Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Henley, William (fl.1775)
HENLEY or HENLY, WILLIAM (fl. 1775), electrician, was elected to the Royal Society on 20 May 1773, and admitted fellow 10 June. On 16 Dec. of that year he read a paper before the society, which in 1774 appeared in pamphlet form, under the title ‘Experiments concerning the Different Efficacy of Pointed and Blunted Rods in securing Buildings against the strike of Lightning.’ The details of seven experiments are given, with diagrams and certain evidence supposed to confirm Henley's theory, that a sharp point is greatly preferable as a conductor to a knob. This and other papers of Henley's on various electrical subjects and on a machine for perpetual motion are printed in the ‘Philosophical Transactions’ for 1772, 1774, 1776, and 1778. According to Thomson, Henley was a linendraper.
[Thomson's Hist. Royal Society, p. liv; Watt's Bibl. Brit.]