John 'Mad Jack' Fuller - Later Life

Later Life

Fuller was a supporter and sponsor of the Royal Institution in London. He acted as mentor and supporter of the young Michael Faraday. In 1818 he loaned the Institution £1000 (about £100,000 in today's value) and later wrote off this debt. In 1828 he established the Fuller medal of the Royal Institution and in early 1833 he founded the Fullerian Professorship of Chemistry to which Michael Faraday was appointed as the first professor. Later he also endowed the institution with the Fullerian Professorship of Physiology.

In 1818, Fuller built the Observatory at Brightling which had been designed by Robert Smirke, and in 1822, he endowed Eastbourne in Sussex with its first lifeboat. In 1828, he financed the building of the Belle Tout lighthouse, on the cliff at Beachy Head, near Eastbourne. The first Belle Tout lighthouse was a temporary wooden structure that started service on 1 October 1828. The construction of the permanent granite lighthouse began in 1829 and it became operational on 11 October 1834. On Thursday, 18 September 1828, Jack Fuller bought Bodiam Castle for 3000 guineas at auction to save it from destruction.

On the afternoon of Friday, 11 April 1834, Fuller died at his home, 36 Devonshire Place, London. He was buried under the Pyramid in Brightling churchyard. The main beneficiaries of his will were his nephew, Peregrine Palmer Fuller Palmer Acland (1789–1871)and General Sir Augustus Elliot Fuller(1777–1857) who was John Fuller's first cousin once removed.