James Waterston (7 February 1879 – 28 April 1930) was a Scottish entomologist and minister of the

United Free Church of Scotland The United Free Church of Scotland (UF Church; gd, An Eaglais Shaor Aonaichte, sco, The Unitit Free Kirk o Scotland) is a Scottish Presbyterian denomination formed in 1900 by the union of the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland (or UP) and ...

who in 1917 was appointed as the first specialist hymenopterist at the Imperial Bureau of Entomology. James Waterson was born on 7 February 1879 in Paisley, Renfrewshire,

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

, and was educated as

George Watson's College George Watson's College is a co-educational independent day school in Scotland, situated on Colinton Road, in the Merchiston area of Edinburgh. It was first established as a hospital school in 1741, became a day school in 1871, and was merg ...

in Edinburgh before studying

Divinity Divinity or the divine are things that are either related to, devoted to, or proceeding from a deity.divine< ...

and Science at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...

, graduating with bachelor's degrees in both subjects, before being awarded a doctoral degree in science. He became a minister of the United Free Church in Shetland where he continued his biological studies, carrying out studies of ectoparasites, becoming an authority in the

Mallophaga The Mallophaga are a possibly paraphyletic section of lice Louse ( : lice) is the common name for any member of the clade Phthiraptera, which contains nearly 5,000 species of wingless parasitic insects. Phthiraptera has variously been re ...

of Britain. In 1917 Waterston joined the Imperial Bureau of Entomology to study the Hymenoptera of the superfamily Chalcidoidea. He was temporarily commissioned in the Royal Army Medical Corps in May 1917 and served as entomologist to the Malaria Commission at

Thessaloniki Thessaloniki (; el, Θεσσαλονίκη, , also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece, with over one million inhabitants in its metropolitan area, and the capital of the geographic region of ...

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, with the rank of captain. In May 1920 he joined the staff of the British Museum, Natural History as Assistant Keeper, First Class, in the Department of Entomology. His main areas of work as a taxonomist were the Chalcidoidea,

, or bird lice, and Siphonaptera, or fleas. He died, soon after a major operation, on 28 April 1930 in London. His son, Andrew Rodger Waterston (1912–1996) was also a noted entomologist and malacologist and was, like his father, a curator at Department of Entomology at the British Museum, Natural History.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Waterston, James Scottish zoologists Hymenopterists Scottish entomologists 1879 births 1930 deaths