Lord Byron’s daughter Lady Ada King was the world’s first computer programmer

A brilliant English noblewoman born during an ill-fated union between a wild romantic poet and religious mathematics student would set the world on a path to endless possibilities

Ada as a young woman .

If someone were to ask you to imagine what the world’s first computer programmer looked like, it is a safe bet you would not describe a woman in crinoline. But historians of computer science acknowledge that Lady Ada King, Countess of Lovelace, better known simply as Ada Lovelace, was a programming pioneer.

Despite being the daughter of the passionate Romantic era poet, she had a brilliant mind for maths and logic.

Today is the bicentenary of her birth, a day that by rights should be set aside to celebrate the impact computer programming has had on modern life.

Ada’s father was George Gordon, Lord Byron. The scandalous romantic poet doggedly pursued Annabella “Anne” Milbanke, the woman who would become Ada’s mother.

Milbanke had been educated by a Cambridge professor, developing a fascination for mathematics as a girl. She was also deeply religious and felt it was her mission to reform the wild poet, Byron.

Richard Westall’s 1813 portrait of the poet George Lord Byron.

He proposed to her several times before she finally accepted. They married in January 1915 and on December 10, 1815, two centuries ago today, their daughter and only child Augusta was born. Although disappointed at not having a boy, Byron nicknamed her Ada. She was his only child born in wedlock, but his marriage was already in trouble by then. Anne suspected Byron was having an affair with his half sister and that he was going mad.

She left him as much for the sake of Ada as for her own sake and neither Ada or Anne saw him again. He left England in April to escape mounting debts and after rumours surfaced about his relations with his half sister. He died in 1824.

Worried that Ada might inherit some of her father’s characteristics Anne raised the child on a steady diet of science, maths and logic. However, she couldn’t always prevent the child’s passionate nature from emerging.

Ada as a young woman .

At the age of 12 Ada became obsessed with the idea of flying and spent months compiling notes on building wings and powering them with steam, until her mother chided her for neglecting her studies. She produced her own book on the subject titled Flyology.

When she was 18 she had an affair with one of her tutors and tried to elope when the liaison was discovered. Anne was mortified at having to cover up another scandal caused by the hot Byronic blood.

But balancing the passion was the influence of a circle of brilliant minds. Ada came under the advanced tutelage of Augustus De Morgan, the University of London’s first professor of mathematics who coined the term mathematical induction and refined methods of developing mathematical proofs. She was also tutored by the great mathematical genius Mary Sommerville, who became a mentor.

Sommerville also introduced Ada to Charles Babbage in 1833. Babbage had been working on a simple mechanical calculator called a difference engine, when he realised that with some additions he could create what he called an analytical engine.

Charles Babbage (1791-1871), inventor of the analytical engine in 1833, which paved the way for computers.

This device could be used to perform more complex calculations, using punch cards to enter information. He never built the machine but Ada saw his plans and became fascinated by the possibilities of the machine, seeking to understand all of its intricacies. Babbage called her the “enchantress of numbers”.

In 1835 she married scientist and politician William King, 8th Baron King. They had three children, the first in 1836 was a son she named Byron after her father, the second in 1837 was a daughter named Annabella and the third was born in 1839 and named George Gordon. King was made Earl of Lovelace in 1838 and Ada became Countess Lovelace.

In 1844 she published a translation of an Italian mathematician’s article about Babbage’s analytical engine. Her extensive notes were longer than the article itself and included a program for calculating Bernoulli numbers, the world’s first computer program.

She wrote of Babbage’s machine that it “weaves algebraic patterns, just as the Jacquard-loom weaves flowers and leaves”.

Difference Engine No1 designed by Charles Babbage, parts made by Joseph Clements, assembled by Henry Provost Babbage, England, 1822-1879

Some of her father’s traits began to emerge in the 1840s. She became flirtatious although is not known to have had any affairs. She also began to gamble, working on ways to apply her mathematical genius to winning at games of chance. Her scheme landed her in trouble with a gambling syndicate when it failed.

Ada died of cancer in 1852 and at her own request was buried beside her father in the yard of the Church of St Mary Magdalene in Hucknall, Nottinghamshire.

Originally published as Lord Byron’s daughter Lady Ada King was the world’s first computer programmer