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Microscopic Hemin Crystals
1853 Ludwig Teichmann, in Kracow, Poland, developed the first microscopic crystal test for hemoglobin using hemin crystals -
Period: to
1850-1900
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The 'Heme'
In 1853, L.Teichmann discovered and named 'heme,' the non-protein, iron-bearing part of blood (Teichmann 1853). -
Dry Plate Photography
An English physician, Maddox, developed dry plate photography, eclipsing M. Daguerre’s wet plate on tin method.
This made practical the photographing of inmates for prison records. -
Arsenic Test
English chemist James Marsh used chemical processes to confirm arsenic as the cause of death in an 1836 murder trial. -
Measurements
As a way of identifying criminals, a Belgian prison warden begins taking measurements of prisoners' heads, ears, feet, and height. -
Guaiac (West Indian Shrub)
The Dutch scientist J. (Izaak) Van Deen developed a presumptive test for blood using guaiac, a West Indian shrub. -
Handcuffs
On June 17, 1862, inventor W. V. Adams patented handcuffs that used adjustable ratchets - the first modern handcuffs. -
Photography
Odelbrecht first advocated the use of photography for the identification of criminals and the documentation of
evidence and crime scenes. -
Telegraph
The use of the telegraph by fire and police departments begins in Albany, New York in 1877. -
Anthopometry
Alphonse Bertillon, a French police employee, identified the first recidivist based on his invention of anthropometry. -
Sherlock Holmes Books
Sherlock Holmes, the fictional character created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in works produced from 1887 to 1915, used forensic science as one of his investigating methods -
Anthropology
Chicago is the first U.S. city to adopt the Bertillon system of identification. Alphonse Bertillon, a French criminologist, applies techniques of human body measurement used in anthropological classification to the identification of criminals. -
Fingerprints
1892 (Sir) Francis Galton published Fingerprints, the first comprehensive book on the nature of fingerprints and their use
in solving crime. -
Handwriting Analysis
Alfred Dreyfus of France was convicted of treason based on a mistaken handwriting identification by Bertillon. -
Ballistics
1898 Paul Jesrich, a forensic chemist working in Berlin, Germany, took photomicrographs of two bullets to compare, and
subsequently individualize, the minutiae.
