Jack Vincent (6 March 1904 – 3 July 1999) was an English ornithologist.

Biography

Vincent was born in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

. At age 21 he moved to

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

where he worked on two farms in the Richmond district of the Natal Province. In the 1920s he went back to England where he became a bird collector for the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

. From the late 1920s to the early 1930s he accompanied Admiral

Hubert Lynes Rear Admiral Hubert Lynes, (27 November 1874 – 10 November 1942) was a British admiral whose First World War service was notable for his direction of the Zeebrugge and Ostend raids designed to neutralise the German-held port of Bruges, which ...

on several ornithological expeditions to East Africa,

Central Africa Central Africa is a subregion of the African continent comprising various countries according to different definitions. Angola, Burundi, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo ...

and

Southern Africa Southern Africa is the southernmost subregion of the African continent, south of the Congo and Tanzania. The physical location is the large part of Africa to the south of the extensive Congo River basin. Southern Africa is home to a number o ...

. Most memorable was his travel to the

Mount Namuli Mount Namuli is the second highest mountain in Mozambique and the highest in the Province of Zambezia. It is high and was measured, surveyed and described in 1886 by Henry Edward O'Neill, the British consul in Mozambique. The Namuli massif con ...

massif in

Mozambique Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...

in 1932 where he discovered some bird taxa new to science including the Namuli apalis (''Apalis lynesi'') and the dapple-throat (''Arcanator orostruthus''). In 1934 he married the Scottish girl Mary Russell in

Cape Town Cape Town ( af, Kaapstad; , xh, iKapa) is one of South Africa's three capital cities, serving as the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. It is the legislative capital of the country, the oldest city in the country, and the second largest ...

. In 1937 Vincent bought a farm in the Mooi River district of Natal. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

he served as

colonel Colonel (abbreviated as Col., Col or COL) is a senior military officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations. In the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, a colonel was typically in charge o ...

with the

Natal Carbineers The Ingobamakhosi Carbineers (formerly Natal Carbineers) is an infantry unit of the South African Army. History Origins The regiment traces its roots to 1854 but it was formally raised on 15 January 1855 and gazetted on 13 March of that year, ...

in East and Northern Africa. Afterwards he was awarded

Member of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

for his services. In 1942 he moved to a post at the

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

Haifa Haifa ( he, חֵיפָה ' ; ar, حَيْفَا ') is the third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropol ...

British Mandate of Palestine British Mandate of Palestine or Palestine Mandate most often refers to: * Mandate for Palestine: a League of Nations mandate under which the British controlled an area which included Mandatory Palestine and the Emirate of Transjordan. * Mandatory P ...

. In 1949 Jack Vincent became corresponding member of the American Ornithologists' Union and the first director of the Natal Parks, Game and Fish Preservation Board (in short: Natal Parks Board), a body which played an important role in the conservation of the

white rhinoceros The white rhinoceros, white rhino or square-lipped rhinoceros (''Ceratotherium simum'') is the largest extant species of rhinoceros. It has a wide mouth used for grazing and is the most social of all rhino species. The white rhinoceros consists ...

in KwaZulu-Natal in the 1950s. From the late 1940s to the early 1950s he was editor of '' Ostrich: Journal of African Ornithology'' the journal of the South African Ornithological Society. From 1963 to 1967 he took part on conservation projects of the International Council for Bird Preservation (now: BirdLife International). For this work he received the gold medal of the

World Wildlife Fund The World Wide Fund for Nature Inc. (WWF) is an international non-governmental organization founded in 1961 that works in the field of wilderness preservation and the reduction of human impact on the environment. It was formerly named the Wo ...

. In 1967 he rejoined the Natal Parks Board before he retired in 1974. After the death of his wife Mary in 1989 Jack Vincent moved to Pietermaritzburg. In 1993 he got the honorary doctorate degree of the

University of KwaZulu-Natal The University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) is a university with five campuses in the province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. It was formed on 1 January 2004 after the merger between the University of Natal and the University of Durban-Westville. ...

. In 1999 he died at age 95 in Pietermaritzburg. In 1950, the endangered Vincent's bush squirrel (''Paraxerus vincenti'') endemic to Mount Namuli was named in honour of Jack Vincent.

Selected works

*''Check List of the Birds of South Africa'', 1952 *''The Red Book: Wildlife in Danger'', with James Fisher, Noel Simon, 1969 *''Web of Experience: An Autobiography'', 1989

References

In Memorian Colonel Jack Vincent
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vincent, Jack 1904 births 1999 deaths English ornithologists English conservationists Members of the Order of the British Empire 20th-century British zoologists