Copper gauze in two pieces in a bag. Copper is an extremely versatile coinage metal. It is malleable and is a good conductor of both heat and electricity. It is used in the alloys bronze and brass and is chemically reactive. It could be used in a range of different experiments.

This copper gauze comes from a 15-drawer cabinet found in the Herschel family home in the 1950s. Collectively the contents of this and a similar cabinet seems to suggest that they were used by successive generations of the family to store specimens, material and apparatus for carrying out experiments. This copper gauze was presumably used by John FW Herschel and/ or his children (it may even have been used by John FW with his children) as the raw materials for experiments.