Captain H.J. Round
- H.J. Round - the little known genius who added much to thermionic valve or
tube development and made significant developments to ASDIC
Captain Henry Round is a little known genius in the field
radio early radio development. As a result of his efforts H.J. Round had a great
impact on British history. His developments in radio direction finding noticed
the movement of the German navy which he reported and this resulted in the
Battle of Jutland, the largest naval battle of the First World War. In addition
to this H.J. Round made significant contributions to the development of the
thermionic valve or tube, and he also worked successfully on the development of
ASDIC.
As for his character, Captain H.J. Round was something of an
individual and an extrovert. He was also short in stature, and his looks were
said to be similar to those of Winston Churchill, even down to a cigar. He also
had a dislike for unnecessary protocol, preferring to get to the point as soon
as possible.
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... Round was something of an individual and an extrovert ....
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Image courtesy Marconi plc |
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Early years
Henry Joseph Round was the eldest child of Joseph and Gertrude Round and was
born on 2nd June 1881. He spent his early years in the small town of
Kingswinford which is in Staffordshire, England.
Henry Round's early education took place at Cheltenham
Grammar School. Later he furthered his education at the Royal College of Science
and here he gained first class honours degree.
First employment
H.J. Round commenced his professional life when he joined the Marconi Company in
1902. The company was very newly formed and was at the forefront of "wireless"
technology having made the first transatlantic radio transmission the previous
year. However the investment in achieving these new milestones was huge and the
returns at this time were relatively small. Despite the shortage of cash, H.J.
Round was sent to the USA. Here his office junior was a man named David Sarnoff
- he alter became the Chairman of RCA.
While in the USA, Round experimented with a variety of
different aspects of radio technology. From early 1903 until 1904 he focussed on
dust cored tuning inductors as the concept of tuning a signal was still in its
infancy, and methods of satisfactorily tuning receivers and transmitters was
needed.
While H.J. Round's main focus was on studying tuning, he was
also able to spend time performing some experiments with transmission paths over
land and sea at different times of the day. He also spent time investigating
direction finding for which he used a frame antenna. What he learned from these
experiments would prove very useful in his later work.
In further work that H.J. Round undertook, he made some
groundbreaking discoveries, one of which was over fifty years ahead of its time.
In 1906 H. H. Dunwoody had discovered the crystal detector which was a very
important rival to Fleming's diode valve. (Interestingly the patent for the
diode valve was owned by Marconi as Fleming was a consultant to the company).
Round performed a number of experiments on the crystal detector using a of
materials. He also applied a direct current to them and noticed that some
actually emitted light. H.J. Round reported this in the 9th February 1907
edition of Electrical World. This is the first known report of the effect of the
light emitting diode. Unfortunately Round was well ahead of his time and it took
until the 1960s before it was fully exploited.
Job changes
Th cash shortages experienced by the Marconi company forced some drastic
measures, and Round had to be discharged from the company. He looked for new
employment, and although he was turned down by Edison, he did manage to take up
a post with the New York Telephone Laboratories.
After a short period the Marconi finances recovered and H.J.
Round was able to re-join to the company and return to England. Now Round became
investigated solutions to the problems of valve amplification. This work soon
paid dividends and in 1913 and the following year Round patented a number of
ideas for valve improvements including that of an indirectly heated cathode.
This was a major step forward and it paved the way for enabling valves to be
used far more widely. Also during this time he patented his auto-heterodyne
(autodyne) receiver and developed the first use of automatic grid bias.
H.J. Round's Autodyne Receiver
First World War
The First World War broke out in 1914. The military authorities realised the
benefits that could be reaped from wireless communications, and accordingly
Round was seconded to Military Intelligence with the rank of Captain.
Calling on his previous experience with direction finding,
Round set up a chain of direction finding stations along the Western Front.
These stations proved to be so successful that he was instructed to set up a
second chain of stations in England. In May 1916 they were monitoring
transmissions from the German Navy that had been at anchor at Wilhelmshaven. On
30th May they reported a 1.5 degree change in the direction of the signals being
picked up from the German fleet along with an increase in activity. The
information was reported to the Admiralty who reasoned the German fleet had put
to sea. Accordingly the Admiralty ordered the British Fleet to put to sea to
intercept the Germans, and the following day the Battle of Jutland was fought.
It was the largest sea battle of all time. In it the British fleet lost seven
ships and about 7000 men, whilst the Germans only lost three ships and around
2500 men. While the British suffered greater losses, it meant that the German
fleet did not sail. After the war it was revealed that it was as a result of the
endeavours of Captain H.J. Round that the Battle had taken place.
Captain H.J. Round made other contributions to the war
effort, designing the first telephony transmitters and receivers for airborne
use. For all his services during the war, Round was awarded the Military Cross.
Return to civilian life
With the cessation of hostilities, H.J. Round returned to more peaceful and
commercially profitable activities working for the Marconi Company. Initially
his activities were devoted towards the development of improved thermionic valve
or tube activities. He developed some new high power valves or tubes (types MT1
and MT2) and alongside this he developed some transmitters capable of delivering
around 20 kW. Then in March 1919 he oversaw the installation of a large
telephony wireless station at Ballybunion in Ireland.
With the transmitting station complete, H.J. Round next
developed some more transmitters, but this time for range testing. The radio
transmitters were located at the Marconi works in Chelmsford, and in order to
gain an idea of the ranges being achieved, listeners were invited to send in
reports on the transmissions. In order to attract listeners, the transmissions
were modulated with music - a revolutionary idea for the time. The number of
listeners grew and many reports were received by those who had enjoyed the radio
transmissions. As a result the idea of radio broadcasting dawned in the United
kingdom, and a regular wireless telephony news service was inaugurated on 23rd
February 1920. Three and a half months later on 15th June 1920, the famous
Australian soprano Dame Nellie Melba took part in a broadcast concert organised
by the Daily Mail. This radio broadcast created a significant amount of public
interest and many people listened to it.
These early British radio broadcasts were not without their
problems. They caused interference to what were thought to be "more serious"
uses for wireless and they were sopped. However, two years later another set of
broadcasts were inaugurated. The transmission site for these was at Writtle just
outside Chelmsford. In line with all stations of the day a call sign was
assigned to the station and for this one it was 2MT (Two Emma Tock). It took to
the air using a transmitter that had been designed by H.J. Round.
The success of this station lead to the establishment of
another station at Marconi House in the Strand. With the call sign 2LO this
station was taken over by the BBC at its formation in 1922. From this it can be
seen that H.J. Round naturally played a very significant role in the foundation
of broadcasting, providing much of the technical expertise and drive to ensure
that it succeeded.
Amidst all of this work, H.J. Round was still working on a
number of other projects. One of the major jobs was the conversion of the
Marconi wireless station at Caenarvon, Wales from a spark transmitter to a valve
or tube transmitter. This radio transmitter used a total of 56 of Round's MT2
valves or tubes with a 10 kV supply. The station was naturally very powerful,
and as a result on 19th November 1921, signals from it were heard in Australia.
Career moves
Round was appointed to the post of Chief Engineer at Marconi Research in 1921,
and he remained with the company until 1931 producing a huge amount of work.
During this time he undertook a wide variety of different projects including the
design d development of radio transmitters and receivers, gramophone recording
systems, and he even developed a public address system that was used to relay
the speech by King George V of England at the Wembley Exhibition.
Despite all his successes, Round decided to set up his own
private consultancy in 1931. Although he still worked closely with the Marconi
Company on many occasions it gave him more flexibility to undertake the work he
wanted to do. However shortly after the outbreak of the Second World War he was
commissioned to work for the UK Admiralty (the department that ran the British
Navy) on ASDIC. The letters ASDIC, stand for AntiSubmarine Detection
Investigation Committee, and the system is known as Sonar today. After the war
he undertook more work for the Marconi Company, working primarily on echo
sounding, a field in which he was considered an expert.
Personal Life
H.J. Round married Olive Wright Evans in 1911 and they had seven children: two
sons and five daughters. Sadly his eldest son John who was a Spitfire pilot in
the Second World War was killed in action. Round outlived Olive and was
remarried in 1960 to Evelyn Bays. Round himself died in August 1966 in a nursing
home in Bognor Regis after a short illness.
Looking back
H.J. Round achieved a phenomenal amount in his life. He was known for his huge
work output and the number of development "firsts" to his name. He
revolutionised the design of radio receivers of the day. He developed new valves
and moved forwards thermionic technology. In addition to this he played a
significant role in the technology used in two world wars. He also had the
distinction of being the first person to note the effect used today in light
emitting diodes.
Round was awarded two main honours. In the First World War
there was the Military Cross for his efforts mainly on direction finding and
then in 1951 he was awarded the coveted Armstrong Medal by the Radio Club of
America. Despite these two awards and the huge impact of many of his
developments, the name of Captain H.J. Round is not widely known and he is very
much an unknown genius.
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