Wales and the Bomb: The Role of Welsh Scientists and Engineers in the UK Nuclear Programme

by John Baylis

Overview

Nuclear weapons pose very difficult ethical, scientific, engineering, and industrial problems. Given the continuing contemporary debate about the utility or otherwise of nuclear weapons, it is instructive to look back at the evolution of the British nuclear program, a fascinating story in which Wales and some of its leading scientists and engineers played a significant role in developing atomic and later thermonuclear weapons.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781786833617
Publisher:	University of Wales Press
Publication date:	01/09/2019
Series:	Scientists of Wales
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	160
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

This book is aimed at undergraduate and postgraduate level.

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CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

A brief history of atomic energy research

We now know a great deal about the science and technology of atomic energy. We know that atoms are constructed like miniature solar systems. At the centre of the atom is the nucleus, with electrons orbiting around it. We know that the nucleus is made up of protons and neutrons, packed together very tightly. Hydrogen, the lightest element has one proton while uranium, the heaviest natural element, has ninety-two protons. We also know that the nucleus is held together with great force, indeed it is 'the strongest force in nature'. We now know also that when it is bombarded with a neutron, it can split apart in a process called fission. We know that because uranium nuclei are so large, the nuclear force that binds them together is relatively weak, making uranium good for fission. In the fission process excess neutrons are released which can trigger a chain reaction causing a massive release of energy.

All of this knowledge however was the result of the work of many philosophers and scientists going as far back as the Greek philosopher, Leucippus and his pupil, Democritus, in the fifth century BC. It was Democritus who first used the word 'atom', meaning 'not divisible', to define the smallest constituent of matter. It was not, however, until the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that more scientific ideas about the atom emerged. Isaac Newton, the greatest scientist of his day, argued in his Optics that matter was formed in solid, hard, impenetrable Particles. In the nineteenth century John Dalton, a British chemist, wrote a book entitled A New System of Chemical Philosophy in which he argued that elements are formed from certain combinations of atoms and that all atoms of the same element are identical. Dalton also believed that atoms were hard indestructible spheres, like billiard balls. He saw chemical compounds as simple geometrical arrangements of these spheres.

The next major development in atomic theory came with Faraday's work in 1833–4 on the effects resulting from the passage of electricity through a solution of a chemical compound. This led him to the conclusion that associated with each atom in solution is a definite quantity of electricity which is the same for the atoms of all elements. Some years later Johnstone Stoney argued that Faraday's work had shown that electricity exists in separate portions, atoms of electricity, to which he gave the name electron. This opened up ideas in the scientific community in the 1880s that there was a common unit of electric charge and that atoms had some kind of structure which might mean that, contrary to previous thinking, they might not be impenetrable.

The 1890s were a particularly productive era for atomic theory. In 1897 J. J. Thomson of the Cavendish laboratory in Cambridge published evidence that proved the existence of a negatively charged particle with a mass about one two-thousandth of that of a hydrogen atom. These particles, now known as electrons, demonstrated the existence of an entity common to all matter, a building block for atoms. Two years earlier Wilhelm Roentgen in Germany was experimenting with cathode rays in a glass tube in which a discharge was taking place when he noticed that radiation was emitted that was capable of penetrating opaque objects. He called this radiation x-rays. The fluorescent effect associated with x-rays led a French scientist, Henri Becquerel, in 1896 to study the fluorescent salts of the element uranium. He found that the salts emitted radiation and that the radiation belonged to the element uranium itself. Marie Curie gave the name radioactivity to this property of spontaneously emitting ionising radiation. Marie Curie and her husband Pierre went on to do further research on uranium and in 1898 they isolated two new elements that exhibited spontaneous energy production: polonium and radium.

At much the same time Ernest Rutherford, working initially in Cambridge and then at McGill University in Montreal, was working on the radiations emitted by uranium. He discovered that there were two types of rays which he called alpha and beta rays. The alpha rays are streams of heavy, positively charged particles which emerge from the radioactive atoms with great energy, but are not very penetrating. Beta rays are also streams of particles, (electrons) light in weight, negatively charged and moderately penetrating, which could be stopped by a thin sheet of metal. At the same time a French scientist, Paul Ulrich Villard, discovered gamma rays. These are electromagnetic waves, similar to x-rays, which are very penetrating and can only be stopped by lead or a similar heavy material.

In 1900 Rutherford began work with Frederick Soddy from Oxford. By studying the nature of radioactivity they reached the revolutionary conclusion that atoms were not indestructible. After returning to Manchester University in 1907 Rutherford continued his experiments with alpha particles and in 1909 undertook one of the crucial experiments in physics, investigating the extent to which a beam of alpha particles is spread out after passing through thin metal foil. The results led Rutherford to propose a nuclear model of the atom. His idea 'was that the atom consisted of a central positively-charged nucleus in which most of the mass of the atom is concentrated, surrounded by a distribution of electrons'. In 1917 he succeeded his old Professor J. J. Thomson in the Cavendish chair in Cambridge where he continued his work exploring the structure of the nucleus. Working with James Chadwick in 1920 he highlighted the importance of the hydrogen nucleus in the structure of atoms which he called the proton.

Rutherford also speculated about the possible existence of an uncharged entity which could explain gamma radiation. It was James Chadwick, however, in 1932 who discovered the neutron. Research by Bothe and Becker in 1930 involving the alpha particle bombardment of certain light elements resulted in the emission of a penetrating radiation which they took to be gamma radiation. Chadwick realised that the radiation was more penetrating than any known hitherto and was able to establish that it was made up of particles of mass nearly equal to that of the proton and with no net charge. As Margaret Gowing has pointed out, 'with the discovery of the neutron the picture of the structure of the atom took the form that it still has, in essence, today. The miniature solar system ... (in which) the nucleus is made up of protons and neutrons', with electrons circulating around it.

Chadwick's discovery of the neutron led to experiments by Enrico Fermi in Rome in which he demonstrated that artificial radioactivity could be produced by bombarding even the heaviest elements with neutrons. In 1934 he found that one of the elements that could be activated by neutron bombardment was uranium, the heaviest naturally occurring element. Fermi's experiments were followed up by a number of other scientists, including Lise Meitner, Otto Hahn, Frederic and Irene Joliot-Curie, Fritz Strassmann, Otto Frisch and Niels Bohr. Meitner was forced to leave Germany in July 1938 because of Hitler's persecution of the Jews and during Christmas of the same year she worked with her nephew, Otto Frisch, on the latest ideas about the effects of neutron bombardment of uranium. Their conclusion was that the arrival of a neutron in a uranium nucleus would set up violent internal motions in the nucleus and cause it to split into two more or less equal fragments. Frisch called this fission because of its similarity to the division of a biological cell. Meitner and Frisch calculated that the nuclear reaction would lead to enormous energy being released, up to 200,000,000 electron volts, as the fission fragments flew apart. Frisch's verification of these ideas was published in the journal Nature in February 1939 setting 'the world of physics in an uproar'. Frisch subsequently worked with Rudolph Peierls at Birmingham University producing what Per F. Dahl has described as the 'theoretical flicker', which was to lead to the breakthrough in atomic energy research.

Structure of the book

The annus mirabilis of nuclear physics was 1939 with major discoveries taking place on the outbreak of the Second World War. This provides the starting point for the book's second chapter. The aim of the chapter is to look at a number of facilities in Wales that played a role in the early atomic energy experiments and the role of a number of Welshmen who played a critical part in events which led to the development of the first atomic weapons in 1945. Chapter 3 then looks at the major events in the UK in the post-war period which led to the decision to develop an independent British nuclear force after wartime collaboration with the United States ended, and the creation of a team of scientists and engineers that actually developed atomic and subsequently thermonuclear weapons in the 1950s and early 1960s. Having set the broader context chapter 4 goes on to look at the role played in this programme by a significant number of Welsh scientists and engineers. The chapter looks at their role in the nuclear testing programme and in the re-establishment of a close nuclear partnership with the United States from 1958 which developed further with the sale of Polaris missiles to Britain in 1963. Chapter 5 then returns to the broader context and looks at the key developments in the 1960s through to the 1990s when the UK took the decision to upgrade its nuclear force with the Polaris nuclear improvement programme and eventually decided to replace the force with a new Trident missile bought again from the United States, continuing the special nuclear relationship through to the end of the Cold War and beyond. Chapter 6 charts the contribution of a new generation of Welsh scientists and engineers to the British nuclear programme as it evolved to the present day. The book ends with a discussion of why so many Welsh scientists and engineers, amongst the best that Wales has produced, contributed in significant ways to the story of one of the greatest (and controversial) scientific events of the twentieth century.

CHAPTER 2

WALES AND THE WARTIME ORIGINS OF ATOMIC ENERGY

Britain was the first state that decided it was necessary to develop an atomic weapons capability. In September 1939, two days before war broke out, the Danish physicist Niels Bohr and an American colleague, J. A. Wheeler, published a paper outlining the theory of uranium fission. Their paper highlighted the importance of the fissile isotope uranium-235, which would have to be separated from uranium-238. They did not believe, however, that such separation would be possible. In March 1940, two physicists in Birmingham University, Rudolph Peierls and Otto Frisch wrote a memorandum not only showing that a lump of U-235 of just 5 kg would produce an immensely large reaction needed for an atomic explosion, but also suggesting an industrial method of separating U-235. Following on from the work of Rudolf Peierls and Otto Frisch the British wartime government set up the Maud Committee consisting of six eminent scientists, to study the possibility of developing a nuclear weapon. In July 1940, the committee completed its report with three main recommendations. First, it argued that it was possible to construct a uranium super bomb which was 'likely to lead to decisive results in the war'. Secondly, it recommended that the work on such a bomb should be continued as the 'highest priority and on the increasing scale necessary to obtain the weapon in the shortest possible time'. And thirdly, that 'the present collaboration with America should be continued and extended especially in the region of experimental work'. The highest priority that needed to be given to the project, the report argued, was due to the fact that Germany was also working on uranium research and 'the lines on which we are now working are such as would be likely to suggest themselves to any capable physicist'.

The committee accepted that it was possible that the bomb might not be produced by the time the war ended but the members believed that the prodigious explosive power of such weapons was likely to be of such military significance in the future that every effort should be made to develop them as soon as possible. The report argued that:

Even if the war should end before the bombs are ready, the effort would not be wasted, except in the unlikely event of complete disarmament, since no nation would care to risk being caught without a weapon of such decisive possibilities.

Eddie Bowen and the Tizard Mission

A copy of the report was taken to the United States in the summer of 1941 with the US still neutral and groups of scientists were, in a rather unfocused manner, working on the possibilities of the bomb. It was only after receiving the Maud Report that the US took the project more seriously, and even before Pearl Harbour, the Manhattan Project was set up. By this time Britain had set up an organization with the code name 'Tube Alloys' with the aim of establishing the research and industrial programme necessary to develop atomic weapons.

One Welshman, Edward ('Eddie') George Bowen, played a key role in passing on the information contained in the Frisch-Peierls Memorandum to the United States, and thereby establishing the close Anglo-American nuclear collaboration that was to follow. Eddie Bowen was the son of a sheet metal worker from Cockett, near Swansea. He joined Swansea University as a brilliant scholar at the very young age of 16 and graduated with a first-class honours degree in physics in 1930. He had a masters degree in science at the age of 19 and completed his PhD at King's College, London in 1934. His research attracted the attention of R. A. Watson-Watt and he became part of his team at Orfordness working on experimental ground radar. As part of this team he made a major contribution to the development of aircraft radar, establishing himself by the outbreak of the war as one of the leading British scientists of the day. In August 1940 he was chosen to be part of a mission led by Sir Henry Tizard (and including Professor Cockcroft) to visit the United States (before they had joined the war) to pass on Britain's most important military secrets, including a sample of a cavity magnetron and details of Britain's latest uranium research. Bowen was responsible for carrying the metal deed box (known as 'Tizard's Briefcase') containing all the technological secrets. When he arrived at Euston station he handed it to a porter and as he gathered up his belongings he watched the porter disappear into the crowd in search of the boat train to Liverpool. Fortunately, he was eventually re-united with the box and, following the sea voyage, delivered it, with his colleagues to the United States.

In discussions with American scientists, Tizard and Cockcroft discovered that although similar research was being undertaken in the US (especially by Enrico Fermi at Columbia University) the research was several months behind that conducted in Britain. The findings of the Maud Reports were also passed on to the US later in 1941 and played an important part in accelerating the US nuclear programme. (Bowen's work played a major part in the Battle of the Atlantic for which he was awarded the OBE in 1941 and the US Medal of Freedom in 1947. He went on to have a very distinguished scientific career in the field of radiophysics in Australia after the war.)

The atomic scientist: Evan James Williams

Included in the research passed on to the Americans during the Tizard Mission was information about the MDS (magnetic detection of submarines) system which had been developed by another Welsh scientist, Evan James Williams. Williams was born in 1903 in Cwmsychbant in Ceredigion. His father was a stonemason. He went to school in Llandysul and at the age of 16 won a scholarship to Swansea University where he studied physics. After obtaining a first-class honours degree in 1923, followed by a masters degree, he did research under Lawrence Bragg at Manchester University, obtaining his doctorate in 1926. This was followed by another degree at the Cavendish Laboratory where he studied under Ernest Rutherford. His research focused on atomic collisions and sub-atomic particles, involving the impact of fast electrons on atoms. In 1933 he spent a year working with one of the greatest scientists of his day, Niels Bohr, in Copenhagen. He later went on to lecture in physics at Manchester University and Liverpool University, where he worked with James Chadwick. In 1938 at the age of 35 he was appointed to the chair of physics at Aberystwyth University and in 1939 he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society. When war broke out he joined the experimental physicist, P. M. S. Blackett, at RAE Farnborough to work on methods to stop the U-boat threat to British wartime shipping. He often discussed his work with Winston Churchill. His research, passed on to the Americans in 1940, was taken up with great enthusiasm by American scientists.

(Continues…)

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Table of Contents

Series Editor's Foreword, ix,
List of Illustrations, xi,
Acknowledgements, xiii,
Preface, xv,
1 Introduction, 1,
2 Wales and the Wartime Origins of Atomic Energy, 7,
3 The British Nuclear Programme from the 1940s to the 1960s, 21,
4 The Role of Welsh Scientists and Engineers in the Early British Nuclear Programme, 39,
5 The British Nuclear Programme from Chevaline to Trident, 63,
6 The Involvement of Welsh Scientists and Engineers in the British Nuclear Programme from the 1960s to the Present Day, 91,
7 Conclusion, 113,
Notes, 119,
Appendix 1: Welsh scientists and engineers involved in the Atomic Energy Programme, 133,
Appendix 2: The Duff-Mason Report, 135,
Select Bibliography, 151,
Index, 153,

Editorial Reviews

John Baylis has already written extensively on the British nuclear programme. Now, in introducing us to the disproportionate number of Welsh scientists and engineers involved in the early Bomb programme, he adds to the story a welcome and revealing human dimension.”

 

Sir Lawrence Freedman

A foremost international authority on the history of nuclear weapons, John Baylis has produced an illuminating study of the role of Welsh scientists and engineers in the development of Britain’s atomic and thermonuclear weapons. Wales and the Bomb will prove of fascination for students of British nuclear history and for anyone interested in the cultural history of technology in Wales and Britain since the Second World War.”

 

Len Scott

Nuclear weapons pose difficult moral problems. They also involve complex scientific challenges. In this interesting study, John Baylis focuses on the role of scientists and engineers, mostly born and brought up in Wales, in the development of the British nuclear weapons programme over the past seventy years. It is a fascinating and surprising story.”

 

Robin Williams