Book : Newton And The Counterfeiter by Thomas Levenson
Krishna
Newton was the Warden of the Royal Mint and he was forever trying to find and hang counterfeiters, who produced illegal cash and circulating them in the economy.
He was greatly successful by his wit. What is surprising is that he took up that position after garnering God like status in science as a professor in Cambridge. But he met his match in the master counterfeiter William Chaloner.
OK, this is supposed to be the story; however, and to most readers’ utter delight, the story is about Newton’s life as a whole and how he came from farming stock and how he made progress towards his significant and breathtaking discoveries by his inquisitive mind, his perseverance and his dogged pursuit of myriad subjects that peaked the interest of his brilliant and curious mind.
Isaac Newton was a country boy, born to Hannah Newton in 1642. (He was born on Christmas day!). He was premature, and his father had died three months ago. His father had left enough wealth to his mother Hannah. The boy was premature and they waited three days to see if he will survive before they named him Isaac, after his father. Since his mother remarried, he was left in the care of his grandmother to be looked after.
As a child he was good with tools and built accurate water clocks and sun dials as a young boy. His superior intellect was obvious even at the grammar school he enrolled in.
He joined Trinity College due to his cleverness but that was the case with many other country students as well.
His mother hated his reading and inventing and wanted him to be a good farmer. He failed at his task, daydreaming or stealing off to the library when he should be looking after sheep! He finally got entry to Trinity college (Cambridge) but his mother, out of spite, refused to pay for the studies, limiting his funds to ten pounds a year. So he had to do menial jobs (waiting on other students and eating leftovers) to get by. He wrote down all his sins, including ‘stealing plums from mom’s box’ and ‘striking my sister’.
As soon as he won the scholarship in Trinity, the bubonic plague entered England. Brought by rats from Holland ships, the plague swept the region and overwhelmed the burial capacity that corpses were mass interred with very little dignity.
Anyway, Newton now publishes his treatise that elevates him to instant celebrity status, and the world fetes him as the greatest living scientist.
Meanwhile Chaloner starts with petty crimes and in London, learns the basics of counterfeiting from various people who teach him tricks. Soon he becomes adept at fashioning the newly complex coins that the Royal Mint produced which is supposedly unduplicatable.
The author takes us through the introduction of paper money (mainly to aid the war effort of the King who was pouring enormous money into a war with France).
I was under the impression that this was going to be a cat and mouse game with the master counterfeiter Chaloner and the master detective Newton. It is not so. (Maybe because it is not from the fertile imagination of a writer but is based on real events). Chaloner bravely goes against Newton trying to impress the parliamentarians that the management of the Mint ‘is a disgrace’. He comes very close to humiliating Newton as well as gaining entry into the Mint as ‘an expert who can suggest ways to make the coinage inimitable.
The rest of the story reads like a chaotic battle between Chaloner and the single minded Newton. Chaloner had no chance against the meticulously planned case against him. He does not, as we said, come across as a mastermind; he did make sure that he was not directly linked with the fake coins or fake tickets that were like cash but he could not even resist the temptation to boast. With the prison and his accomplishes all being threatened/ cajoled/ bribed by Newton, many of these folks were Newton’s spies themselves.
Two surprises come out of this narration. One is Newton’s apparent glee in using violent methods to extract confessions – mainly from criminals caught – and the second is how the legal system of those days both did not allow a lawyer to be assigned for the accused (‘lest a criminal profit from the learned knowledge of the professional who understands law’ was the strange reason given to it) and the willingness in many cases to skirt the boundaries of the law in order to deliver justice as the judge / jurors saw it.
And ironically, the book takes off again after Chaloner was executed and is no longer in the picture! Newton becoming the Master of the mint on his success in recoinage and thus becoming wealthy; the recoinage failing due to the same flaw (the silver in the new coins also could get more gold from abroad so was melted by those who saw an opportunity). Newton, the mathematical genius, falling for an investment in the old pyramid scheme known as the South Sea Bubble and losing a princely sum of 20000 pounds.
And his turning back to science to publish another book that is famous today after Principia.
All in all, a profitable read on an unusual subject.
6/10
– Krishna