Person

Huxley, Thomas Henry (1825 - 1895)

FRS

Born
4 May 1825
Ealing, Middlesex, England
Died
29 June 1895
Eastbourne, England
Occupation
Biologist and Anthropologist

Summary

Thomas Huxley was assistant surgeon and naturalist in Australia and surrounding waters from 1846 to 1850 on board H.M.S. Rattlesnake. His fellow naturalist on board was John MacGillivray. Owen Stanley, in command of Rattlesnake, had orders to survey of a safe passage through the Great Barrier Reef in continuation of the work of Francis Blackwood in H.M.S. Fly. Despite lacking adequate facilities, Huxley and MacGillivray made considerable collections of biological specimens. Huxley, who in his later career became renowned for his expertise in comparative morphology, worked on marine invertebrates during the voyage and after returning to London. His pioneering studies, based on these specimens, resulted in papers on the morphology of cephalopods, brachiopods and rotifers, and revolutionised the classification of Medusae and Tunicata. In his later career Huxley played a central role in scientific circles in the United Kingdom. Among the numerous scientific societies of which he was President was the Royal Society. He is perhaps best known as a staunch supporter of Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution.

Details

Chronology

December 1846 - 1850
Career position - Assistant surgeon and naturalist, H.M.S. Rattlesnake
1850
Education - Passed first MB examination, University of London
1851 - 1895
Award - Fellow, The Royal Society, London (FRS)
1852
Award - Royal Medal, The Royal Society, London
1854 - 1885
Career position - Professor of Natural History, Royal School of Mines, London
1855 -
Career position - Naturalist, Geological Survey of Great Britain
1855 - 1858
Career position - Fullerian Professor, Royal Institute, London
1865 - 1867
Career position - Hunterian Professor, Royal College of Surgeons, London
1868 - 1870
Career position - President, Geological Society, London
1869 -
Award - Member, American Philosophical Society
1869 - 1870
Career position - President, British Association for the Advancement of Science
1876
Award - Wollaston Medal, Geological Society, London
1878
Career position - President, Queckett Microscopical Society
1880
Award - Clarke Medal, Royal Society of New South Wales
1881 - 1885
Career position - Inspector of Fisheries, United Kingdom
1883 - 1885
Career position - President, Royal Society of London
1884 - 1890
Career position - President. Marine Biological Association
1888
Award - Copley Medal, The Royal Society, London
1890
Award - Linnean Medal, Linnean Society, London
1892 - 1895
Career position - Privy Councillor
1893
Award - Hayden Memorial Geological Award, Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, U.S.A.
1894
Award - Darwin Medal, Royal Society of London

Related Awards

Related Cultural Objects

Related People

Archival resources

Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science

  • Thomas Henry Huxley - Records, 1851 - 1971, MS 134; Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science. Details

John Oxley Library, Manuscripts and Business Records Collection, State Library of Queensland

  • Thomas Henry Huxley - Records, 1847 - 1848, OM82-2; John Oxley Library, Manuscripts and Business Records Collection, State Library of Queensland. Details

Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales

  • Linnean Society of London - Records, 1792 - 1870, FM 4/2699; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
  • Thomas Henry Huxley - Records, c. 1953 - c. 1956, A4000; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details
  • Thomas Henry Huxley - Records, 1846 - 1850, FM 4/216; Mitchell and Dixson Libraries Manuscripts Collection, State Library of New South Wales. Details

National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection

  • G. H. Inskip - Records, 1849 - 1950, MS 3784; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • James Thomas Stanton - Records, 1849 - 1951, MS 4029; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • Thomas Henry Huxley - Records, 1825 - 1895, Mfm M876-916; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details
  • William Henry Archer - Records, 1847 - 1866, MS 264; National Library of Australia Manuscript Collection. Details

National Library of Australia Pictures Collection

  • Thomas Henry Huxley - Pictures, 1847, PIC R449 LOC1111; National Library of Australia Pictures Collection. Details
  • Thomas Henry Huxley - Pictures, 1946, PIC R449 LOC1112; National Library of Australia Pictures Collection. Details

State Library of Victoria, Australian Manuscripts Collection

  • Thomas Henry Huxley - Records, 1825 - 1895, M876-916; State Library of Victoria, Australian Manuscripts Collection. Details

Published resources

Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation Exhibitions

Books

  • Bashford, Alison, The Huxleys: an intimate history of evolution (Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press, 2022), 576 pp. Details
  • Bassett, Marnie, Behind the picture: H.M.S. Rattlesnake's New Guinea cruise, 1846 to 1850 (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1966), 112 pp. Details
  • Bibby, Cyril, Scientist extraordinary: the life and scientific works of Thomas Henry Huxley, 1825 - 1895 (Oxford: Pergamon, 1972), 208 pp. Details
  • Di Gregorio, Mario A., T.H. Huxley's place in natural science (New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 1984), 253 pp. Details
  • Goodman, Jordan, The Rattlesnake: a Voyage of Discovery to the Coral Sea (London: Faber and Faber, 2005), 357 pp. Details
  • Huxley, J., Thomas Henry Huxley's Diary of the Voyage of H.M.S. Rattlesnake (London: 1935). Details
  • Huxley, L., Life and letters of Thomas Henry Huxley, 2 vols (London: Macmillan, 1900). Details
  • Huxley, T. H., The oceanic Hydrozoa: a description of the Calycophoridae and Physophoridae observed during the voyage of H.M.S. "Rattlesnake", in the years 1846 - 1850 (London: Ray Society, 1859), 143 pp. Details
  • Huxley, T. H., Collected essays, 9 vols (London: Mcmillan, 1893-1894). Details
  • Huxley, T. H.: edited from the unpublished MS by Julian Huxley, T. H. Huxley's diary of the voyage of H.M.S. Rattlesnake (London: Chatto and Windus, 1935), 371 pp. Details
  • Marshall, A. J., Darwin and Huxley in Australia (Sydney: Hodder and Stoughton, 1970), 142 pp. Details
  • McCalman, Iain,, Darwin's Armada (Camberwell (Vic.) : Viking, 2009), 422 pp. Details
  • McKenna, Mark, From the edge: Australia's lost histories (Melbourne: The Miegunyah Press (University of Melbourne Publishing Ltd), 2016), xx, 251 pp. See pages: 95, 102, 103. Details
  • White, Paul, Thomas Huxley: making the "Man of Science" (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 222 pp. Details

Book Sections

  • Butcher, Barry W., 'Gorilla Warfare in Melbourne: Halford, Huxley and 'Man's Place in Nature'' in Australian Science in the Making, R. W. Home, ed. (Sydney: Cambridge University Press, 1988), pp. 153-169. Details
  • Mozley, Ann, 'Huxley, Thomas Henry (1825-1895), biologist, anthropologist and philosopher' in Australian dictionary of biography, volume 1: 1788 - 1850 A-H, Douglas Pike, ed. (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1966), pp. 577-578. http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A010535b.htm. Details

Edited Books

  • Foster, M.; and Lankester, E. Ray eds, The scientific memoirs of Thomas Henry Huxley, 4 vols (London: MacMillan, 1900-). Details

Journal Articles

  • Goodman, Jordan, 'Losing it in New Guinea: the Voyage of HMS Rattlesnake', Endeavour, 29 (2005), 60-5. Details
  • Huxley, T. H., 'On the anatomy and affinities of the family Medusae', Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society, 139 (1849), 413-34. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstl.1849.0022. Details
  • Huxley, T. H., 'Joseph Beete Jukes', Quarterly journal of the Geological Society of London, 26 (1870), xxxii-xxxiv. Details
  • Murray, Tim, 'Mr Miles, Mr Oldfield and Professor Huxley: early thoughts on the origins of the Australians', Bulletin of the history of archaeology, 33 (1) (2023), 1-12. https://doi.org/10.5334/bha-671. Details
  • Murray, Tim, 'Mr Miles, Mr Oldfield and Professor Huxley: early thoughts on the origins of the Australians', Bulletin of the history of archaeology, 33 (1) (2023), 1-12. https://doi.org/10.5334/bha-671. Details
  • White, Paul, 'Science at Home: the Space between Henrietta Heathorn and Thomas Huxley', History of Science, 34 (1) (1996), 33-56. Details

Resources

Resource Sections

Reviews

  • Bashford, Alison, The Huxleys: an intimate history of evolution (2022)
    Rose, Edwin D., Isis, 115 (3), (2024), 676-7. Details

Theses

  • Jensen, Sophie Alice, 'On such a full sea: John MacGillivray (1821 - 1867)', PhD thesis, Australian National University, 2010, 339 pp. Details

See also

Gavan McCarthy [P004098] and Helen Cohn

EOAS ID: biogs/P000514b.htm

Except where otherwise noted, content on this site is
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
What do we mean by this?

Published by Swinburne University of Technology.
This Edition: 2024 November (Ballambar - Gariwerd calendar - early summer - season of butterflies)
Reference: http://www.bom.gov.au/iwk/calendars/gariwerd.shtml#ballambar
For earlier editions see the Internet Archive at: https://web.archive.org/web/*/www.eoas.info

The Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation uses the Online Heritage Resource Manager (OHRM), a relational data curation and web publication system developed by the eScholarship Research Centre and its predecessors at the University of Melbourne 1999-2020. The OHRM has been maintained by Gavan McCarthy since 2020.

Cite this page: https://www.eoas.info/biogs/P000514b.htm

"... the rengitj, as a visible mark or imprint on the land, is characterised as a place of origin, the repository of all names, as well as a kind of mapped visual expression of the connection between people and places which is to be carried out in the temporal sequence of the journey." Fanca Tamisari (1998) 'Body, Vision and Movement: In the footprints of the ancestors'. Oceania 68(4) p260