Fingerprinting History

• Prehistoric fingerprinting was first recorded around 1000-200 BC. Fingerprinting was used in ancient Babylon for business transactions by pressing their finger into a clay tablet. It was also used in ancient China when the Chinese used clay seals in order to seal documents around 3^rd century B.C.

 

• In the year 1686 a professor of anatomy at the University of Bologna, Marcello Malpighi, was noted in his treaties; the ridges, spirals and loops in fingerprints. Out of respect of his discoveries he had a layer of skin named after him called the Malpighi layer.

  

• In 1823 an anatomy professor at the University of Breslau, John Evangelist Purkinje, had published a thesis that discussed nine fingerprint patterns.

  

• Fingerprinting was first used by the English in July of 1858 by the Chief Magistrate of the Hooghly district in Jungipoor, India, Sir William James Herschel. He first used fingerprints on native contracts, then afterwards he had Rajyad Konai, a local businessman, impress his hand on a contract. The idea was to originally frighten the businessman out of all thought of repudiating his signature, but it then led to Herschel making every contract being stamped with their palm prints, and then later their index and middle fingers. It was believed then that personal contact with the document made the contract more binding than if they had just simply signed it.

 

• In 1863 Professor Paul-Jean Coulier published his observations that (latent) fingerprints could be developed on paper by iodine fuming. He also explains how to preserve/fish developed impressions and he mentions the potential for identifying a suspect’s fingerprints by using a magnifying glass.

• In the 1870s Dr. Henry Faulds studied about “skin-furrows” after noticing finger marks on specimens of prehistoric pottery. In the year 1880 he gave an explanation about his classification system and gave a sample of the forms that he had designed for recording inked impressions, to Sir Charles Darwin. Also during this year Faulds published an article in the Scientific Journal, “Nature”. In this he discussed the idea of using fingerprints as a means of personal identification, and the use of printers ink as a method for obtaining such fingerprints. He is also credited for the first fingerprint identification of a greasy fingerprint that was left on an alcohol bottle.

 

• In the year 1882 Gilbert Thompson, of the U.S Geological Survey in New Mexico, used his own thumbprints on a document in order to prevent forgery. This was the first known use of fingerprints in the U.S.

• In 1882 Alphonse Bertillon had devised a system of classification, which is known as Anthropometry or the Bertillon System. This system included measurements such as, head length and width, length of the middle finger, left foot and the forearm from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger.
• In 1892 Juan Vucetich had made the first criminal fingerprint identification. He was able to identify Francis Rojas, a woman who had murdered her own sons and had tried to place the blame on another. Being she had left a bloody fingerprint on a door post they were able to prove that she was the murderer. Galton published his book “Fingerprints” which established the individuality and permanence of fingerprints. Inside the book included the first classification system of fingerprints. He was also able to prove Herschel and Faulds suspicions right, he was able to scientifically prove that an individual’s fingerprints do not change over the course of an individual’s lifetime.
• On June 12^th of 1897, the Council of the Governor General of India approved a committee report that fingerprints should be used for classification of criminal records. Haque and Bose were two individuals that worked in Calcutta Anthropometric Bureau, which was the world’s first Fingerprint Bureau. Haque and Bose are the two Indian fingerprint experts who were credited with the primary development of the Henry System of fingerprint classification.
• The year 1902 was the year where fingerprints were first systematically used in the U.S.

• In 1903 the New York State Prison system began the first systematic use of fingerprints in the U.S for criminals.

• In 1905 the U.S. Army began using fingerprints and in 1907 the U.S Navy began using fingerprints. Afterwards in the year 1908 the U.S Marine Crops began using fingerprints.

• In 1924, congress passed an act that established the Identification Division of the FBI.  By 1946 the FBI had processed 100 million fingerprint cards in manually maintained files. By 1971 they had process 200 million cards. With the introduction of automated fingerprint identification technology, the files were divided into computerized criminal files and manually maintained civil files.

• In 2011 the largest AFIS repository in America, operated by the Department of Homeland Security’s US Visit Program, contained over 100 million fingerprints.