Fred. A. Winsor Originator of Public Gas-Lighting. Founder of the Gas-Light and Coke Company, incorporated by Charter AD 1812.

Frederick Albert Winsor (1763-1830), 'Originator of Public Gas-Lighting, Founder of the Gas-Light and Coke Company, incorporated by Charter AD 1812'. [formerly Friedrich Albrecht Winzer] The caption continues: "The Street first lighted by Gas was Pall-Mall, during the Sessions of Parliament of 1809 and 1810. The eastern portion of that Street is represented above [behind Winsor] fronting Carlton House with the Gas Lamp Posts which extended from St James's Palace to Cockspur Street." The DNB gives the date of lighting of Pall Mall as 1806. Winsor was born in Brunswick and died in Paris. DNB online: When Winsor arrived in London he had much public scepticism to contend with. He established himself in Cheapside and in May 1804 obtained a patent for gas-making apparatus. Over the next five years he was to be awarded three further patents for gas generation. He began his campaign in 1804 with a series of public lectures at the Lyceum Theatre. He acquired premises for gas manufacture in Mayfair. In 1806 he relocated at 97 Pall Mall, and in 1807 he staged spectacular public demonstrations of gas lighting on the walls of the fashionable Carlton House Terrace and in Pall Mall. By 1815 30 miles of gas main had been laid in London and by 1820 at least a score of independent provincial companies had been founded. By that time, however, Winsor had been ousted, his flamboyant character being deemed a liability. In December 1815 he went to Paris and founded a small gas company there. Typically he staged dramatic public demonstrations but the company failed in 1819. Thereafter he seems to have had no active connection with the gas industry. He died in Paris on 11 May 1830, and was buried in the cemetery of Père Lachaise. Subsequently, a memorial to him was erected in Kensal Green cemetery: appropriately it was inscribed, ‘At evening time it shall be light’ (Zechariah 14:7).