The Board of Agriculture in 1803 had commissioned Sir Humphry Davy to deliver a course of lectures on the connexion of chemistry with vegetable physiology.
By the market house is a statue of Sir Humphry Davy, who was born here in 1778.
Rouelle, while in England Humphry Davy expounded the same idea in the experimental demonstrations which gave his lectures their brilliant charm.
Berzelius's investigation of the action of the electric current on salts clearly demonstrated the invaluable assistance that electrolysis could render to the isolator of elements; and the adoption of this method by Sir Humphry Davy for the analysis of the hydrates of the metals of the alkalis and alkaline earths, and the results which he thus achieved, established its potency.
In 1806 Sir Humphry Davy proved that the formation of acid and alkali when water was electrolysed was due to saline impurities in the water.