
from the Committee into which it had of
resolved itself, and Mr. Fuller was
immediately voted into the custody of
the Sergeant at Arms; when he vio-
lently rushed into the House, vehemently
asserting that the Speaker, whom he
designated as "the little insignificant
fellow in the wig," was the servant of the
House, and had no authority over the
Members, who had converted him into
their Master. He was at length carried
off the field by the united efforts of four
of the messengers of the House. He
remained two days in custody; and was
then discharged with a very severe repri-
mand from the Speaker, who threatened
him with summary expulsion on a repe-
tition of his offence. After this memo-
rable scene, he was not returned to ano-
ther Parliament.
Mr. Fuller was distinguished through
life by much eccentricity; but it was
mingled with a kind heart, that displayed
itself in deeds of princely munificence.
The favourite object of his liberality was
the Royal Institution, where he first
founded a Professorship of Electricity,
in the year 182.., and subsequently, a
few weeks before his death, a Professor-
ship of Comparative Anatomy and Phy-
siology. He also gave the Institution at
the same time the sum of 3000 l. to accu-
mulate in the funds; making the sum
total of his benefactions amount to
10,000 l. On the 24th of March last the
members were specially convened to
thank him; and it was resolved that a
age of the Rt. Hon. T. Pelham (by the
subscription should be made for a Bust
of their munificent Patron, to be placed
in a prominent situation in this Institution.
Mr. Fuller erected an observatory at
his house of Rose Hill About twenty
years ago it was expected that he would
promote the publication of a history of the
three Eastern rapes of Sussex; for which
it was supposed that the large collections
of the Rev. Mr. Hayley, which were in
his possession, would furnish very exten-
sive materials.
Mr. Fuller has died extremely rich.
The bulk of his fortune, consisting of
estates in Sussex and in the island of
Jamaica, are left to Augustus Elliot
Fuller, esq. brother to Capt. Fuller,
R.N. and a nephew of the deceased, as
also of Lord Heathfield. The estates in
London are left to Sir Peregrine Palmer
Acland, Bart. another nephew. He has
also left very numerous legacies. His
remains were taken to the family vault at
Brightling in Sussex for interment, at-
tended out of London by twenty-four pri-
vate carriages.

Corrections by Annette Lloyd Thomas: Jack Fuller's Father was the Rev. Henry Fuller (1713-1761). Rose Fuller (1708-1777) was the son of John Fuller (1680-1745) and Elizabeth Rose (1681-1726). Thomas Fuller (1655-1720) bought the mansion at Brightling c. 1697. He left the property to his nephew John Fuller (1680-1745) who named the estate Rose Hill in honour of his wife Elizabeth Rose, the daughter of Dr. Fulke Rose of Jamaica.
Jack Fuller founded the Professorship of Chemistry in 1833 (not of Electricity) and the Professorship of Comparative Anatomy and Physiology in early 1834. The observatory at Brightling is not at the mansion at Rose Hill but nearby on the Brightling-Burwash road. Augustus Elliot Fuller was not technically a nephew - he was the son of Jack Fuller's first cousin John Trayton Fuller.
Sir Peregrine Palmer Acland was the son of Jack Fuller's sister Elizabeth and her husband Sir John Palmer Acland.

BRIGHTON GAZETTE

17 April 1834, page 3

The Late John Fuller, Esq.

We regret to announce the death, on Friday last, at his
residence in London, after a tedious illness, of John Fuller,
Esq., of Rose Hill, in this county, aged 78 years. This
gentleman, better known by the name of "Honest Jack
Fuller," represented the county of Sussex during several
successive Parliaments, for a period of more than twenty
years, and was made celebrated by a well-known scene in the
House of Commons, -- when he called the Speaker " a little
insignificant fellow in a wig," -- for which he was committed
to the custody of the Sergeant-at-arms. He was distin-
guished throughout life by much eccentricity, mingled with
a kind heart that displayed itself in actions of princely
munificence: of this his splendid benefactions to the Royal
Institution are only one example.
Mr Fuller died extremely rich. The bulk of his fortune,
consisting of estates in Sussex and the island of Jamaica,
are left to Augustus Elliot Fuller, Esq., brother of Captain
Fuller, R. N., and a nephew of the deceased, as also of Lord
Heathfield. The estates in London are left to Sir Peregrine
Acland, another nephew. Besides which there are very
numerous legacies.
The following anecdote, which may be relied on, of Mr
Fuller, is not generally known. During Mr Pitt's adminis
tration a messenger arrived at Rose Hill with the offer of a
Peerage, on the condition that Mr Fuller should vote in a
particular manner on some question of the day. Mr Fuller,
who at the moment had a large party of friends assembled
at his dinner table, directed the messenger to be ushered
into the dining room to receive his answer. In his presence
and that of his guests, Mr Fuller threw the letter into the
fire telling the messenger at the same time to acquaint the
Minister with the manner in which his offer had been re-
ceived, and adding -- "I was born Jack Fuller, and Jack
Fuller I will die."
The tenants are to meet the funeral at Robertsbridge on
Saturday, and accompany it to the mausoleum built by Mr
Fuller at Brightling, where his remains will be interred.
Mr Fuller stood successfully a severely contested election
with Colonel Sergisson, which lasted sixteen days, and cost
the former 20,000l., in addition to a subscription purse of
30,000l., made by the county. The expences incurred by
Mr Sergisson were, we believe, equally heavy.

Extract from "Highways & Byways in Sussex" by E.V. Lucas

Pages 380-381, Macmillan and Co, Limited 1912

Four miles west of Robertsbridge, up hill and down, is Brightling, whose Needle, standing on Brightling Down, 646 feet high, is visible from most of the eminences in this part of Sussex.
The obelisk, together with the neighbouring observatory, was built on the site of an old beacon by the famous Jack Fuller - famous no longer, but in his day (he died in 1834 aged seventy-seven) a character both in London and in Sussex. He was big and bluff and wealthy and the squire of Rose Hill. He sat for Sussex from 1801 to 1812, and was once carried from the house by the Sergeant at Arms and his minions, for refusing to give way in a debate and calling the Speaker "the insignificant little fellow in a wig." His election cost him £10,000 plus £30,000 subscribed by the county. When Pitt offered him a peerage he said no: "I was born Jack Fuller and Jack Fuller I'll die." When he travelled from Rose Hill to London Mr. Fuller's progress was almost regal. The coach was provisioned as if for arctic exploration and coachman and footmen alike were armed with swords and pistols. ("Honest Jack," as Mr Lower remarks, put a small value upon the honesty of others.) Mr. Fuller had two hobbies, music and science. He founded the Fullerian professorships (which he called his two children), and contributed liberally to the Royal Institution; and his musical parties in London were famous. But whether it is true that when the Brightling choir dissatisfied him he presented the church with nine bassoons, I cannot say.
John Fuller has a better claim to be remembered in Sussex by his purchase of Bodiam Castle, when its demolition was threatened, and by his commission to Turner to make pictures in the Rape of Hastings, five of which were engraved and published in folio form in 1819, under the title Views in Sussex. One of these represents the Brightling Observatory as seen from Rosehill Park. As a matter of fact, the observatory, being of no interest, is almost invisible, although Mr. Reinagle, A.R.A., who supplies the words to the pictures, calls it the "most important point in the scene". Furthermore, he says that the artist has expressed a shower proceeding "from the left corner". Another picture is the Vale of Ashburnham, with the house in the middle distance, Beachy Head beyond, and in the foreground woodcutters carrying wood in an ox waggon. "The whole," says Mr. Reinagle, A.R.A., "is happily composed, if I may use the term." He then adds: "The eye of the spectator, on looking at this beautifully painted scene, roves with an eager delight from one hill to another, and seems to play on the dappled woods till arrested by the seat of Lord Ashburnham." Other picutes in the folio are "Pevensey Bay from Crowhurst Park," a very beautiful scene, "Battle Abbey," and " The Vale of Heathfield," painted from above the road, with Heathfield House on the left, the tower on the right, the church in the centre in the middle distance, and the sea on the horizon: an impressive but not strictly veracious landscape.
In Brightling church is a bust to John Fuller, with the motto: "Utile nihil quod non
honestum." A rector in Fuller's early days was William Hayley, who died in 1789, a zealous antiquary. His papers relating to the history of Sussex, are now, like those of Sir William Burrell, in the British Museum.

Michael Faraday and John Fuller

"Up to 1833 Faraday was bringing the forces of nature in subjection to man on a salary of only £100 per annum, with house, coals, and candles, as the funds of the Institution would not at that time afford more; but among the sedate habitues of the place was a tall, jovial gentleman, who lounged to the lectures in his old fashioned blue coat and brass buttons, gray smalls, and white stockings, who was a munificent friend in need. This was John Fuller, a member of Parliament. He founded a Professorship of Chemistry, with an endowment that brings in nearly £100 a year, and gave the first appointment to Faraday for life. When the Institution became richer, his income was increased; and when, on account of the infirmities of age, he could no longer investigate, lecture, or keep accounts, the managers insisted on his still retaining in name his official connection with the place, with his salary and his residence there. Nor, indeed, could they well have acted otherwise; for, though the Royal Institution afforded in the first instance a congenial soil for the budding powers of Faraday, his growth soon became its strength, and eventually the blooming of his genius, and the fruit it bore, were the ornament and glory of the Institution."

Extracted from: MICHAEL FARADAY by J. H. GLADSTONE, PH.D., F.R.S.
NEW YORK HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE 1872
More here.

Eastbourne Lifeboat: What Was Her Name?

The search continues for the name of the first Eastbourne Lifeboat, a gift to the town from Mad Jack Fuller in 1822. It is difficult to imagine that a boat of this importance was not formally named and launched. Attempts to learn the boat's name from the Royal National Lifeboat Institution Museum have failed.

In response to a posting on the Sussexpast Yahoo group site, Ros Chislett provided several leads which are being followed up. Lifeboat - In Danger's Hour by Patrick Howarth (Hamlyn, 1981) ISBN 0-600-34959-4, considered to be a "lavishly illustrated authoritative history of the RNLI" is one of the sources recommend. A reading list compiled by the RNLI can be viewed at http://www.rnli.org.uk/Downloads/fs6.pdf.

Saving Lives: Eastbourne Lifeboat

Jack Fuller was a man ahead of his time. He often got in on the ground floor when innovations were being made. For example, he provided a lifeboat for a new station at Eastbourne in 1822, two years before the Royal National Lifeboat Institution was founded by Sir William Hillary. The boat was 25 ft long, was 8 ft 6 in across the beam and had ten pulling oars. She was built by a Mr. Simpson of Eastbourne.

The name of this ship has not yet been discovered by the writer. However, she is credited in saving 35 lives during 7 services. Many medals and honours were bestowed upon her officers and crew.

Who was John "Mad Jack" Fuller?

The eccentric John Mad Jack Fuller, squire of Brightling, is a fascinating topic of research for me. Born in 1757 Fuller was in some ways a typical English squire and Member of Parliament in the Georgian Period. However, his penchant for building follies and his ebullient personality are the stuff of which legends are made. He was a patron of the arts and sciences who made valuable contributions to the community.

In 1777, at the age of 20, Jack Fuller inherited his family's wealth and mansion, Rose Hill at Brightling, East Sussex. He served 4 terms in parliament and was on more than one occasion removed from the House for raucous behaviour. Fuller was a huge man who wore his hair in a pig tail. He never married and had no children.

THE FOLLIES

He is buried in a 25 ft tall pyramid in the churchyard of St. Thomas of Canterbury church, a structure he had built 24 years before he died in 1834. Legend had it that he was interred in full evening dress, sitting upright at a table set with a roast chicken and a bottle of claret. Renovations to the pyramid in the 1980's put this tale to rest.

It is also said that when in London, Fuller bet that he could see the spire of Dallington church from his house. Upon returning home he found that this was not the case and sent a group of men out to erect a conical building designed to resemble the spire. Needless to say, Fuller won the bet and the Sugar Loaf as it has come to be called still stands.

Fuller's Observatory was furnished with state of the art astronomy equipment. It is now a private home. The Observatory, and quite possibly the Greek Rotunda Temple, was designed by noted architect Sir Robert Smirke who also designed the British Museum in London among other important commissions. The Obelisk or Brightling Needle, another of Fuller's legacies, is 65 ft high and is most likely a monument to celebrate Wellington's victory over Napoleon in 1815.

PHILANTHROPY

Among Fuller's lasting contributions to the community are: the Belle Tout lighthouse at Beachy Head and the barrel organ at Brightling church which is now the largest of its kind in full operation in Britain today. He is also credited with saving Bodiam castle from demolition as he purchased it from a firm of builders and had it restored. The Tower, another odd structure, is said to have been built by Fuller so that he could keep an eye on the progress of workmen at Bodiam. Fuller was a founding member of the Royal Institution and created two professorships which have endured into the 21st Century.