vitriol manufacturer

[donna-paul]

i have a gt gt gt gt gt grandfather who was a vitriol manufacturer
what is it please all i keep finding is references to bricks!!!
and mining but he lived in london all his life!
paul

[Emjaybee]

Concentrated sulphuric acid, formerly called oil of vitriol, is a valuable desiccating agent. It acts so vigorously in this respect that it removes water from, and therefore chars, wood, cotton, sugar, and paper. It is used in the manufacture of ether, nitroglycerine, and dyes for its property as a desiccant. When concentrated sulphuric acid is heated, it behaves as an oxidizing agent, capable, for example, of dissolving such relatively unreactive metals as copper, mercury, and lead to produce metal sulphate, sulphur dioxide, and water.

[donna-paul]

OH!!!

thanks meldrew

donna-paul

[Keith Bateman]

Hi donna-paul,

It must also have been used in the manufacture of Paper - my 10 year old great uncle drank some in error at the factory where his father worked in Devon, which made him an invalid for the next 30 years!

Cheers

Keith

[PrueM]

Hi Keith,
Yes, vitriol was used in the manufacture of paper - after the introduction of wood fibres (rather than cotton) in around 1880. 

It is, as Meldrew so eloquently pointed out, sulphuric acid - H₂SO₄.  It still has several uses in the modern paper industry, including in the production of alum (aluminium sulphate) which is used to size paper (i.e. makes paper less absorbent, e.g. for writing paper).  Sulphuric acid is also used in the sulphite process of reducing wood fibres to pulp for paper.  In historical terms, it was also used in the manufacture of iron gall ink - that's the browny coloured ink that we find on so many handwritten old documents - sometimes the ink becomes so acidic over time that it eats right through the paper.

Sulphuric acid is a colourless, slightly oily liquid.  I suggest that your uncle thought that the undiluted acid was water, and took a swig - it's amazing that he survived at all! 

Prue

[donna-paul]

thankyou all SO much for your replies
gives me a new line of enquiry just have to look for somewhere in the london area that would have used this "trade"
the search goes on
donna-paul