The son of a cabinetmaker, Young became his father's apprentice before, from the age of 19, taking an interest in chemistry. He worked as an assistant to the acclaimed chemist Thomas Graham (whose statue stands in Glasgow's George Square), first at Anderson's University, then, from 1837-1841, at University College in London.
White went on to work in the Muspratts works in St Helens and at Tennants in Manchester before attempting the extraction and refinement of a source of petroleum found near Alfreton in Derbyshire. Production became viable from 1848, and when demand increased Young established further works at Bathgate and at Addiewell, near West Calder.
He later withdrew from business and spent his time yachting, travelling and pursuing other scientific interests. He died at Kelly on 13 May 1883.
JAMES YOUNG was born in 1811, and was the son of a working cabinetmaker who lived in the Drygate. As soon as he was able, he became his father's apprentice and learned how to use his hands in the overcoming of mechanical difficulties. About the age of nineteen his thoughts were directed to other objects, and his handicraft received a new impulse by his coming into contact with Thomas Graham, who was a few years his senior, and who had just been appointed to lecture on chemistry in the Andersonian. From being a listener and a student, Young became in time his assistant and occasionally his substitute in the duties of teaching, and he continued on this footing while Graham remained in Glasgow. In 1837, when Graham removed to London, Young went with him and acted as his assistant at University College for some four years more.
When one considers the amount and character of the work that Graham got through during these years, the influence that it must have had upon Young cannot be estimated - probably he himself could hardly have calculated it. Intimate intercourse with a man of such originality, such insight, such determination to carry out what he felt was his life-work in spite of poverty and neglect, must have acted upon him to develop similar resolution. In subsequent years when Young had his own difficulties to overcome he did not forget the varied lessons he had learnt not only from the chemist but still more from the man, and there can be little doubt that the devotion to Graham which he displayed his whole life through was his irrepressible confession that he owed most if not all his subsequent success to Graham's example and instruction. During the eleven and a half years that he spent in this way he acquired a thorough training in scientific chemistry and experimental research. That, however, was not the direction in which his capacity was to reveal itself, though he had pursued investigation and had arrived at good results. He had still to gain experience of chemical operations on the large scale, and this he got partly in the works of the Muspratts at St. Helens, and next in the branch works of the Tennants at Manchester, whither he went in 1843.
It was while here that his attention was directed to the spring of rock oil or petroleum which had been noticed at Alfreton in Derbyshire. He investigated the nature of this outflow, carried on experiments to ascertain the composition of the oil, and how it could be turned to practical use, but it was not till 1848 that, along with his friend and assistant, Edward Meldrum, he erected works where the crude oil was prepared for the market. The new products were successful, but the spring was unequal to the demands made upon it, and it very soon became a question where a fresh supply of raw material was to be obtained. This he got ultimately from a substance which had been tried in the Glasgow gas works for gas making, and which on distilling at a low temperature yielded a large quantity of oil similar to the natural petroleum. Young saw that this was what he was in want of, secured the patent, and began operations at Bathgate along with Meldrum and Binney. Larger works were subsequently erected at Addiewell, near West Calder, and both have been carried on ever since, first by Young himself along with his partners, and then by a company to which the works were disposed of in 1866.
Young's success, however, was not won without a severe effort. The chemical and mechanical difficulties which had to be overcome were bad enough, but besides these he had to fight for his invention, and the Torbanehill mineral case, in which the most distinguished chemists were engaged on one side or the other, though forgotten to some extent now, will ever remain a famous one in the history of scientific trials. Young carried on the battle with the utmost determination; it was his struggle for existence, but he may also have been able to look forward and discern that it was not a purely selfish one, that in endeavouring to seize his opportunity and get some return for his long scientific training, his skill, and the thought and labour he had expended, he was also making a hitherto useless or at least unused material of inestimable value, and conferring a boon on all in endeavouring to produce a more abundant, a cheaper, and a more generally useful source of brilliant light than had ever been tried before. That he did win, and did reap the reward does not need now to be told, and that the oil and the lamps he invented for burning it have done far more than he could ever have anticipated is so obvious that it does not now even elicit a remark. It is a striking testimony to the value of the paraffin lamp that it has not only been adopted in the country in place of all others, but that it his superseded the use of gas even where that illuminator is available. If this is due in part to fashion, it is due also to the greater pliancy with which the lamp lends itself to decorative effect. In this way Young's invention has shared in and helped to promote the improvement in taste which has been so marked during the last twenty years.
The best part of Young's life was spent in carrying on this manufacture, but after it changed hands, although he remained in the company, he took no active part in the concern. He withdrew from business and occupied himself with attending to the estates which he had purchased, in yachting, and travelling, and in scientific pursuits. Though he had no ambition for publicity, there were one or two acts of a public character which ought not be forgotten.(*) But these, though public in expression, sprung in reality from the deepest of his private feelings, and from his best memories. He died at his residence of Kelly on May 13, 1883.
Young was a silent and undemonstrative man, as he had been accustomed to think out by himself the questions that concerned him; he was not always prepared to accept any view that might be pressed upon him, and this gave his opinions a distinct flavour of independence and originality. But he was neither self-assertive nor dogmatic. With unimpaired memory for the past, he was as keenly alive as ever at the close of his life to the questions of the day, to all the discoveries, and especially to the inventions which were making, and, even up to his decease, he was finding out quite new directions in which his love for chemistry was displaying itself. Only those who had the opportunity of hearing his views can guess what he might have ultimately done in helping its progress in directions still neglected in this country.
(*) These were:- The statue of Graham which he presented to Glasgow, and which now stands in George Square; the privately printed edition of Graham's scientific papers, collected and arranged by the late Dr. Angus Smith, who shared in Young's admiration of the great investigator; the foundation of the Chair of Technical Chemistry, and the erection of the laboratory in connection therewith; lastly, the touching care he exhibited for the recovery and guardianship of the remains of his earliest and most famous friend, Livingstone.
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