Bartholomew Sikes

{{see also|Hydrometer}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

{{Infobox UK legislation

| short_title = Sikes' Hydrometer Act 1816

| type = Act

| parliament = Parliament of the United Kingdom

| long_title = An Act for establishing the Use of an Hydrometer, called Sikes's Hydrometer, in ascertaining the Strength of Spirits, instead of Clarke's Hydrometer.

| year = 1816

| citation = 56 Geo. 3. c. 140

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| royal_assent = 2 July 1816

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| repealing_legislation = Spirits (Strength Ascertainment) Act 1818

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| status = Repealed

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Bartholomew Sikes (died 1803){{cite web |url=https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/people/cp31620/bartholomew-sikes |title=Bartholomew Sikes |website=Collections |publisher=Science Museum Group |access-date=30 December 2020}} was an officer in the employ of HM Excise who in the late 18th century perfected a device by which the alcoholic content of a liquid can be measured.{{cite journal |last1=Tate |first1=Francis G. H. |date=14 March 1931 |title=Bartholomew Sikes's System of Alcoholometry |url=https://www.nature.com/articles/127398a0 |journal=Nature |volume=127 |issue=3202 |pages=398–399 |doi=10.1038/127398a0 |s2cid=186243546 |access-date=30 December 2020|url-access=subscription }}

In 1802 he presented his invention to a board of inquiry together with nine other competitors who included Mary Dicas of Liverpool whose hydrometer was the approved instrument by the American excise. Sikes' device was chosen over the other nine.{{Cite book |last=Morrison-Low |first=A. D. |url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-49542 |title=Dicas [married name Arstall], Mary (fl. 1800–1815), maker of scientific instruments |date=2004-09-23 |publisher=Oxford University Press |volume=1 |language=en |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/49542}}

The success of the device caused his name to be immortalised in an Act of Parliament: Sikes' Hydrometer Act 1816 (56 Geo. 3. c. 140). From 1816 until 1980 the hydrometer was the standard used in the UK to measure the alcohol proof of spirits, and from 1846 in Canadian law.{{harvnb|Denison|1955|p=132}}