Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Copeland, Ralph
COPELAND, RALPH (1837–1905), astronomer, born on 3 Sept. 1837 at Moorside Farm near Woodplumpton, Lancashire, was son of Robert Copeland, yeoman, by his wife Elizabeth Milner. After education at the grammar school of Kirkham, he went to Australia in 1853, and divided five years in the colony of Victoria between work on a sheep run and at the gold diggings.
Being much interested in astronomy, he on his voyage home in 1858 observed the great comet (Donati) of that year. Entering the works of Beyer, Peacock & Co., locomotive engineers, of Manchester, as a volunteer apprentice, he continued his astronomical studies, and with some fellow-apprentices fitted up a small observatory for a 5-inch refractor by Cooke at West Gorton near Manchester. Copeland's first recorded observation was of a non-instantaneous occultation of κ Cancri by the moon on 26 April 1863, which the well-known observer the Rev. W. R. Dawes communicated to the Royal Astronomical Society. Resolved to devote himself exclusively to astronomy, Copeland in 1865 matriculated at the University of Göttingen, and attended the lectures of Klinkerfues, who was in charge of the observatory, and of other professors. With Börgen, a fellow-student, Copeland undertook the observation with the meridian circle of the Göttingen observatory of the position of all the stars down to the ninth magnitude, in the zone two degrees wide immediately south of the celestial equator. The intention was to contribute the result of the observation to a larger scheme then being organised by the Astronomische Gesellschaft, but the work when completed was declined by the Gesellschaft, because the computation did not conform to their plan. Copeland and Börgen's catalogue was published independently in 1869 as the ‘First Göttingen Catalogue of Stars.’
In 1869 Copeland took the degree of Ph.D. with a dissertation on the orbital motion of α Centauri. On 15 June of the same year he and Börgen sailed as members of a German Arctic expedition for the exploration of the east coast of Greenland, their special object being to measure an arc of the meridian in this neighbourhood. They wintered in latitude 74° 32'. Cope- land's training in mechanical engineering and his skill with a rifle rendered him a useful member of the expedition. By the beginning of May in the next year a base 709 metres long was measured close to the ship, the Germania, and later the geodetic operations were continued to latitude 75° 11-5' N. The results were published in 'Die Zweite Deutsche Nordpolarfahrt' (vol. ii. Leipzig, 1872).
In Jan. 1871 Copeland became assistant astronomer at Lord Rosse's observatory at Birr Castle, Parsonstown. There he was for the next two years chiefly occupied with the observations on the moon's radiant heat (see Lord Rosse's paper in Phil. Trans. 1873). In 1874 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society, and in the same year was appointed assistant in the Dublin University observatory at Dunsink, but was allowed to accompany Lord Lindsay to Mauritius to observe the transit of Venus in December of that year. The journey was made on the yacht Venus, and during a call at the uninhabited island of Trinidad in the South Atlantic Copeland was fortunate enough to discover a great tree fern (Cyaihea Copelandi), groves of which are found only in the loftiest and nearly inaccessible parts of the island. The observation of the transit was only partially successful, but Copeland was thenceforth associated with Lord Lindsay (now the earl of Crawford and Balcarres), and left Dunsink in 1876 to take charge of his observatory at Dun Echt, Aberdeen, in succession to (Sir) David Gill. At first Copeland was much occupied in preparing for publication the 'Dun Echt Observatory Publications,' vol. iii., containing computations relating to the observations made at Mauritius. At the end of 1876 the temporary star known as Nova Cygni was discovered. Observing this star on 2 Sept. 1877, Copeland made the noteworthy discovery that its spectrum had become reduced to a bright line. In pursuit of Lord Crawford's plan of rendering Dun Echt a centre for the dissemination of astronomical information, it was Copeland's business to announce to the astronomical public all cometary discoveries in circulars giving the orbits and ephemerides, these being in many cases computed by him from his own observations. For ten years he observed every comet as it appeared, both for position and spectroscopically, and made noteworthy observations of the spectra of nebulae and stars, which he recorded in the 'Monthly Notices.' In 1882 he went to Jamaica and successfully observed the transit of Venus, continuing his journey westward through Lord Crawford's liberality in order to test the suitability of the slopes of the Andes for observation. Subsequently Copeland prepared the catalogue (1890) of Lord Crawford's valuable library of astronomical literature, which he had helped to arrange, began a spectroscopic study of nebulae which was not completed, and in 1887 journeyed to Russia to observe the total solar eclipse of that year/when his purpose was frustrated by bad weather.
Meanwhile he edited with his friend, Dr. Dreyer of Armagh, ' Copernicus, a Journal of Astronomy,' an organ of the Dun Echt observatory, of which three volumes appeared in Dublin (1881-4). They contain much of Copeland's writing, including his 'Account of some Recent Astronomical Experiments at High Elevations in the Andes,' with other incidents of his expedition to America in 1882 (vol. iii.).
In 1889 Lord Crawford presented the instrumental equipment of his observatory at Dun Echt, together with his astronomical library, to the Edinburgh observatory, on condition that it should be maintained as a Royal Observatory. On the acceptance of the offer by the nation Copeland was made Astronomer Royal for Scotland, on 29 Jan. 1889, in succession to Charles Piazzi Smyth [q. v. Suppl. I]. To this office was attached the professorship of astronomy in Edinburgh University. Copeland's first task in his new capacity was to remove the observatory from Calton Hill and to rebuild it on Blackford Hill. This work was not completed until 1895, and in the interval he began a new reduction of the meridian observations of one of his predecessors, Henderson (published posthumously). Next year he journeyed to Vadso in a fruitless effort to observe the total solar eclipse of that year ; but in India in 1898 (as a member of the official expedition), and at Santa Pola, on the south-east coast of Spain, in May 1900, he successfully observed eclipses of the sun. At Blackford Hill, Copeland continued by the issue of 'Edinburgh Circulars' the announcements of astronomical events, which he had begun at Dun Echt ; his last circular (No. 54) referred to the appearance of the Nova in Perseus at the beginning of 1900, the spectroscopic observation of which was his last astronomical work. In 1901 he had an attack of influenza, and from this time his health gradually failed. He ceased his professorial lectures in 1902, and died at Edinburgh on 27 Oct. 1905. Copeland married twice: (1) in 1859 Susannah Milner, his first cousin (d. 1866), by whom he had issue one son and one daughter; and (2) in Dec. 1871 Theodora, daughter of the orientalist, Professor Benfey of Göttingen, by whom he had three daughters and a son.
[Notice by Dr. J. L. E. Dreyer in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society for February 1900; Macpherson's Astronomers of To-day, 1905 (with portrait).]