Kater

Kater, HENRY, an English physicist, was born at Bristol, 16th April 1777. Entering the army in 1799, he went out to India, and was actively engaged in the great trigonometrical survey. Ill-health compelled him to return home in 1808; then, after labouring for six years in the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, he retired on half-pay. He died in London on 26th April 1835. His contributions to science are chiefly to be found in the Philosophical Transactions between 1813 and 1832. The most important of his memoirs relate to the determination of the length of the seconds pendulum at the latitude of London; the 'floating collimator,' an instrument for aiding the determination of the horizontal or zenith points, for which invention he received the gold medal of the Royal Astronomical Society; the British standards of length and mass; and compass needles. Conjointly with Dr Lardner, he was the author of 'A Treatise on Mechanics' in the Cabinet Cyclopædia. For the emperor of Russia he verified the Russian standards of length.