Charles Green (balloonist): Difference between revisions

▲Green, son of Thomas Green, fruiterer, of Willow Walk, Goswell Street, London, who died in May 1850, aged 88, was born at 92 Goswell Road, London, on 31 January 1785, and on leaving school joined his father's business.<ref name=dnb>Dictionary of National Biography (1885–1900), by G. C. Boase, Published 1890 a publication now in the public domain.</ref> His first ascent was from the Green Park, London, on 19 July 1821, by order of the government, at the coronation of George IV, in the first ever balloon filled with carburetted hydrogen gas.<ref name=fai/><ref name=dnb/> The trip got into trouble and he had to be rescued by a passing ship captained by the mate, Francis Cheesman, who ran the silk through with his bowsprit, releasing the gas. After that time he made 526 ascents. On 16 August 1828 he ascended from the Eagle Tavern, City Road, on the back of his pony, and after being up for half an hour descended at Beckenham in Kent. In 1836 he constructed the Great Nassau balloon for Gye and Hughes, proprietors of Vauxhall Gardens, from whom he subsequently purchased it for 500 pounds, and on 9 September in that year made the first ascent with it from Vauxhall Gardens, in company with eight persons, and, after remaining in the air about one hour and a half, descended at Cliffe, near Gravesend. On 21 September he made a second ascent, accompanied by eleven persons, and descended at Beckenham in Kent. He also made four other ascents with it from Vauxhall, including the celebrated continental ascent, undertaken at the expense of [[Robert Hollond]], M.P. for Hastings, who, with [[Thomas Monck Mason|Monck Mason]], accompanied him. They left Vauxhall Gardens at 1:30&nbsp;p.m. on 7 November 1836, and, crossing the channel from Dover the same evening, descended the next day, at 7 a.m., at [[Weilburg]] in Nassau, Germany, having travelled altogether about five hundred miles in eighteen hours.<ref name=fai/> This journey was celebrated with a painting by John Hollins that is now in the [[National Portrait Gallery (London)|National Portrait Gallery]] in London.<ref name=hollin>[http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait.php?search=ap&npgno=4710&eDate=&lDate= A Consultation prior to the Aerial Voyage to Weilburgh, 1836], John Hollins, 1836, National Portrait Gallery</ref> The painting shows Green, John Hollins (the artist), Robert Hollond M.P. [[William Milbourne James (judge)|Sir William Milbourne James]], [[Thomas Monck Mason]] and [[Walter Prideaux]].<ref name=hollin/>