The Basis of Everything

by Andrew Ramsey

  If Rutherford needed a reciprocal demonstration of Oliphant’s generosity of spirit, it arrived one September Sunday in 1930, during one of Lady Mary’s afternoon teas. An uninvited visitor arrived at the front door of Newnham Cottage, suitcase in hand, but brandishing no formal invitation to the social gathering within. The young man explained that he had travelled from Eastern Punjab in India with the goal of working with Rutherford at the Cavendish.

  Neither Rutherford nor his wife was impressed by such brazenness, but they were placated by Oliphant and Chadwick, who convinced Rutherford not to send the humble, if misguided, traveller on his way. Oliphant then offered to take on the visitor as a research student, and they worked closely together in researching the artificial disintegration of atomic nuclei.

  The knowledge of nuclear physics that the man – who became Professor Rafi Muhammad Chaudhry – gleaned from his time at the Cavendish and from subsequent research work undertaken elsewhere in Britain would prove crucial when he returned to Lahore, in what became Pakistan after post-colonial partition. With the help of Oliphant’s overt lobbying, Chaudhry took up a position at Lahore’s Government College University, where he would be recognised as a driving force behind Pakistan’s nuclear weapons research program.

  In his role as Professor of Nuclear Physics, he received ongoing support from Oliphant, who helped him secure equipment grants, and the two men maintained a lifelong correspondence. It was only a force more formidable than Mary Rutherford – the discriminatory White Australia policy – that prevented Oliphant from securing his esteemed colleague a position at Canberra’s new national university in the 1950s.

  * * *

  As Oliphant grew more comfortable and credentialled among the Cavendish hierarchy, and as Rutherford’s commitments away from the laboratory mounted, the professor increasingly turned to his Australian protégé to fill in for him at his scheduled lectures on atomic physics.

  On these occasions, he would call me into his office to sit beside him while he explained what I should talk about, with the aid of an extraordinary collection of notes, written on odd scraps of paper and pinned together in the right order. He had used these notes for many years, so that there were copious amendments and additions, always in pencil, some of which had become almost too faint to read. We went through these carefully, sometimes for an hour or more, adding, crossing out, and getting the papers into hopeless disorder.14

  Unfortunately for Rosa, her husband’s increased kudos in Rutherford’s eyes did not translate to any significant easing of austerity measures at home. After almost a year at Bateman Street, Mark found the couple slightly more expansive lodgings on Hinton Avenue, where they shared bathroom facilities with the landlady, who lived in a basement flat. The residence proved to be so numbingly cold they would awake on some winter mornings to find the water in the jug on the bedroom washstand frozen solid. It was a clear sign that alternative lodgings were urgently needed.

  They soon shifted to a small terrace property in Grantchester Meadows, a quiet street just over a kilometre south of the city’s heart. The extra distance from central Cambridge meant that walking to and from the Cavendish Laboratory and shops and services was no longer practical for the Oliphants; it therefore necessitated the purchase of cheap second-hand bicycles. But Mark’s improving circumstances also allowed them to buy their first wireless radio set for £1, though it did not include an electrodynamic speaker, so listening was an individual pursuit, conducted through rudimentary headphones.

  It was not until the summer of 1928 that Mark gained access to a vehicle, sharing with his Australian colleague, Cecil Eddy, the £50 cost of a well-worn Citroën convertible, complete with celluloid side curtains that flapped at a furious pace, even when the vehicle was moving at one considerably less so. Weekends were then often spent exploring further afield, with the motorised transport opening up parts of the English countryside that could not be feasibly reached by bike.

  Around the same time, Oliphant applied for his bursary to be urgently upgraded to a ‘senior studentship’, which would net him an additional £150 per annum for the next two years. This increase was offered by the 1851 Commission to ‘a few selected students of exceptional promise and proved capacity for original work’.

  It would be months of anxious waiting before he learned that the Commission had found in his favour, with a note from the secretary adding: ‘I am very glad to know that as a married man the remuneration of the senior scholarship enables you to live in greater comfort, as I realise that you must have had a great struggle to get through on your overseas scholarship stipend.’15 By that time, Oliphant had been at the Cavendish more than two years and was close to completing his PhD.

  Having submitted an expansive thesis that detailed his investigation of the ways metal surfaces behaved when bombarded by positive ions, he needed only to pass the oral component of the examination to earn his doctorate. The interview lasted well over an hour, and was conducted by Rutherford and his Cavendish colleague Charles Ellis, who would ultimately vie with Oliphant for the role of laboratory assistant director.

  Like Chadwick, Ellis had been in Germany – albeit on holiday – when war broke out in 1914, and was likewise detained at Ruhleben, where he helped Chadwick establish his makeshift laboratory. At conflict’s end, he entered Trinity College and was involved in research work at the Cavendish when Rutherford arrived in 1919. He was a pivotal member of the laboratory team, though his work explored the effects of beta and gamma radiation, while Chadwick and Rutherford focused on the possibilities presented by alpha radiation and particles.

  Years after he successfully negotiated the examination by Rutherford and Ellis, Oliphant found himself in Ellis’s shoes, alongside the professor, in a similar interrogation of a research student, Bertram Vivian (later Baron) Bowden, who was seeking his doctorate qualification. Oliphant learned that asking the questions could be almost as intimidating as having to answer them, after his opening query was met with wide-eyed terror from the interviewee, who eventually spluttered: ‘I’m afraid I don’t know.’

  At which point Rutherford stepped in, turning to his co-inquisitor and harrumphing: ‘What’s more to the point, Oliphant, neither would you if you hadn’t looked it up ten minutes ago. Let’s have the next question.’16

  * * *

  Although confirmation of her husband as ‘Dr Oliphant’ brought both prestige and pecuniary benefits for Rosa, she continued to feel that Mark devoted an unrealistic proportion of his time and energy to the research work that consumed him. His improved circumstances had eased the worst pain of poverty, and also allowed them occasional luxuries. But her sense of isolation lingered.

  The plan forged for their Cambridge adventure when the couple left Adelaide – that they would remain in Britain only for the duration of Mark’s scholarship then return to Australia – seemed less likely to be enacted as they slowly settled into life as expatriates in England. Despite now holding the doctorate that had been his primary objective when setting out on his initial voyage, Mark could no more consider quitting Cambridge than he might ponder a return to silversmithing. Having secured the financial wherewithal to continue his research work until at least mid-1933, he was now as much a part of Rutherford’s vision and the laboratory’s future as the Cavendish was embedded in his own soul.

  The loneliness that Rosa continued to feel, despite the kindness exhibited by Lady Rutherford and Elizabeth Cockcroft and a widening circle of other friends, became acute when the Oliphants decided to start the family they both so craved, and Rosa suffered a series of devastating miscarriages. The pain and loss she and Mark felt but stoically concealed were compounded by news, in late 1929, that the Cockcrofts’ almost three-year-old son, Timothy, had died suddenly from a severe asthma attack. Rosa and Mark noted how John Cockcroft threw himself ever more single-mindedly into his work.

  Then, on 6 October 1930, Rosa Oliphant gave birth to a son, Geoffrey, at the couple’s Grantchester Meadows home. She had b
een confined to bed for much of a difficult pregnancy, but five and a half years and 16,000 kilometres from their wedding in Adelaide, Mark and Rosa Oliphant at last had a child of their own. Rosa was attended throughout by their family physician and a Swiss nurse recommended by the Rutherfords.

  Fortune was now shining upon Mark Oliphant. Shortly after the arrival of a healthy son, he received news of his first successful grant application – albeit for the modest sum of £80, to cover the cost of apparatus. That was soon dwarfed by news from the Royal Society – doubtless driven by Rutherford, then in the final throes of his five-year president’s term – that Oliphant had been appointed a Messel Fellow. The fellowship was funded from the estate of German-born industrial chemist Dr Rudolph Messel, who died in his adopted home city of London and bequeathed a vast portion of his personal fortune to the Royal Society, of which he was a fellow. This honour increased Oliphant’s annual income by a further £150 a year, with an accompanying pledge for an annual allowance of £600 (around £40,000 today) for two years from 1932, when his senior studentship expired.

  In the two years since Oliphant’s finances were so grim he had been compelled to write, cap in hand, to the 1851 Commission’s secretariat in London, chasing the slim chance of a scholarship upgrade, his yearly income had more than doubled. To celebrate, and to make use of the return fare – valid for five years – that was part of his 1851 scholarship arrangement, he booked passage in late June 1931 for Rosa and Geoffrey to accompany him on a triumphant visit to Adelaide. It was almost four years since they had sailed for Cambridge, and both their families – anxious to see the couple and their blond-haired, now ten-month-old boy – planned to give them rollicking welcomes when they set foot on South Australian soil following a six-week sea voyage.

  Weeks after arriving, amid much fêting of Mark’s academic achievements and joy at the new family addition, Oliphant announced that he must scurry back to Cambridge. The summer dormancy of June to September would soon end, and the university would re-engage for Michaelmas term. He advised Rosa, however, to stay on in Adelaide and spend additional time with her family, thereby not subjecting Geoffrey to England’s approaching winter, and its damp threat to infant children.

  His wife was uncomfortable with the prospect of a prolonged separation, but she stood little hope of forcing a backdown by her strong-willed husband. It would be six months before all three were reunited, as 1932 slowly embraced the warmth of the northern spring.

  * * *

  Around the same time as the Oliphants were cautiously welcoming news that Rosa was pregnant with Geoffrey, Rutherford learned he was to become a grandfather for the fourth time. In the spring of 1930, Eileen Fowler – not yet thirty – revealed that she and Ralph were expecting another child.

  Not unlike Rosa Oliphant, Eileen was confined to bed for all but the first month of her pregnancy. She had been warned against having more children due to health issues that had become increasingly serious during earlier deliveries, including the development of a tubercular spot on one of her lungs. However, her keenness to add to a family that already included sons Peter (then aged seven) and Patrick (three) and daughter Elizabeth (known as Liddy, aged five) meant she was prepared to shoulder that risk.

  Although Oliphant sensed Ernest and Mary Rutherford’s misgivings as the pregnancy progressed, Eileen remained unfazed by the medical warnings. Mary accordingly went ahead with plans to return to New Zealand over the Christmas and New Year of 1930 to 1931 to visit her own ageing mother in Christchurch. ‘I am sorry to be away when her baby arrives in December but am not at all worried about her,’ Mary wrote to her mother-in-law, confirming her imminent homecoming. ‘Eileen looks very peaky and we think she shouldn’t have thought of having a fourth, but she was keen to.’17

  The child – a daughter, Ruth – was born on 14 December 1930 without incident and, despite a bout of gastric flu that ran through the household, there was no indication of pending trouble. That was until nine days later when, as Ernest dressed to attend Tuesday-night dinner at Trinity College’s Great Hall, a nurse arrived from the Fowler house to tell him that Eileen, his only child, had died due to a pulmonary embolism – a clot that had entered her bloodstream and led to cardiac arrest. It was, at that time, a not uncommon consequence of childbirth.

  Rutherford drove immediately to the Fowlers’ house, and next day – Christmas Eve – sent a telegram to Mary via her brother, who was hosting the Newton family’s Christmas dinner in Christchurch.

  ‘Eileen died suddenly but peacefully Wed evening. Embolism,’ he wired. ‘Baby well . . . all well. No need to change your programme. Rutherford.’18

  The news arrived just hours before Mary’s family was to gather for dinner on Christmas Eve. Charlie Newton chose not to pass on the information until after they had eaten.

  While the private grief elicited in Ernest and Mary by the loss of their sole child can only be imagined, outwardly their response was one of fatalistic acceptance, given Eileen’s known health risks.

  In the letters they penned each other from opposite hemispheres that bleak Christmas Day, Ernest wrote: ‘It is a sad end for Eileen’s adventure but it may be called in a sense a happy end for I was always afraid of her becoming an invalid. If her lung trouble had flashed out again it would have been a bad complication in any case.’19 Mary echoed the same sentiment in her response: ‘Can’t help feeling that poor Eileen has been saved a life of invalidism.’20

  So as not to spoil their Christmas Day, the Fowler children were told their mother was simply too unwell to join them for Yuletide celebrations. It prompted the eldest, Peter, to inquire: ‘Is she ever going to get better?’21 The terrible truth was broken to them the next morning.

  Mary then remained in New Zealand for several months, until the British winter had fully passed. Perhaps as a means of embracing some measure of normality to help quell their collective grief, Mary wrote to Ernest during the early weeks of 1931 recounting mundane details, including updates on the success of the new year diet she had adopted.

  With no immediate family to share or alleviate his sorrow, Rutherford withdrew – at Mary’s suggestion – to the untamed, snow-capped vastness of North Wales. To nourish his being, he took with him the couple’s housekeeper Eileen ‘Bay’ de Renzie, Mary’s cousin, who was not much older than their own departed Eileen. To repair his soul, he asked Mark Oliphant to join him. The Australian left his wife and three-month-old son in Cambridge to support his anguished friend.

  Oliphant spent a week with Rutherford at Celyn in the bleak early days of 1931, while Miss de Renzie lavished the professor with care and affection. To Oliphant, he seemed suddenly older than his fifty-nine years, and exhibited telltale signs of the toll extracted. His handwriting appeared less legible, and he tired more readily than on previous excursions into the valley.22

  * * *

  The desolation brought by Eileen’s death was also painfully difficult to reconcile with the celebratory news that Rutherford was compelled to keep secret until after Christmas. In the weeks before the tragedy, he had received confidential advice that his name had been submitted to King George V for bestowal of ‘the dignity of a Baronetcy of the United Kingdom’ in the 1931 New Year’s Honours. As a life peer, he would not only be entitled to a seat in Britain’s House of Lords, but could also nominate his own territorial adjunct, to distinguish himself from an earlier Baron Rutherford, whose lineage had long since expired.

  Due to strict protocols surrounding release of this information, Rutherford had felt unable to reveal the honour to Eileen before her death. However, he had penned a letter to his wife in New Zealand dated 19 December, in the knowledge that the mail steamer would only dock at Christchurch safely after the list was published.

  Mary wrote back, counselling that the location appended to his title should be readily identifiable with the nation of their birth, not simply as ‘Lord Rutherford of Canterbury’ or ‘Christchurch’ which would potentially be interpreted in the northe
rn hemisphere as an English reference. ‘Havelock, where you got your first educational start seems the most appropriate and sounds well too. Lord Rutherford of Havelock . . .’23

  Whether it was boldness born of separation, or mere personal preference, Ernest overlooked his wife’s suggestion and opted instead for ‘Lord Rutherford of Nelson’. In addition to the kiwi and the Maori warrior that adorned the coat of arms he had drafted, Rutherford included Hermes Trismegistus, whose ancient writings gave birth to alchemy, and inscribed it with the motto ‘Primordia quaerere rerum’, which Oliphant would doubtless have identified from his schoolboy Latin as ‘To seek first principles’.

  Unlike Rutherford’s sponsor for the honour, fellow physicist Robert Strutt – whose father had served as the second Cavendish Professor at Cambridge, after the family adopted the title Rayleigh when bestowed with a peerage – Rutherford chose to retain his surname, as he explained in his letter to Mary:

  So I suppose if it goes through I shall be styled Lord Rutherford but there will be no change in your title. It has been rather a worrying business, for I was very uncertain whether to accept; for a title of this sort is of little use to people like ourselves with no social ambitions. I was pressed by Lord Parmoor [Lord President of the Privy Council] – through whose department it goes – that I ought to accept on general grounds as a recognition of the importance of science to the nation . . . Of course, I do not intend [it] to make any difference in our mode of life.24

  The telegram he sent to his widowed mother in New Plymouth – his father having died two years earlier, aged eighty-nine – was more succinct: ‘Now Lord Rutherford. More your honour than mine.’25

  The humility he displayed was a quality clearly inherited from his mother. When New Zealand’s governor-general, Lord Bledisloe, gushed with national pride at the news and declared to Martha Rutherford that ‘you must be very proud of your illustrious son’, she responded coolly: ‘No more than I am the rest of my sons.’26