Henry Thomas Maire Witham
FRSE
Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soci ...
FGS (1779–1844) was a British landowner remembered as an amateur palaeontologist and mineralogist.
He was an early researcher into the internal structure of
fossil plant
Paleobotany, which is also spelled as palaeobotany, is the branch of botany dealing with the recovery and identification of plant remains from geological contexts, and their use for the biological reconstruction of past environments (paleogeogr ...
s.
Life
![Lartington Hall from South East](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/Lartington_Hall_from_South_East.jpg)
He was born Henry Silvertop the son of John Silvertop of
Minsteracres
Minsteracres is an 18th-century mansion house, now a Christian retreat centre, in Northumberland, England. It is a Grade II listed building.
The house was built in 1758 by George Silvertop. Originally erected with two storeys, a third storey was ...
in
Northumberland
Northumberland () is a county in Northern England, one of two counties in England which border with Scotland. Notable landmarks in the county include Alnwick Castle, Bamburgh Castle, Hadrian's Wall and Hexham Abbey.
It is bordered by land on ...
. His mother was Catherine Lawson of Brough.
He was a compulsive gambler and ran up debts of £105,000 (a truly huge sum in the 1820s) and was forced to sell off much of his property to settle his debts.
From 1826 to 1832 he lived in
Edinburgh
Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...
at 14 Great King Street. During his time in Edinburgh (in 1827) he was elected a Fellow of the
Royal Society of Edinburgh
The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...
, his proposer being
Thomas Allan.
Though having no botanical training, he applied
William Nicol's method of examining fossils and rocks under the microscope by slicing them into
thin section
In optical mineralogy and petrography, a thin section (or petrographic thin section) is a thin slice of a rock or mineral sample, prepared in a laboratory, for use with a polarizing petrographic microscope, electron microscope and electron mic ...
s. Nicol's first published account of this process is contained in Witham's 1831 publication, ''Observations of Fossil Vegetables''. Witham's findings were also published in his 1833 book ''The Internal Structure of Fossil Vegetables found in the Carboniferous and
Oolitic deposits of
Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...
'', illustrated by
William MacGillivray
William MacGillivray FRSE (25 January 1796 – 4 September 1852) was a Scottish naturalist and ornithologist.
Life and work
MacGillivray was born in Old Aberdeen and brought up on Harris. He returned to Aberdeen where he studied Medicin ...
.
He worked strenuously for the
Mechanics Institute, which provided education for the working classes and the Relief of the Sick Poor.
He was a Fellow of the
Geological Society of London
The Geological Society of London, known commonly as the Geological Society, is a learned society based in the United Kingdom. It is the oldest national geological society in the world and the largest in Europe with more than 12,000 Fellows.
Fe ...
and of the
Wernerian Natural History Society
The Wernerian Natural History Society (12 January 1808 – 16 April 1858), commonly abbreviated as the Wernerian Society, was a learned society interested in the broad field of natural history, and saw papers presented on various topics such as ...
of Edinburgh.
He died at his home at
Lartington Hall
Lartington Hall is a 17th-century country house, at Lartington, Teesdale, County Durham, England. It is a listed building, Grade II* listed building.
Architecture
The earliest part of the house, built for the Appleby family, is the three-storey ...
on 28 November 1844.
Family
In 1800 he married Eliza Witham, daughter of Thomas Witham,
Esq.
Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title.
In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentleman a ...
of
Headlam
Headlam is a village in the borough of Darlington and the ceremonial county of
County Durham, England. It lies to the west of Darlington. The population taken at the 2011 Census was less than 100. Details are included in the parish of Ingleton. ...
, in
County Durham
County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly â€About North East E ...
, and niece and heiress of William Witham, esq. of
Cliffe, in
Richmondshire
{{Infobox settlement
, name = Richmondshire District
, type = District
, image_skyline =
, imagesize =
, image_caption =
, image_blank_emblem= Richmondshire arms.png
, blank_emblem_type = Coat ...
,
North Yorkshire
North Yorkshire is the largest ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county (lieutenancy area) in England, covering an area of . Around 40% of the county is covered by National parks of the United Kingdom, national parks, including most of ...
, and thus inherited the Witham name and
Coat of Arms
A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central ele ...
.
Their son Henry John Silvertop (b.1802) kept his father's original surname.
The family were all Roman Catholic.
Publications
*''The Internal Structure of Fossil Vegetables'' (1833)
Botanical Reference
See also
*
''The Birds of America'' - sale in 2010 of a copy of the book presented to Witham's wife
References
External links
''Observations on Fossil Vegetables, Accompanied by Representations of Their Internal Structure as Seen Through the Microscope''(1831)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Witham, Henry
1779 births
1844 deaths
Amateur paleontologists
Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh
People from Northumberland
Gamblers