Page:EB1922 - Volume 32.djvu/1129

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WRENBURY—WURTTEMBERG
1089

army numbering 45,000 trained soldiers was unable to defend a front of 400 km. against the overwhelming number of Bolsheviks, well provided with heavy artillery and unlimited munitions. The isthmus of Perikop had to be abandoned in consequence of a turning movement by the Reds across the "Putrid Sea." On Nov. 15 Sevastopol was occupied by the Bolsheviks.

The evacuation of the army and of thousands of refugees was carried out in good order under the personal supervision of Wrangel, who was the last to leave on board the " Korniloff." A total of 130,000 people were evacuated, of whom 70,000 were soldiers (30,000 fighting men, and 40,000 from the rear), about 7,600 wounded, the rest being civilians. One hundred and fifty million fr. were advanced by the French Government for the relief of the arrriy and refugees, who were in the most awful condition. The refugees were sent to Lemnos, to Egypt and to Yugoslavia.

Wrangel hoped that the evacuation would enable him to keep his army together as a fighting unit to be used at the first op- portunity against the Bolsheviks. The excellent discipline and gallantry of the troops and their devotion to their chief favoured such a plan; but it could not be effected without the support of the Allies, and this resource proved to be exhausted.

The French Government, which had done most for the forces in the Crimea, was unwilling to continue a policy which it con- sidered hopeless. M. Leygues, the successor of M. Millerand as prime minister, demanded categorically the disbandment of Wrangel's army, and the General was directed to announce to the troops that he was not their chief any more and that they were free to disband. About 10,000 were " repatriated " to Soviet Russia, about 12,000 accommodated in Serbia and Brazil. The best part of the army kept together in the camp of Gallipoli in their regimental formations, maintaining according to the testimony of foreign officers excellent discipline and sturdy spirit. The problem as to what was to be done with these picked troops -was still unsolved in the winter of 1921. France had withdrawn her support; Serbia had taken over 5,000 cavalry to serve as frontier guards; the rest were expecting assistance from Russian institutions abroad, such as the Russian embassies in Washington and Tokio, and from the intervention of the League of Nations. (P. Vi.)


WRENBURY, HENRY BURTON BUCKLEY, 1ST BARON (1845- ), English judge, was born in London Sept. 15 1845. His father was for many years vicar of St. Mary's, Paddington, and Arabella Buckley, the author of The Fairy Land of Science (1878), was his sister. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' school and Christ's College, Cambridge, being ninth wrangler in 1868. In 1869 he was called to the bar, and rose to a position of eminence as an authority on company law. He became a Q.C. in 1886 and a bencher of Lincoln's Inn in 1891, while from 1883 to 1898 he was a member of the Bar Committee and the Bar Council. In 1900 he was made a judge of the Chancery division, and in 1906 became a lord justice of appeal and a privy councillor. He retired in 1915, and was raised to the peerage, his high legal authority adding strength to the House of Lords. Lord Wrenbury founded in 1904 the Buckley scholarship in political economy at Cambridge, later styled the Wrenbury scholarship, to be held by scholars from Merchant Taylors' school. His Law under the Companies Acts (1873; gth ed. 1909) is a standard work.


WRIGHT, SIR ALMROTH EDWARD (1861- ), British bacteriologist, was born at Middleton Tyas, Yorks, Aug. 10 1861. He was educated at Dublin University, and afterwards studied law, subsequently obtaining his medical and scientific education at the universities of Leipzig, Strassburg and Marburg. In 1887 he became a demonstrator of pathology at Cambridge, in 1889 went to Sydney as lecturer in physiology, and from 1892 to 1902 was professor at the army medical school at Netley, being then appointed professor of experimental pathology in the university of London. He was knighted in 1906. Sir Almroth Wright came into prominence primarily by his remarkable researches into the problems of parasitic diseases. He introduced the system of anti-typhoid inoculation (see 20.775, 783), and also did much valuable work on the preparation of other vaccines and toxins, while he carried out many important experiments in bacterial infection and in measuring the protective matter of human blood. He acted as a consulting physician to the army in France from 1914-9, and was in 1918 created K.B.E. He has published System of Anti-Typhoid Inoculation (1904); Principles of Microscopy (1906) and Studies in Immunisation (1909), be- sides many papers in medical and scientific periodicals. In 1913 appeared The Unexpurgated Case against Woman Suffrage, which provoked much discussion.


WRIGHT, WILBUR (1867-1912), American inventor, was born near Millville, Ind., April 16 1867. He was the son of Milton Wright, a bishop of the United Brethren in Christ. He secured a high-school education in Richmond, Ind., and Dayton, O. Together with his brother Orville he opened a shop for repairing bicycles at Dayton in the early 'nineties. The Wright brothers early became interested in the problem of flying, and from about 1900 made many experiments with gliding machines at Kitty- hawk, N.C. On Dec. 17 1903 such a machine with a petrol motor attached flew 260 yd., the first successful flight of an aeroplane; and on Oct. 5 1905, near Dayton, they accomplished their first successful long flight, more than 24 m., at the speed of 38 m. an hour. In spite of this proof of the practicability of flight in heavier-than-air machines, they were unsuccessful in enlisting financial support in America. In 1908 Wilbur Wright went to France, and on Sept. 21 won the Michelin prize by a flight of 56 miles. This brought him international fame. In Dec. of the same year he made from Le Mans, France, a flight of 77 m. in 2 hours and 20 minutes. In 1909, during the Hudson- Fulton Exposition in New York City, he flew from Governor's I. up the Hudson river to Grant's tomb and back, travelling 21 m. in 33 minutes and 33 seconds. On March 3 1 909 Congress awarded the Wright brothers a special medal. Later the U.S. Government purchased a machine for $30,000, and afterwards the invention was officially adopted by the U.S. army. The French patents were sold for $100,000. After 1910 Wilbur Wright gave up public flying and devoted his time to mechanical improvement of the Wright machine. He received many medals and honours from European countries. He died at Dayton, May 30 1912.

His brother, ORVILLE WRIGHT (1871- ), was born at Dayton, O., Aug. 18 1871. He was educated in the Dayton schools, worked with his brother Wilbur in the bicycle repairing business, and was closely associated with him in all his experi- ments in developing a practicable aeroplane. He shared in the many honours awarded by foreign countries, and after the death of his brother became director of the Wright Aeronautical Laboratory at Dayton. In 1913 he received the Collier trophy for developing the automatic stabilizer. In 1915 he was appointed a member of the U.S. Naval Consulting Board. The same year the Wright Aeroplane Co. sold its patents to a New York syndicate, Orville Wright remaining chief engineer.


WRIGHT, WILLIAM ALOIS (1836-1914), English man of letters (see 28.847), died at Cambridge May 19 1914. His last publication was The Hexaplar Psalter (1911). In 1912 he resigned the vice-mastership of Trinity College, Cambridge, and lived in retirement till his death.


WUNDT, WILHELM MAX (1832-1920), German philosopher (see 28.855), died at Leipzig Sept. I 1920. His principal work was done before 1907. At the outset of the World War he published an address justifying Germany, and his Die Nationen und ihre Philosophen (1915) eulogizes German thought and culture whilst belittling those of England and France.


WÜRTTEMBERG (see 28.856). Pop. according to 1919 census, 2,518,773. During 1910-1921 the constitutional question in Wurttemberg passed through decisive developments. The constitution dating from Sept. 20 1819 was one of the oldest in Germany. Created by a contract between the King and the Assembly of Estates, it was based upon the people's will and could, for that very reason, be maintained almost without alteration for close upon a century.

The first alteration of any importance was made in 1906, when Wurttemberg introduced, before any other German state, the proportional system of election for the Second Chamber of