Guillaume-Francois Rouelle

Rouelle, Guillaume-François 

Born Sept. 16, 1703, in Mathieu, near Caen; died Aug. 3, 1770, in Passy, near Paris. French chemist. Member of the Paris Academy of Sciences (1744).

In 1742, Rouelle became a professor at the botanical gardens in Paris. In 1744 he defined salts as compounds of acids with bases, and in 1754 he proposed the division of salts into neutral (intermediate), acidic, and basic categories. In 1759 he prepared ethyl chloride by distilling ethyl alcohol with SnCl₄. Rouelle worked with A. Lavoisier, J.-L. Proust, and N. Leblanc.

REFERENCE

Leicester, H. M., and H. S. Klickstein. A Source Book in Chemistry: 1400–1900. New York-Toronto-London, 1952. Pages 75–79.