[5] After some private education, Alexander was sent to Clapham Grammar School in London in 1851, of which Charles Pritchard, who would later become Savilian Professor of Astronomy, was headmaster.

[6] While an undergraduate he helped James Clerk Maxwell with his illustrations of the mechanics of rotation by means of the apparatus known as "the devil on two sticks.

"[7] From Cambridge Herschel passed in 1861 to the Royal School of Mines in London, and began the observation of meteors which he continued to the end of his life.

[3] At the Durham College, Herschel provided, chiefly by his personal exertions, apparatuses for the newly installed laboratory, some being made by his own hands.

With Robert P. Greg he formed extensive catalogues of the radiant points of meteor streams, the more important of these being published in the Reports of the British Association for 1868, 1872, and 1874.

For the British Association (1874–81) he prepared reports of a committee, consisting of himself, his colleague at Newcastle, George A. Lebour, and John T. Dunn, which was formed to determine the thermal conductivities of certain rocks.

[12] He died unmarried at Observatory House on 18 June 1907[11][13] and was buried in Church of St Laurence, Upton-cum-Chalvey, in the chancel of which his grandfather lies.