Edward Bulkley (died 10 August 1714) was an East India Company surgeon (1602-1709) posted in Madras and a pioneer naturalist. He corresponded with

James Petiver James Petiver (c. 1665 – c. 2 April 1718) was a London apothecary, a fellow of the Royal Society as well as London's informal Temple Coffee House Botany Club, famous for his specimen collections in which he traded and study of botany and entomo ...

and was the first to document the bird species of which a list of birds was published by

John Ray John Ray FRS (29 November 1627 – 17 January 1705) was a Christian English naturalist widely regarded as one of the earliest of the English parson-naturalists. Until 1670, he wrote his name as John Wray. From then on, he used 'Ray', after ...

. Ray incorrectly notes him as "Buckley". Bulkley also studied the local plants and corresponded with the Jesuit botanist

Georg Joseph Kamel Georg Joseph Kamel (; la, Georgius Josephus Camellus; cz, Jiří Josef Kamel; es, Jorge Camel; 12 April 1661 – 2 May 1706) was a Jesuit missionary, pharmacist and naturalist known for producing the first comprehensive accounts of Philippine f ...

and acted as an intermediary between Kamel and Petiver. Bulkley corresponded with

Charles du Bois Charles Dubois or Charles du Bois (10 September 1658 (baptised)-20 October 1740), was treasurer to the East India Company, cloth merchant, and naturalist. He corresponded with other naturalists including James Petiver, William Sherrard and Hans Sl ...

on plants and collected Tamil and Telugu names for many medicinal and economically useful plants. Surgeon Bulkley is credited with conducting the first post-mortem in India. The case involved the death of James Wheeler in 1693 and the only previous such examination was in November 1680 when a soldier, Joshua Adams was killed by a strike on the head by Daniel Hughes. An examination of just the scalp was made but Bulkley's was the first case where a complete autopsy was carried out. James Wheeler was a member of the Council of Madras and had been treated by the physician Samuel Browne whose assistant had used a pestle-and-mortar, suspected to have been used earlier for arsenic, to grind pearls as medication. Bulkley determined from the autopsy that it was not arsenic poisoning as suspected and Browne was acquitted. Bulkley was a correspondent of several naturalists in Britain and maintained correspondence with Petiver after the death of Browne who had previously supplied natural history specimens. Bulkley sent samples of soils from India to J. Woodward who included them in his 1729 catalogue. Madras_Birds

Edward Bulkley also served as a Member of the Council of Madras and as a Paymaster. He resigned from work due to ill health in February 1713. He was buried in his garden in Peddanaikpetta, now in the Army lines opposite the

Madras Medical College Madras Medical College (MMC) is a public medical college located in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. Established on 2 February 1835, it is the second oldest medical college in India, established after Calcutta Medical College. History The Governme ...

. The inscription on his tomb reads ''Sacrum sit hoc monumentum perenni memoriae Edwardi Bulkley, Honorabili Anglorum Societati medici, feliciter experti et ipsae tandema consiliis, qui cum naturae arcana diu indagasset, laeto animo ipsae satisfecit viii. Augusti MDCCXIV, et anno aetatis suae climacterico. Ne mireris viator quod in horto ubi animum perpoliebat, corpus suum voluit reponi, beatam sperans ressurectionem.'' His funeral sermon was given by Rev. William Stevenson at St Mary's.

References

External links

Edward Bulkley and the Du Bois Herbarium by Henry Noltie

Lost and found: the good doctor’s tomb - The Hindu: June 6, 2013
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bulkley, Edward 17th-century English medical doctors 1714 deaths Year of birth unknown