SUTTON (Samuel), was born at Alfreton in Derbyshire, and going into the army served under the duke of Marlborough in queen Anne's wars with great credit. He afterwards came to London, commenced brewer, and kept a coffee-house in Aldersgate street, which was well frequented by the learned men of that time, by whom Mr Sutton was much respected, as a man of strong natural parts and uncultivated genius. About the year 1740, he schemed a very simple and natural method for extracting the foul air from the wells of ships, by pipes communicating with the fire places of the coppers; which operated as long as any fire was kept burning for the ship's use. In this happy invention, so conducive to the safety of mariners, he met, however, with a formidable competitor in Dr Stephen Hales; who was at the same time engaged in promoting his own ventilators: tho' these ventilators were by no means so well adapted to sea-use, where room and labour are precious, as Sutton's air pipes; which could scarcely be said to occupy any room, and required no labour to work them, as they produced a regular circulation of air, on philosophical principles. Nevertheless, though Mr Sutton's invention was warmly patronized by Dr Mead and Dr Watson, it was ungenerously discouraged by some leading men in the navy department. Dr Mead annexed an account of these air-pipes, and the history of the author's difficulties in procuring a fair trial to be made of them, to his Discourse on the Scurvy. Mr Sutton took out a patent in 1744, to secure the profits of his invention to himself; and died about the year 1752.
SUTTON'S Air-pipes. See AIR-Pipes.