James Wilson (zoologist)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Wilson was born at Paisley on 20 November 1795, the youngest son of Margaret Sym and John Wilson (d. 1796), a gauze manufacturer. His father died during his first year, after which the family moved to Edinburgh, where he was educated. In 1811, he began to study for the law at the University of Edinburgh.[3]
Wilson joined the Wernerian Society when we was 17 years old.
In 1816, Wilson visited the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, and Paris. He later returned to Paris to purchase Louis Dufresne's collection of birds for the museum of the University of Edinburgh; and helped to arrange them. In 1819, he visited Sweden, soon after which symptoms of lung disease appeared, and he resided in Italy during 1820–1821. In 1824, he married Isabella Keith. They lived at Woodburn, Dalkeith near Edinburgh, where he wrote and worked on scientific pursuits. When his wife died in 1837, he took a winter residence in George Square, Edinburgh. He purchased Woodville in south Edinburgh in 1838.[4]
In 1827, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, his proposer being Robert Jameson. From 1850 until his death he was Curator for the Society.[5]
In 1841, at the request of the Fisheries Board, he made a series of excursions around the coast of Scotland with Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, to study the natural history of herring, Other trips followed at intervals between 1843 and 1850, and fishing excursions inland. In 1854, he was offered but declined the chair of natural history at the University of Edinburgh. The chair had become available on the death of its incumbent, Edward Forbes.
He died at Woodville House[5] on Canaan Lane in Morningside, Edinburgh on 18 May 1856. He is buried in Dean Cemetery in west Edinburgh. The grave lies in the small central south section facing onto the main central path. It stands immediately in front of the more distinctive grave of his brother John Wilson.
Family
In 1824, he married Isabella Keith (d.1837). Their daughter, Marianne (Marion) Rae Wilson married James Alexander Russell.[6]
John Wilson who wrote as "Christopher North" was his eldest brother; Matthew Leishman was his cousin, and lived nearby; Henrietta Wilson the writer was his niece, daughter of his brother Andrew.
His niece, Henrietta Margaret Sym Wilson (1810–1863) came to live with him at Woodville, after her parents died. She was a novelist of some note.[7] She is buried with him in Dean Cemetery.
