Francis George Penrose, a physician by profession with an overriding passion for natural history and photography, was an early adopter of ornithological photography and the formal study of bird migration.
Portrait of F.G. Penrose, with thanks to the Archive Service, Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust.
Francis George Penrose was born into the respected Penrose family in St. Pancras, Middlesex in 1857. His father, Francis Cranmer Penrose, was a renowned architect, archaeologist and astronomer who was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society in 1894 and was Surveyor of the Fabric of St Paul’s Cathedral for over 40 years. Francis George Penrose was the eldest of five children; his sister, Dame Emily Penrose, was a respected scholar of ancient history and became the statutory commissioner for the University of Oxford.
Penrose was initially educated at the church school in Littleham, Devon, where his uncle was a clergyman. He boarded at Repton School, Derbyshire from 1871–1875, until he was 18 and then trained in medicine. After studying in Vienna, Berlin and London he graduated from the University of London as a Medical Batchelor in 1884 and a medical doctor in 1885. He worked at University College Hospital, the Hospital for Sick Children (now Great Ormond Street Hospital) and finally, St. George’s Hospital, London. Dr Poynton, who Penrose supervised at St. George’s, described Penrose as ‘a big handsome man with red hair and beard […]. He was a very kindly courteous man but not a great physician […]. […] his great interest was in natural history, not medicine’; revealing something of Penrose’s character and also that his true passion was abundantly clear to all.
Little is known about Penrose’s early interest in ornithology. Aged 22, He wrote his first journal article in the Ibis (1879); Notes on a Collection of Birds’ Skins and Eggs made by Mr. D. Gill F.R.A.S., on Ascension Island. Gill, like Penrose’s father, was an astronomer and this may explain how Penrose and Gill became acquainted. When Gill visited Ascension for six months in September 1877 to make astronomical observations, Penrose spotted an opportunity, asking Gill ‘to bring me as complete a collection of the birds and eggs of the island as he might be able conveniently to procure’. Gill’s trip provided Penrose with the many specimens and observations that formed the basis of his article. The article also provides evidence that, even at this young age, Penrose was in communication with prominent ornithologists of the time, notably Osbert Salvin and Howard Saunders who had helped to identify the various specimens collected by Gill.
Penrose was elected as a member of the British Ornithologists’ Union in 1891. He attended the inaugural meeting of the British Ornithologists’ Club (BOC) on 5 October 1892 and was a committed attendee of BOC meetings thereafter. He was elected to the committee in 1896 and frequently returned as a committee member in subsequent years. Penrose married Mary Helen Walters in 1894 and they had two daughters. In 1905, Penrose retired to Wiltshire to concentrate on natural history studies, and later relocated to Dorset.
Penrose was an avid collector of eggs and albino birds and often exhibited specimens at BOC meetings. He also recognised the potential benefits of photography to natural history and often showed slides taken by himself and others at these meetings. In 1911 he showed slides of breeding birds in Lumiere autochrome, an early form of colour photography, the likes of which had never been seen at BOC meetings before1.
Perhaps his most important work was prompted by his recognition of the need for coordinated and structured records of bird migration within the United Kingdom, in contrast to then prevalent ad-hoc notices published in The Field newspaper. In June 1905, Penrose proposed at a BOC meeting that a sub-committee be formed to collate evidence on migrant movements using competent recorders around Britain, both on land and at sea. The committee unanimously agreed and by June 1906 the first Migration Committee report had been published based on the observations of 172 recorders and 15,000 observations and regular spring and autumn reports followed until 1914. The involvement of observers in World War One and reduced available funds led to the reports being shelved. Although they ran for only nine years, the Migration Committee reports remain an important historical benchmark2.
In later life, Penrose was elected as President of both the Bournemouth Camera Club and the Bournemouth Natural Science Society. He was also a member of the Zoological Photographic Club and served as President from 1929 to 1930, marking his term in office by inviting members and their wives to his home in Bournemouth as weekend guests, and was remembered by them for his generous hospitality, courtesy and kindness.
Penrose died after a short illness whilst on holiday in Devon on 16 July 1932. He was buried in the churchyard in Martinhoe, North Devon, overlooking the moorland and sea where he would be in the company of birds for evermore.
Footnotes:
1 The 1911 census records show that the pioneering female ornithologist Emma Louise Turner was a visitor to the Penrose household. Like Penrose, Turner was an early adopter of photography for ornithological study and went on to publish multiple ornithological photographic books. She was also an honorary member of the BOU, RSPB vice-president and one of the first female bird ringers. Penrose’s association with Turner is suggestive of his liberal attitude in a male-dominated age.
2 The Migration Committee reports are available online from https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fellows_of_the_Royal_Society_P,_Q,_R
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveyor_of_the_Fabric_of_St_Paul%27s_Cathedral
http://www.clement-jones.com/ps16/ps16_003.html
https://archive.org/details/reptonschoolreg00reptgoog/page/n226/mode/2up?q=penrose
Ancestry: https://hharp.org/library/gosh/doctors/francis-george-penrose.html
List of members of the BOU 1858-1908: Ibis, 50 (1): https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1474-919X.1909.tb05251.x
Obituary: Ibis, 74 (4): 690 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1474-919X.1932.tb00358.x
Author Information:
Ashley Jackson
