Morgan William Crofton (1826,

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

, Ireland – 1915,

Brighton Brighton ( ) is a seaside resort in the city status in the United Kingdom, city of Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, England, south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze Age Britain, Bronze Age, R ...

, England) was an Irish mathematician who contributed to the field of geometric probability theory. He also worked with

James Joseph Sylvester James Joseph Sylvester (3 September 1814 – 15 March 1897) was an English mathematician. He made fundamental contributions to matrix theory, invariant theory, number theory, partition theory, and combinatorics. He played a leadership ...

and contributed an article on probability to the 9th edition of the

Encyclopædia Britannica The is a general knowledge, general-knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It has been published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. since 1768, although the company has changed ownership seven times. The 2010 version of the 15th edition, ...

. Crofton's formula is named in his honour.

Early life

Morgan Crofton was born into a wealthy

Anglo-Irish Anglo-Irish people () denotes an ethnic, social and religious grouping who are mostly the descendants and successors of the English Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. They mostly belong to the Anglican Church of Ireland, which was the State rel ...

family. His father, the

Reverend The Reverend (abbreviated as The Revd, The Rev'd or The Rev) is an honorific style (form of address), style given to certain (primarily Western Christian, Western) Christian clergy and Christian minister, ministers. There are sometimes differen ...

William Crofton, Rector of

Skreen Skreen () is a small village and parish in County Sligo, Ireland. The village is in a civil parish of the same name. History St Adomnán, the first biographer of St Columba (Colmcille) and one of his successors at Iona, first served as abbot ...

County Sligo County Sligo ( , ) is a Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is in the Northern and Western Region and is part of the Provinces of Ireland, province of Connacht. Sligo is the administrative capital and largest town in ...

, was the younger brother of Sir Malby Crofton, 2nd Baronet of Longford House. He was also the cousin of Lord Edward Crofton, Baron Crofton of the Mote. Despite being born into an

aristocratic Aristocracy (; ) is a form of government that places power in the hands of a small, privileged ruling class, the aristocrats. Across Europe, the aristocracy exercised immense economic, political, and social influence. In Western Christian co ...

Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

family, Crofton joined to the

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

in the 1850s in part due to an interest in Cardinal John Henry Newman. This led to his resignation at

Queen's College, Galway The University of Galway () is a public research university located in the city of Galway, Ireland. The university was founded in 1845 as "Queen's College, Galway". It was known as "University College, Galway" (UCG) () from 1908 to 1997 and as ...

and transference to various Catholic colleges. He married twice: firstly on 31 August 1857 Julia Agnes Cecilia, daughter of J B Kernan (died 1902) and secondly Katherine, daughter of Holland Taylor of Manchester.

Career

He was Professor of Mathematics at the

Royal Military Academy, Woolwich The Royal Military Academy (RMA) at Woolwich, in south-east London, was a British Army military academy for the training of Officer (armed forces), commissioned officers of the Royal Artillery and Royal Engineers. It later also trained officers o ...

and Professor of Natural Philosophy at

Queen's University of Ireland The Queen's University of Ireland was established formally by royal charter on 3 September 1850, as the degree-awarding university of the ''Queen's Colleges'' of Belfast, Cork, and Galway that were established in 1845 "to afford a university ...

. He was elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the Fellows of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...

in June, 1868.http://www2.royalsociety.org/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqCmd=Show.tcl&dsqDb=Persons&dsqPos=0&dsqSearch=%28Surname%3D%27crofton%27%29

References

External links

MacTutor biography of Crofton
* 1826 births 1915 deaths 20th-century Irish mathematicians Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism Fellows of the Royal Society Morgan {{UK-mathematician-stub