xxii
INTRODUCTION TO VOLUME
6
(in
the meantime
purchased by
Siemens and
Halske)
and
was
therefore void.
Another
point
under discussion in the
case was
the claim that
Sperry
used
a
method of
damping
that had been
patented by
Anschutz.[28]
The
court
proposed
the
appointment
of
an expert on
whom both
parties
could
agree.
Einstein
was appointed
and
made his first
appearance
in
court
on
5 January
1915. He
had
apparently not prepared
himself
well,
because in his
presentation
he contradicted himself several
times.[29]
The
court
then asked
him
to
answer a
number of
questions
in
a
written
report,
for which he
was
to
be
paid 1,000
marks.[30]
Einstein's
report
is
presented as
Doc.
12. In
it he
states
that the Anschutz
patent
did
not
improve on
the
Van
den Bos
patent.
Anschutz
disagreed
and
the
court
was
not
convinced either. After
a
further session
on
26 March
1915,
at
which Einstein
was
not
present,
he
was
asked
personally
to
inspect
the
Sperry compass
and write
a
further
report
on
the
differences between
the
compasses
of
Van
den
Bos, Anschutz,
and
Sperry.
Einstein
decided
to
per-
form
a
number of
tests
on
the
Sperry
compass,[31]
which took
place
in Kiel
on
10 July
1915. In
his second
report
of
7 August
1915 (Doc.
19)
Einstein
cor-
rects
his earlier conclusion and
states
that the horizontal stabilization
of the
Anschutz
compass
does constitute
an
improvement
over
the
compass
of
Van
den Bos.
He
also concludes that
Sperry's
method of
damping
is
the
one
de-
scribed in Anschutz's earlier
patent.
The
court
decision
of
16
November
1915
followed
Einstein's
report
and
prohibited Sperry
from
manufacturing
and
selling gyrocompasses
that used the method
patented by
Anschutz.[32]
V
Einstein
wrote
only
a
few
papers
on
the
quantum
theory during
this
period,
but
several
of
these
are
of
major
importance.
The
only unpublished
manu-
script
of
this
group,
Doc.
26,
deals with the theoretical calculations
of
the
en-
tropy
constant
of
an
ideal
gas
made
independently by
Otto
Sackur and
Hugo
Tetrode
several
years
earlier. Einstein lectured
on
this
subject
in
January
[28]D.R.P.
no.
236200,
awarded
1908.
[29]See a
report
of the
proceedings
in Wolfgang
Otto
to
Anschutz
& Co., 6 January 1915
(GyKiA, Gruppe IIa, Mappe 555/a).
Otto also characterized Einstein's
presentation
as "super-
ficial"
("oberflächlich").
[30]See
the court
transcript
of
5
January
1915
(copy
in GyKiA, Gruppe IIa,
Mappe 555/a).
[31]See
Einstein
to Königliches
Landgericht
I, 18
May 1915 (copy in GyKiA, Gruppe IIa,
Mappe
555/a).
[32]verdict
of
the
Königliches Landgericht I, Berlin, 16
November 1915
(copy
in GyKiA,
Gruppe IIa, Mappe
555/a).