Griess, Johann Peter

(b. Kirchhosbach, Germany, 6 September 1829; d. Bournemouth, England, 30 August 1888)

chemistry.

The son of a blacksmith, Griess began his advanced studies in Kassel at the Polytechnic, aimed at an agricultural career, then went on to Jena and Marburg. He was a rebellious and idle student, always in trouble with the authorities, but after a short period at the well-known tar distillery at Offenbach he became more subdued and returned to Marburg to work under A. W. H. Kolbe. His career was launched in 1858, when A. W. von Hofmann, who had been impressed by an early paper, invited him to London.

Griess struck everyone both by the eccentricity of his dress and by the excellence of his work. After three years a well-executed investigation for Allsopp and Sons, the brewers, brought him an appointment as chemist in their brewery at Burton-on-Trent, which he held until his death. Griess married Louisa Anna Mason in 1869; they had two sons and two daughters. He became a fellow of the Royal Society and was one of the founders of the Institute of Chemistry.

Griess’s main contribution to chemistry had nothing to do with brewing but stemmed from the early discovery which Hofmann had noted, the formation of a new type of organic nitrogen compound by the action of nitrous acid on certain amines. Between 1860 and 1866 Griess developed the chemistry of this diazo reaction, which was mainly of theoretical interest at first, extending the work of Rafaelle Piria and Ernst Gerland, who had noted the action of nitrous fumes on anthranilic acid, yielding salicylic acid and nitrogen. Griess found that the reaction with picramic acid in alcohol yielded a new type of nitrogen compound for which he devised the name diazodinitrophenol, the first use of the term “diazo.” Studies on aniline produced explosive compounds too unstable to have any application. Further studies with other reactions showed that the diazo reaction was a versatile route to new compounds, but it was not until 1864 that, by coupling diazotized aniline with napthylamine, Griess opened up the general way to a new class of coloring substances. The azo dyes came under intense investigation and thousands were patented.

In 1884 Griess, simultaneously with Böttiger, discovered dyes capable of coloring cotton without a mordant. None of Griess’s patents proved lucrative, although others made fortunes. He died content with his position as a practicing brewery chemist pursuing organic research as a hobby.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

A list of Griess’s writings may be found in Poggendorff. III, 548-549; and IV, 533.

Several sketches of Griess’s life derive from E. Fischer, in Berichte der Deutschen Chemischen Gesellschaft, 24 (1891), 1007-1078, with portrait. An appreciation of his chemical work in relation to the structure of dyes is in F. A. Mason, in Journal of the Society of Dyers and Colourists, 46 (Feb. 1930), 33-39. See also H. Grossmann, in G. Bugge, ed., Das Buch der grossen Chemiker, II (Berlin, 1930), 217–228.

Frank Greenaway