JOHNSON, Manuel John, English as tronomer: b. Macao, China, 23 May 1805; d. 28 Feb. 1859. He was educated at Addiscombe College, England, entered the artillery (1821) at Saint Helena, becoming aide-de-camp to General Walker, who aided him in founding an observatory on the island. By 1833 he had secured materials for 'A catalogue of 606 prin cipal Fixed Stars in the Southern Hemisphere> which was printed by his patrons, the East In dia Company (1835), who had furnished his astronomical equipment. For this important catalogue he was awarded the Royal As tronomical Society's Gold Medal. He was ap pointed (1839) to take charge of the Radcliffe observatory when he worked indefatigably on the redetermination of Groombridge's circum polar stars, his investigations appearing in 18 volumes of the Radcliffe Observations. With the aid of Sir Robert Peel an improved outfit of instruments was furnished (1843) including a Simms transit circle and a heliometer (1849) by Repsold of Hamburg with a seven and one half object glass, the largest then existing. With
this new equipment he observed (1850) 26 im portant double stars and (1852-53) measured the chief stars of the Pleiades and the annual parallaxes of 61 Cygni, continuing the work on Castor, Arcturius and Lyre (1854-55). He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society (1856), and president of the Royal Astronomical So ciety (1857-58). His catalogue of 6,317 cir cumpolar stars was in the printer's hands when he died and was published in 1860. A prize for an essay on an astronomical or meteorological subject is offered at Oxford every four years, since 1862, instituted in his memory. Consult Foster's 'Alumni Osconiensis,> Monthly Notices Royal Astronomical Society (Vols. XIX and XX).