This is a three part story. Firstly Charles Babbage's ancestors through the ages, secondly, his own history - his life as a child and a teenager (and also his family life and his relationship with the remarkable Ada Bryon), and thirdly what inspired him to want to build a computer and his life as an inventor. Was one of his ancestors Queen Mary's cousin? Her name is significant and she was the first person to greet Queen Mary when she arrived back to England to take the throne. Difficult times lay ahead for the Babbage ancestors as Cromwell had them on his hit list. A few survived the Civil War only to be confronted by plague, famine and a mini ice age. Some of his them packed their bags for America others brazened it out becoming part of the emerging oligarchy of Totnes and Dartmouth. These ancestors amassed wealth into the millions over the years. As wealthy as his own parents were they still complained about wasting coal on fires when you could wrap up warm, and how boiling a kettle for hot water was an extravagance. Charles had a difficult relationship with his father he wrote that his father 'believes nothing he hears and only half of what he sees... he is stern, inflexible and reserved... never generous... and a temper the most horrid which can be conceived. He seeks the happiness of no earthly being, he lives without a friend. A tyrant in his family, his presence occasions silence and gloom... he deserves to be miserable. Can such a man be loved? It is impossible.' Did Charles invent the computer to assist shipping arriving into Teignmouth Docks? He owned a yacht moored in the harbour, he had studied navigation. He knew the log table used for navigational calculation were inaccurate. He wrote 'what a breakthrough the corrections of these tables would mean to the safety of tens of thousands of ships upon the ocean, the accuracy of the coast surveys, the exact position of light houses, the track of every shore from headland to headland, the latitude and longitude of mid-sea islands. the course and motion of the current direction and speed of the winds, bearing and distance of mountains and in short everything which constitutes the chief elements of international commerce in modern times depends upon the fullness and accuracy of the tables'. A remarkable man in any age.
About the Author: Lucy Simister lives and works on the edge of Dartmoor in Devon and has had a keen interest in history and biography - especially when there is a local focus. She has written about other famous people who have had a connection with the South West - Charles Dickens, Elizabeth Barrett and John Keats. She has also written children's books, plays and a musical.