J. J. Fahie, who also quotes this passage, says:
“The discovery in question seems to have been made independently, and at about the same time by Gautherot (Philosophical Magazine or Annals for 1828, Vol. IV. p. 458), by P. S. Laplace, and by J. B. Biot (Journal de Physique et de Chimie, for 1801, Vol. LIII. p. 266). The latter made the further very acute observation that, if the wires are attached to plates of metal, and these plates approached by their edges, they will attract one another; while if approached by their faces no action whatever takes place. For other interesting experiments of this kind see ‘Nicholson’s Journal’ for 1804, Vol. VII. p. 304.”
Previous to the aforesaid discoveries, on the 12th Brumaire, An. IX (Nov. 1800), Gautherot had published his refutation of Volta’s contact theory, through the Paris “Société Philotechnique,” and it is to be found recorded at p. 471, Vol. I of the “Mémoires des Sociétés Savantes et Littéraires de la République Française.”
Later on he devoted so much attention to galvanic researches that Messrs. A. F. de Fourcroy and L. N. Vauquelin made a special report upon the five important memoirs containing the results of his many observations to the French Institute on the 21st Fructidor.
The first memoir gives the whole theory and practice of the various kinds of conductors, and describes an apparatus devised by Gautherot to ascertain the conducting powers of different natural, solid, liquid and even gaseous bodies (Izarn, “Manuel du Galvanisme” 1804, pp. 56–60). He enters into full details as to the effects of the voltaic pile in many experiments made upon himself, and draws consequences which apparently disprove the identity of the electric and the galvanic fluids.
The second memoir treats of the galvanic properties of charcoal, and shows that it is a less perfect conductor than are metallic substances.
In the third memoir he makes known his discovery that charcoal and zinc form a galvanic apparatus which will produce shocks, the decomposition of water, etc. He observes “that in the decomposition of water, charcoal decomposes that fluid in the same way with non-oxydable metals; or, in other words, that when two pieces of charcoal are employed for this purpose, one of them disengages the hydrogen gas, and the other the oxygen ... when the portions of charcoal touch each other in the water, its decomposition is not stopped on that account, as happens when metallic substances are brought in contact under the same circumstances. Indeed, if to bring more immediately together, one of the pieces of charcoal be cut in a furcated shape, this does not become an obstacle to the decomposition of the water.”
The fourth memoir treats further of different kinds of conductors, and of various methods of constructing galvanic columns.
In the fifth and last memoir, Gautherot relates his important discovery that an effective galvanic apparatus can be made without metals. He constructed one of forty layers of charcoal and plumbago, which communicated a strong and pungent taste, accompanied by the galvanic flash of light, and which finally produced the decomposition of water, the charcoal side disengaging the hydrogen gas (Izarn, “Manuel du Galvanisme,” 1804, p. 177).
During the month of March 1803, he read before the “Institut National” a memoir entitled “Recherches,” etc. (researches upon the causes which develop electricity in the galvanic apparatus). This appeared in the Journal de Physique, Vol. LVI. p. 429.