Francis Trevelyan Buckland


Francis Trevelyan Buckland , better known as Frank Buckland, was an English surgeon, zoologist, popular author and natural historian. He was born in a reputed family of naturalists. After a brief career in medicine he took an interest in fishes and other matters. He was one of the key members and founders of the acclimatisation society in Britain, an organization that supported the introduction of new plants and animals as food sources which was influenced by his interest in eating and tasting a range of exotic animal meats.

Frank was the first son of Canon William Buckland, a noted geologist and palaeontologist, and Mary, a fossil collector, palaeontologist and illustrator. Frank was born and brought up in Oxford, where his father was a Canon and the Dean of Christ Church. His godfather was the sculptor Sir Francis Chantrey. Educated at home by his mother, he went, at eight and a half, to a boarding school in Cotterstock, Northamptonshire staying with his uncle John Buckland. From 183739, he went to a preparatory school in Laleham, Surrey, run by his uncle, John Buckland, a brutal headmaster who flogged his pupils quite excessively. Relief came with a scholarship to Winchester College, a school with an unbroken history of six hundred years. Here he was taught by the Second Master, Charles Wordsworth, who sent letters of praise to his father. Winchester had a harsh regime, but was much preferable to his previous school. While at Winchester he continued to take an interest in animals, trapping rats and mice

Source: Wikipedia


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