Biographical dictionary
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| Name | Dates | Biography | |
|---|---|---|---|
| DOUBLEDAY, Edward | 4 October 1810 - 14 Decenber 1849 | Well known Lepidopterist who is not recorded to have had an interest in beetles. However, he did give 862 Coleoptera, including foreign specimens, and a number of other insects to the NHM on 14 January 1840. It is not clear whether he collected these himself. (MD 9/02) | |
| DOUBLEDAY, Henry | 29 June 1809 - 29 June 1875 | Brother of Edward above and another well known Lepidopterist who is not recorded to have had an interest in beetles. However, he is mentioned by J.Stephens, 1829, pp.103,125, and he published ‘Clytus erythrocephalus in England’ in EMM., 9, 1873, p.268, on the basis of specimens found in his Epping garden but which he assumed had been imported in skins, and which he subsequently gave to John Curtis. (MD 9/02) | |
| DOUGHTY, Chester Goodwin | 26 January 1870 - 24 January 1939 | Third son of Reverend Ernest George Doughty, rector of Martlesham, and of Mary Francis Christie of the Manor House, Framingham Pigot, Norfolk. Cousin of Doughty of Arabia Deserta fame. Educated at Crespigny House school, Aldeburgh; Bradfield College, Berkshire; and between 1888 and 1891 at Pembroke College, Cambridge where he took degrees in Law. Became articled to a firm of Solicitors at Plymouth and subsequently moved to another firm in London, before, on the death of his father in 1915, giving up the law and moving to Gorleston where he remained for the rest of his life. Doughty had an extensive interest in natural history fostered particularly through the Suffolk Naturalists Society of which he became an active participant after its foundation in 1929. Although he had published little up to this time, his longest article being on ‘The loves of the weevils', (Ent., 1910, p.212, he then proceeded to contribute material on a great diversity of subjects to every part of the Transactions. According to the writer of his obituary in Trans.Suffolk Nat.Soc.Proc., 1939 (4), pp.xc-xcii, his interest in Coleoptera began in 1899, and was quickly followed by Lepidoptera in the following year. Both were pursued in parallel with botany, zoology, conchology and fossils. He was particularly knowledgeable about the local coast, and travelled extensively throughout the British Isles. His only foreign trips are recorded to have been to Italy in 1909 and to Switzerland in 1916. Doughty's collections were split up after his death. The Coleoptera passed to the Ipswich Museum where the collection is housed in 30 storeboxes, most specimens having attached data. (I am very grateful to Howard Mendel for supplying me with information about Doughty). (MD 9/02) | |
| DOUGLAS, E.D.R. | Published 'Creophilus maxillosus v. ciliaris Steph. in Ireland’ in EMM., 27, 1891, p.305. (MD 9/02) | ||
| DOUGLAS, H.E.M. | Gave 34 Coleoptera which he had collected as a member of the Clark Expedition to North and West China to the NHM in 1910 (1910.332). Douglas received various awards for bravery including the VC. (MD 9/02) | ||
| DOUGLAS, John William | 15 November 1814 - 28 August 1905 | Born in Putney the son of David Douglas of Tranent near Edinburgh. Educated at a private school where he received a serious injury to his leg as the result of a practical joke. During the two years convalescence which followed he took up botanical draughtsmanship and, when he regained his health, he joined the staff at Kew Gardens to pursue this interest further. After a few years, however, he left Kew to join the staff at the Customs House where he remained for the next fifty years, reaching a senior position and being personally thanked by Gladstone for his work on the importation of Continental wines. He married in 1843, living first at Camberwell and subsequently at Lee and Lewisham. He died at Harlesden. Douglas's interest in insects began when he was at Kew, and his first article 'Random Thoughts on Entomology' was published in Ent. Mag., 4, 1837, pp.340-342 and 5, 1837, pp.62-65. Although much of his work was on the Lepidoptera (the genus Douglasia was named after him by Stainton), Coccidae, and Hemiptera on which he published his best known work with John Scott The British Hemiptera, vol 1, Hemiptera-Heteroptera, 1865, he also wrote on beetles. His best known articles are probably those on the food and habits of Velleius diltatus in hornet's nests' in EMM., 15, 1879, p.260, ‘Anisoxya fuscula at Lee', ibid., 12, 1876, p.83; and his article on the Colorado beetle, ibid., 13, 1877, p.181. He also published articles in EWI. including one on myrmecophilous beetles (80, 1858, p.16). 'A Proposal for a new catalogue of British Coleoptera', appeared in Zool., 6, 1858, pp.5899-6001. He was also the author of The World of Insects, 1856. In the Ent.Ann., 1865, Douglas states that he was 'at home to entomologists every Friday evening after half past six PM from November to March inclusive'. On Douglas’s collections of Hemiptera see a forthcoming article by Mick Webb. Douglas gave a weevil to NHM in 1843 (43.26) and a further five beetles in 1846 (46.94). A copy of a letter from Janson in the J.W. Ellis collection at Liverpool Museum implies that P.B.Mason acquired the 'entire' Coleoptera collection of Douglas, but if this was the case it is not mentioned by Hancock and Pettit (1981) as among the Bolton material. Harvey et al (1996) record that there are three MS notebooks in the NHM listing captures covering the periods 1848-52, 1853-56 and 1855-96 , and a MS leaf listing his insect collection. Pederson (2002), 121, lists correspondence in the RESL dated 1890 with C.J.Wainwright. Douglas became an editor of the EMM in 1874. Simms (1968) records material in the W.C.Hey collection at York. FESL from 1845-1862, 1876-1905 (Council 1846, Secretary 1849-56, President 1861). There are obituaries in EMM., 41, 1905, pp.221-22,262 (by E.Saunders); ibid., 42, 1906, p.16 (by C.W.Dale); and in ERJV., 17, 1905, pp.246-248. (MD 9/02, 12/21) |
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| DOUGLAS, W.D.R. | Mentioned by Johnson and Halbert (1902) p.543. (MD 9/02) | ||
| DOUGLAS-FOX, J. | Chalmers-Hunt (1976) p.139 records that a collection of British Coleoptera bearing this name was sold at Stevens auction rooms on 29 July 1902. (MD 9/02) | ||
| DOUGLASS, G.N. | Gave 17 Coleoptera which he had collected in S. Italy to the NHM in 1891 (91-66) and a further 24 beetles from the Cyclades in the following year (92.65). (MD 9/02) | ||
| DOUGLASS, Martin | Gave 21 Coleoptera which he had collected on the isle of Elephanta, E. Africa, c.1880 to Sunderland Museum on 21 March 1882. Other material labelled 'Earl of Durham' in this museum may also have been collected by him. (MD 9/02) |