Alfred St Alban Smith: Donor of Animals and Zoological Society of London Silver Medallist in 1931. Part Two: Life, Times and Family

A rubber plantation in Malaya in the 1920s

What do we know of the life of Alfred St Alban Smith, a rubber planter in the Malay States who generated such praise for his efforts to send animals, particularly reptiles, to London zoo in the 1920s and 30s?

By searching genealogical sites, including a family tree, and newspapers available online I have managed to build up a timeline of Alfred St Alban Smth’s life, albeit with some gaps. Although there is information that he kept reptiles at what must have been his various homes on the rubber estates he worked on, I have failed to uncover what stimulated his great and abiding interest in reptiles and why he developed into such a major donor of reptiles, amphibians, birds and mammals to London. As always in wading through material these searches comes up one finds errors which need to be followed up together, though, with surprises in family connexions—as will become evident below.

Smith and his family were often referred to as ‘St Alban Smith’. They lived in an era when a double-barrelled surname, even when unhyphenated, was thought to bring a social cachet. It also distinguished the family from the many other Smiths that were around. In official registration documents and the like the surname is usually simply ‘Smith’. 

Alfred St Alban Smith was a son of the Raj. He was born on 11 June 1880 in Calcutta to the Rev Alfred William Lewis Smith and Clara Virgina Pyne (née Armour). His father was River Chaplain to the Port of Calcutta at the time.

Aged 11 he appears in a newspaper report of a concert held in February 1892 at Christ Church Girls' School in Nellore (now in Andhra Pradesh). He performed an ‘instrumental duet’ with his mother. ‘The little man's touch and precision promise well for his musical future’, the reporter concluded. And it those musical abilities which were being celebrated in 1893, not in India but in Cornwall, passing the piano test in the primary division in the Trinity College London’s examinations at Truro under the tutelage of a Miss F. Clyma. His presence at Truro suggests he was a boarder at one of the schools there.

We then jump to the late 1890s. in 1898-99 when he was 18-19 Alfred seems to have held a junior teaching posts at schools in the south of England. At Woolston College, Southampton in 1898, he was a steward at a sports day. He was also at Castle College, Guilford, Surrey in 1898. At a concert to raise funds for a hospital, St Alban Smith sang ‘Cock of the Walk’ which ‘was vociferously encored, and in response he gave 'He didn't go to work next morning’’. A similar concert was held in Aldershot in April 1899: ‘Mr. St Alban Smith's song was a very up-to-date one indeed, and was received with many hearty rounds of applause. It was a song which told England's foreign affairs in a nutshell, and it brought forth many a laugh as well’.

Surrey newspapers show him playing football, the round ball variety, for Guildford in 1888-99.

The next records I have found show he was back in India by 1902 and aged 21.

On 19 April 1902 St Alban Smith (5’ 9¾”, 144lb, brown hair, pale complexion, hazel eyes, scarred on both cheeks and above the left eye) enlisted in the British Army for the Boer War. He did so in Colombo, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and joined the Ceylon Volunteer Company, Gloucestershire Regiment. I can only think that this unit of volunteers was attached to the Glosters was because the 1st Battalion of that Regiment was in Colombo guarding Boer prisoners who had been shipped there. Newspaper reports show a number of expats in India had sailed to Colombo in order to join up. Amongst his contingent to travel south at their own expense, St Alban Smith was shown as from Tundla a railway town now in Uttar Pradesh. His father had been Chaplain there since 1901. He departed for South Africa on 21 April but only stayed until 22 June. By the time he arrived the war was in its last days. Back in Colombo Private Smith was discharged on 12 August.  His service before the end of the war on 31 May qualified him for the Queen’s South Africa Medal.

Later in 1902 he was installed as a teacher at La Martiniere College, Lucknow. The headmaster reported: ‘…his place was taken at the beginning of Christmas Term by Mr. St. Alban Smith. who, in addition to some previous experience as a teacher, had gained experience of another kind in the late war in South Africa, where he served as a volunteer in the Ceylon Contingent’.

In 1905 , the year of his father’s death, his job and location had changed again. In Trichinopoly (Tiruchirappalli) then in the Madras Presidency St Alban Smith became a Freemason in the Lodge of the Rock. He was also playing cricket for the town side. 

In December 1905 the Madras Weekly Mail reported:

Princess Janaky of the Chinna Aramsnai, Pudukottha, gave a delightful Garden Party on Monday, the 27th, in honour of her brother H. H. the Rajah of Pudukottha's birthday. The Band of the 86th C.I. played a charming selection of music during the evening, and games were arranged for the guests. In the potato and bucket race, instead of Jill madly clutching at potatoes, whilst Jack looked on, a new element was introduced. Jill held the pail whilst Jack tried to get the potatoes up from the ground on a little tea spoon, a most difficult accomplishment, was won by Miss Savage and Mr. St Alban Smith…

Later that year, in August, was the report:

I regret to state that Mr. St, Alban Smith had a nasty fall from his horse last week, but the injuries are not so bad as was at first feared and he is expected to be able to get about before long.

On 14 February 1906 he married Lena Margaret Cicely Savage in Trichinopoly. Lena Savage (she of the potato and bucket race) was from Boscombe, Bournemouth. At the time Smith was employed in the traffic department of the South India Railway Company which had its headquarters in Trichinopoly.

Prowess at hunting Blackbuck, that gorgeous Indian antelope, was next in the Madras Weekly Mail in May 1906:

Messrs. Smythe and St. Alban Smith went out shooting on Saturday morning and returned before breakfast time with three black buck, which I am informed were dropped with one shot each. One of the buck was the famous one-horned buck that we have all been after for several years now, and I hear on examination no less than eleven scars, the results of old bullet, wounds, were found on its body. An air of mystery is lent to the whole proceeding by the persistent way in which these sportsmen refuse to give any information as to where their happy hunting ground is, and as I understand this is the third time they have gone on an "after chota hari, will return to breakfast" shoot, and have returned with two or more buck, I think we should have their movements watched so that we may be able to stock our larders with venison on the third Saturday in each month, as they regularly do.

And yet more venison later that month:

Again has venison been scattered broadcast all over the station, but this time an additional charm was added to it, inasmuch as a lady shot some of it. Mr. and Mrs. St, Alban Smith were out shooting on Sunday morning and each of them bagged a buck. Mrs St. Alban Smith's was a particularly fine one and was, I understand, dropped with a single shot at 150 yards. It is seldom one hears of a lady shooting black buck in Southern India in the month of May.

In 1907 the Madras Weekly reported a move from ‘Assistant Secretary to the Agent of the South Indian Railway’ to the ‘Assam-Bengal Railway as Senior Assistant Traffic Superintendent’. 

A daughter, Mercy Stella Margaret, was born in Chittagong in 1907.

Shipping records show that in 1909 St Alban Smith travelled from London to Lagos. The London Evening Standard of 13 May show that he had been appointed ‘traffic inspector’ for the Lagos Railway. He cannot have been in Nigeria for more than a few months because in 1910, aged 30, Smith moved to Malaya to work for Malacca Rubber Plantations. There he was member of the Malay States Volunteer Rifles. In 1914 he was on leave in Britain. On 31 August, 27 days after the declaration of war, and giving his address as Manor Hotel, Lydford, Devon, he joined the Honourable Artillery Company, that renowned ‘gentlemen of the City of London’ regiment. There he served in the 1st Battalion which was despatched to France on 16 September. There he would have fought in the First Battle of Ypres which began on 19 October. However, he was back in Britain on Christmas Day and then medically discharged on 25 March 2015. The reason is given as ‘trench foot’ in his obituary in the Straits Times; his army records show ‘cardiac dilatation and emphysema’ of unknown date of origin. ‘Condition probably aggravated by frostbite in trenches. Is still very feeble nervous and shaky’. On his pay and disability pension (7 shillings per week for one year) Smith wrote to point out the Army’s calculations did not include the bounty he was due. He also pointed out that he ‘purchased all my own uniform and kit except rifle, webbing equipment and waterproof sheet’. The HAC records, separately from the Army, all former members of the regiment. Smith’s address is shown as 92 Paisley Road, Bournemouth.

His discharge papers noted that he was returning to the New Amherst Estate, Kuala Lumpur, and that he had a snake bite scar on his left calf. Was the latter gained through his work in the field or was it an indication of pursuit of his herpetological interest?

His commanding officer signed off his papers with:

This man’s character during his service with the colours has been exemplary.

Alfred St Alban Smith lost no time in returning to Malaya. He left on the Japanese ship Hirano Maru on 3 April 1915 to disembark at Penang. 

His return to Malaya was marked by a acrimony. In September he had Mr E.H. Scott before the police court in Kuala Lumpur charged with ‘criminal breach of trust’ over $100 (about £12). The prosecutor ‘said that at first sight it might appear that $100 was too trivial a sum on which to bring Mr. Scott into court, thus making the charge out to be one of a vindictive nature. Counsel mentioned that discrepancies had been discovered when Mr. St Alban Smith, the manager of New Amherst Estate, had returned from leave, and referred to accused's adopting a defiant attitude. That was why the charge was pressed'. Scott was acquitted but then had St Alban Smith prosecuted. On 11 October:

Mr. Scott prosecuted Mr. St Alban Smith, manager of the New Amherst Rubber Estate, for having, as he stated, (I) attempted to screen an offence (criminal breach of trust), and (2) used criminal intimidation towards him (Mr. Scott). These proceedings were the outcome of the recent prosecution of Mr. Scott by Mr. Smith for criminal breach of trust, which resulted in an acquittal. In the course of the trial it was shown that Mr. Smith had threatened the prosecution unless Mr. Scott resigned and joined the army, in which contingency there was to be no prosecution. Mr. Robinson, for the defence, at the outset took the point that as no offence had been committed, as was subsequently shown by the acquittal, there could be no screening. The magistrate adopted this view, and Mr. Pooley, prosecuting, had nothing to say against it. Mr. Pooley then announced that he would withdraw the charge of criminal intimidation, although he contended that there had been some attempt to intimidate. Mr. Robinson did not want a withdrawal. He demanded an acquittal, and this the Court allowed. The accused was found not guilty of both charges, and discharged. This, counsel observed, would be the end of the litigation between the parties.

With that the invalided-out St Alban Smith was soon back in the Army—this time with a commission. The London Gazette announced that Smith was to a temporary (i.e. wartime) Second Lieutenant in the Royal Irish Regiment with effect from 27 November 1915. I can find no army records for this period but the Straits Times reported that he was present at the Easter Rising in Dublin in 1916. Records indicate that St Alban Smith must have been in the 3rd (Reserve) Battalion, Royal Irish Regiment, and to have been part of the initial response since they were stationed in the city, at Richmond Barracks. Only a few weeks later, on 4 May, St Alban Smith relinquished his commission ‘on account of ill-health’.

The Financial News of 2 October 1917 recorded that at a general meeting of the Mengkibol (Central Johore) Rubber Co Ltd at Winchester House, Old Broad Street, London, the chairman spoke:

To turn now to the report, you will. I know, share the deep concern with which we heard of the murder of our much esteemed manager (Mr. Willson), and our sympathy with his family. It is at least satisfactory to know that the murderer paid the penalty of his life. Mr. St. Alban Smith was appointed on probation to succeed Mr. Willson as manager, and it is now proposed to confirm him in his appointment. I am glad to say he was very successful in his recruiting mission to India, and thus solved the labour problem that for a time caused us all some anxiety.

I do not know when Smith’s first marriage ended in divorce. However the 1921 Census in England shows Lena St Alban Smith was ‘divorced’ and working as a ‘nurse (domestic)’ in the house of the American manager of the Palmolive Soap Company at 11 Hoop Lane, Golders Green. The daughter, Mercy, was with her and in full-time education.

Alfred St Alban Smith’s second marriage was on 15 November 1923 at the Kensington Register Office in London. He was shown on the marriage certificate as the divorced husband of Lena Cicely Margaret Smith and aged 43. The bride was a spinster, aged 39, Olive Winifred Easby*, the daughter of William Easby MD (deceased). The address of both was given as 88 Queens Gate, London SW7.

Olive was born in Wandsworth in 1884. In the 1901 Census she was a ‘copyist’ in London while In 1911 she was a ‘masseuse’, living in Hemel Hempstead. Hertfordshire. In both censuses she was living with her widowed mother. I cannot find her in the 1921 Census and it would seem that she was in India living as ‘Mrs Smith’ in India. Indeed on 20 September 1923 the London and China Express informed its readers that Mr and Mrs St Alban Smith had left for ‘home’ but that while in England he intended to visit Munich for ‘medical treatment for a trouble resulting from his war experience’. This return ‘home’ matches the marriage of Alfred and Olive in London after the voyage.

A reminder: if you are reading this other than on the Zoology Jottings site, it has been stolen.

In 1925 British newspapers show that St Alban Smith was involved in the launch of new rubber plantations. In one prospectus he was the agent reporting on the prospects of a new plantation in Borneo. Nearly all rubber plantation companies in the Straits Settlements were registered in London or Glasgow. From the late 1920s until 1941 he can be found in the rubber trade directories, first as manager of a particular estate in Singapore or in other Malay states nearby, then as general manager and finally, from 1935, as proprietor of two estates in Sungei Tiram, Johore. 

In the years from 1920 shipping records and newspaper reports show that St Alban Smith was in Britain in 1923, 1925, 1926, 1931, 1932, 1937 and 1938. Those dates do not mean he travelled in other years since not all routes into or out of UK are covered. Foreign ships could come from the Far east to Mediterranean ports with the passenger travelling quickly onwards by rail to a channel ferry. His second wife sometimes travelled with him, sometimes not with her travelling back to Singapore later than him. My guess is that some of these long voyages were for business, with the companies registered in London, and others for long leave. 

Two of his stays in England on leave brought the attention of the police.  On 27 May 1932 he was ordered to pay costs after having been found driving an unlicensed motor vehicle. His address was Brook Cottage, Poulner (Ringwood, Hampshire). In October 1937 he was staying at The Mount, Redlynch, at the north of the New Forest. In Salisbury he was fined £1 with 5 shillings costs; his licence was endorsed. According a constable on the beat Smith ‘came in his car at a high speed from the Canal, and out in front of the lorry into High Street, missing it only by inches. The lorry driver, in order to avoid a collision, had to brake hard and pull hard to the near side. The car gave no warning of its approach and continued into Bridge Street at the same speed’.

The last collection of animals for London Zoo was in 1936 when, as noted above, St Alban Smith was the proprietor of two rubber plantation in Johore. In 1937 he was in London and the Daily Herald had a short piece:

In sparsely-furnished bachelor quarters in the heart of the Malayan jungle, a rubber planter sat at a table writing furiously; writing against time and describing the feelings experienced by a man apparently dying of snake bite.

Half an hour previously he had been bitten by a 13 feet hamadryad, the deadly King Cobra,

The only antidote he took was whisky—a means to allay the slow poison creeping through his body. and to stay the pain and feeling of numbness enveloping his system.

That was in February. A week or so ago that man, Mr. A. St. Alban Smith, pioneer in the study of snake venom in its relation to medicine, walked into London unknown, unheralded.

He is convinced now that he must be immune from the harmful properties contained in snake venom.

On 12 March 1939 The Straits Times reported that St Alban Smith had decided to retire in this country (i.e. Malaya) ‘owing to war injuries’. He had clearly changed his mind because in the report on his taking a shipment of animals to London in 1936, he had indicated in February 1937 he was considering returning to England to ‘settle down permanently’. Another article followed up with:

Last week, the veteran planter and zoological collector took over Pangkor House, a holiday bungalow on lovely Pangkor Island. The island is one of the beauty spots of Malaya, with bathing from the kind of beach that one sees in the films about the South Seas but rarely finds on the west coast of the Peninsula. There are, however, some lovely beaches on the east coast, but they are too far off the Malayan beaten track to be known to the Singaporean who wants a real seaside local leave.

Pangkor's bays provide good fishing and sailing and there are some delightful walks, with the ruins of an old Dutch fort for those who are historically inclined.

Blue Funnel Line's Glaucus

In June 1940 St Alban Smith set off from Singapore ‘with the object of trying to serve in some capacity during the present war’ as The Straits Times put it. He reached Liverpool on 13 August on board Blue Funnel Line’s cargo ship Glaucus. He gave his address as the East India & Sports Club, St James’s Square, London and his occupation as ‘Retired Army Officer’. The Straits Times reported: ‘But he was far from fit and soon after arrival he had to enter a nursing home where he died last Sunday at the age of 60’.

The nursing home was the Victoria Institute in Bournemouth. Alfred died on 15 September 1940, a month after he disembarked in Liverpool. Alfred’s address was that of his brother-in-law, Frederick Samuel Wilkinson (1890-1978), 54 Pearce Avenue, Poole, Dorset, who informed the registry office of his death. Wilkinson was married to Alfred’s sister, Violet Muriel Smith (1891-1959). The certified cause of death was 1a Cirrhosis of the liver, 1b Recurrent malaria.

Siblings

Smith’s mother died in 1916. Thereafter all his siblings, four brothers and a sister according to an online family tree, left India at some stage in their lives. One settled in Australia, the others  in England. Several served as members of volunteer regiments in India before they left. One of the brothers, Wilfred Arthur Smith (1881-1972), had a son, Group Captain Wilfred George Gerald Duncan Smith DSO & Bar, DFC & Two Bars, AE (1914 –1996) an RAF flying ace of the Second World War. His son is Sir Iain Duncan Smith MP and former leader of the Conservative Party—and Alfred St Alban Smith was his great-uncle.

Aftermath

In the announcement of Alfred’s death The Straits Times of 20 September 1940 noted: ‘Mrs St Alban Smith is at present in Singapore’. 1941 was not a good year to be left in the Malay peninsula. I can find no mention of her in available passenger lists in or after 1940. I also found no mention of Olive Winifred after that time other than the record of her death at the age of 84. She died as Olive Winifred St Alban Smith (St Alban Smith as the surname on her death certificate) on 19 October 1968 at Rush Court Nursing Home, Brightwell cum Sotwell, near Wallingford, then in Berkshire but now South Oxfordshire. The ‘widow of Alfred St Alban Smith, rubber planter’, the cause of death was: 1a Bronchopneumonia, 1b Arteriosclerosis.

Alfred’s first wife, Lena Margaret Cicely Savage died on 19 October 1942, aged 67 and exactly 26 years before Olive Winifred, of ‘coronary occlusion’ at Lighthouse View, Highcliffe-on-Sea, Hampshire, the house of her daughter and husband. Her death certificate had the same wording as that Olive Winifred, ‘widow of Alfred St Alban Smith, rubber planter’. At the time of the 1939 Register, the emergency census taken in anticipation of war, she had a house at 27 Hamilton Road, Bournemouth. With her were seven other occupants including her grand-daughter, born in 1930, and three probable relations, possibly siblings or cousins. Earlier in the 1930s the first Mrs St Alban Smith lived in Woolmer Green, Hertfordshire, as did her daughter and son-in-law. Mother and daughter were successive chairmen of the local Women’s Conservative Association.

The Smiths’ daughter, Mercy Stella Margaret (1930-1970), married Herbert Rossiter-Angell (1884-1962) in 1929. Their daughter, Charlotte Anne Margaret, was born in 1930 and died in 2001). Mercy married, secondly, Allan Pratt in 1963. Alfred St Alban Smith has living descendants from Mercy and Herbert Rossiter-Angell.

Any more information?

Thus far I have been unable to locate a photograph of Alfred St Alban Smith and have found no reference to letters or articles he might have written which would go some way to explaining how his interest was sparked, how his activities developed and of what he did to study reptiles in the field and in captivity. If anyone has such information I would be very please to hear from them.

*A family tree gives the name of his second wife as Olive Winifred Lascelles without further details.

NOTE: There is another St Alban Smith in the records. A Canadian family with one, Henry Denne St Alban Smith DSO, serving as an engineer in the First World War. I have not looked for a family connexion but it is easy to imagine there is one.

Alfred St Alban Smith: Donor of Animals and Zoological Society of London Silver Medallist in 1931. Part One: Matters Zoological

In a recent article I described how Reg Lanworn, a keeper at London Zoo, had been sent out to bring back a collection of animals from Singapore that had been assembled by Alfred St Alban Smith, a rubber planter. For his support between 1926 and 1930 St Alban Smith was awarded the rare honour of a Silver Medal by the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) in 1931. He continued to send shipments until 1936. His main interest was in the reptiles of the Malay Peninsula and there is no doubt that he sent a sufficient number to fill a zoo’s reptile house several times over.

St Alban Smith (as he was usually termed although Smith was his surname) and his donations attracted a great deal of coverage in newspapers both in Britain and in what was then Malaya.

The following is a list of his donations to the zoo or ones which he facilitated together with some notes from the media coverage.

The lists have been taken from the annual reports of ZSL. Many of the common names used are difficult to match to names both common and scientific in use nearly a hundred years later. For some years species or subspecies new to the collection were deemed worthy of special mention and in those cases the scientific name was given.

1926

2 Javan Adjutants

1927

1 Malayan Palm-Civet, 2 Prevost’s Squirrels, 3 Two-banded Monitors, 1 Rusty Tiger Cat, 1 Slow Loris

1928

This collection from St Alban Smith was brought to London by Walter Goodfellow (1866-1953) the well known collector. Goodfellow was being paid by John Spedan Lewis (1885-1963) of John Lewis department stores and noted aviculturist to collect birds in the Far East.

1 Malayan Palm Civet, 3 Plantain Squirrels, 2 Prevost’s Squirrels, 2 Hamadryads, 1 Binturong, 1 Slow Loris, 1 Oriental Eagle-Owl, 1 Malay Fish-Owl, 8 Java Sparrows, 1 Indian Cobra, 1 Three-marked Palm Civet, 1 Malaccan Civet, 1 Yellow-throated Marten, Fin-tailed Lizards, 1 Rough-necked Monitor, 1 Red-marked Burrowing Snake, 2 Dog-faced Water Snakes, 1 Painted Tree Snake, 1 Eight-lined Snake

1929

One of the Hamadryads (King Cobra) was over 11 feet long. 

Much was made in the newspapers, occidental and oriental, of the tiger in this collection. It (‘Charlie’) was, the newspapers reported, ‘the only man-eating tiger the Zoo has ever possessed’. Reports are a little garbled but one states that the tiger was tracked and caught by St Alban Smith himself. All reports agree that it was a Sumatran Tiger.

The collection also includes a large number of monitors lizards, one of which is a giant, approaching in size the “dragons” of Komodo. These monitors indulged in fighting during the voyage, and they will have to be kept in the reptile house sanatorium for some time while their scars are being dressed.

1 Binturong, 4 Prevost's Squirrels, 3 Slow Loris, 2 Black Apes, 3 Indo-Malayan Palm Civets, 2 Leopards, 2 Pallas's Squirrels, 1 Sun Bear, 1 Masked Palm Civet, 1 Tiger, 1 Silvery Gibbon,

2 Great Barbets, 4 Nicobar Pigeons, 2 Purple-capped Lories, 3 Forsten's Lorikeets, 2 Blue-streaked Lories, 2 Grand Eclectus, 2 Violet-necked Lories, 2 Wrinkled-billed Hornbills, 1 Brahminy Kite, 1 Indian Pied Hornbill, 1 Javan Hawk-Eagle, 2 Red Lories, 2 Black-capped Lories, 4 Ornate Lorikeets, 1 Blue-collared Parrakeet, 1 Racquet-Tailed Parrot, 2 Blood Pythons, 18 Black-and-Gold Tree Snakes, 4 Reticulated Pythons, 7 Two-banded Monitors, 22 Common Asiatic Toads, 5 Painted Tree Snakes, 1 Spiny Terrapin, 20 Yellow Monitors, 1 Bell's Lizard, 4 Orange-striped Snakes, 3 Rare Elaphes, 2 Tail-lined Tree Snakes, 1 Fordonia Water Snake, 2 Hamadryads, 1 Wagler's Temple Viper, 15 Gray's Temple Vipers, 1 Common Malayan Tree Frog, 1 False Sea Snake, 1 Red-marked Burrowing Snake, 1 Eight-lined Snake, 3 Emerald Tree Snakes, 2 Cerberus Water Snakes, 43 Malayan Bull Frogs, 1 Ornate Tree Snake,1 Iridescent Snake, 1 Red Big-toothed Snake, 1 Emma's Lizard, 1 Cerberus Water Snake, 1 Green Pit Viper, 1 Sumatran Pit Viper, 2 Flattish Soft-shelled Turtles, 1 Doria's Water Snake, 1 Sumpah-sumpah, 1 Spotted Callugar

1930

The 1930 shipment which Keeper Lanworn was sent out to bring back from Singapore was the big one, well two because a second ship left Singapore a month after the first. On 26 April, St Alban Smith launched an appeal in the Straits Times to augment his own collection that was to be sent to London:

This article is an appeal, but before the impoverished reader turns away hastily let us reassure him that it is not his money we want; neither do we want his old clothes nor his signature to a petition praying for an improvement in the rubber and tin markets. We want animals, birds and reptiles!

At present, the London Zoo, in which Malaya was almost unrepresented for many years, contains 285 specimens of the wild life of this country. The collection is not nearly representative and the London Zoological Society, in a laudable attempt to improve this state of affairs, has already dispatched one of the ablest keepers in its employ, Keeper Lanworn, who is due in Singapore shortly. It should be understood that Keeper Lanworn is rot coming to Malaya to spend money.

He is coming to take charge of a collection made by Mr. A. St. Alban Smith at Seletar, and anything else he can lay his hands on….

This is a much larger matter than may appear at first glance. We hear repeated complaints that people at Home are content to remain in blissful ignorance of the various aspects of life in different parts of the Empire. Here is an opportunity to teach them something in a pleasant way; to provide interest and amusement for the thousands of Londoners who flock to Regent's Park on every Bank Holiday; to perform a still greater public service by making available for study by the scientists living specimens of the wild life of the Peninsula… Snakes, frogs and other reptiles are wanted as well as tigers and the larger beasts. In no case will any expense be incurred by the donor if he or she will arrange for delivery of the contribution to Mr. A. St. Alban Smith at Seletar, Singapore. From that point all transport charges to London will be met, Messrs. Alfred Holt and Co., Ltd., having generously agreed to forego their charges in the case of animals intended for the London Zoo, while the Zoological Society has expressed its willingness to put up a card giving the name of each person presenting a specimen. In addition, the Straits Times is prepared to acknowledge all contributions received at Seletar…

Hitherto, the Zoological Society has had to rely upon the enthusiasm of the few for contributions to its Malayan section. That the specimens already received are appreciated is evidenced by the Society's willingness to send a keeper half way round the world to take charge of the collection of one man. The visit provides an opportunity for making this appeal to a wider section of the public and we commend it to the earnest consideration of all lovers of animal life. Particularly would we ask those who have visited the Zoological Society's Gardens in Regent's Park to recall the thrill and pleasure that attended an experience which could not have been enjoyed but for the generosity of people living in the remoter parts of the world. Now is the chance to pass on, at little or no expense, some of that pleasure to others, only a very small percentage of whom are ever likely to have an opportunity cf seeing the wild animals of the tropics in their natural surroundings.

Apart from the recreation provided for many thousands every year by the London Zoo, the educative and scientific value of the institution entitles it to the sympathetic support of all who are in a position to give assistance. Another claim which the Zoological Society has to the consideration of the people of Malaya is that its founder and first President was Sir Stamford Raffles, the most assiduous worker, the most enthusiastic collector of everything which could advance the cause of knowledge and of science.

A reminder: if you are reading this other than on the Zoology Jottings site, it has been stolen.

The newspapers took a great interest in the the collection. On 20 June 1930, the Straits Times provided a list of the donations, together with those animals bought by ZSL from dealers, which had left Singapore on the Alfred Holt steamer Eumaeus in May. The article also warned:

Mortality on a long voyage is always heavy, especially among reptiles, so unless keeper Lanworn is specially fortunate the consignment he will deliver at the Gardens will probably be considerably less than that which left Singapore.

From the same report we learn that Reg Lanworn was ‘was laid up for two weeks as a result of undue familiarity with a large temple viper’ and thus unable to gather some of the animals promised by government departments.

A further shipment from Singapore, including, presumably, those left behind because of Reg Lanworn’s snake bite, followed:

A final shipment will leave on June 29. in this will be included a fine male tapir purchased by the Zoo, a three-year-old tame Orang Utan presented by Mrs. Cochrane, of British North Borneo, a bear from Major Peake, Johore, several rare birds, wild cats, civets, a leopard, a large collection of tortoises and terrapins, and over 100 poisonous snakes.

1 Jelerang Squirrel, 1 Large Indian Civet Cat, 1 Marbled Cat, 2 Leopard Cats,1 Hardwicke's Civet Cat, 1 Dusky Langur, 4 Slow Loris, 1 Pig-tailed Monkey, 2 Rusty Tiger Cats, 7 Asiatic Chipmunks, 5 Chinese Squirrels, 1 Grizzled-Grey Tree Kangaroo, 1 Rusty Tiger Cat, 2 Crab-eating Monkeys, 1 Feather-tailed Phalanger, 2 Racket-tailed Parrots, 1 Lesser Sulphur-crested Cockatoo, 3 White-billed Hornbills, 26 Malay Orange-bellied Flower-peckers, 1 White-breasted Niltava, 1 Friar Bird, 5 White-collared Kingfishers, 2 Malayan Yellow-vented Bulbuls, 1 Malay Serpent Eagle, 7 Green Sunbirds, 1 Occipital Blue Pie, 1 Black-winged Grackle, 2 Yellow-crowned Bulbuls, 2 Great Barbets, 3 Indian White Eyes, 4 Dwarf Turtle Doves, 1 Ferruginous Wood Partridge, 1 Great-headed Maleo, 2 White-rumped Lories, 6 Ornate Lorikeets, 1 Aru Island Parrakeet, 9 Painted Tree Snakes, 3 Emerald Tree Snakes, 5 Cerberus Water Snakes, 1 Hamadryad, 2 Blood Pythons, 10 Indian Cobras, 45 Gray's Temple Vipers, 15 Tail-lined Tree Snakes, 1 Greater Indian Rat Snake, 4 Eastern Rat Snakes, 6 Black and Gold Tree Snakes, 23 Wagler's Pit Vipers, 1 Indian Wolf Snake, 2 Spiny Terrapins, 3 Iridescent Snakes, 4 Orange-striped Snakes, 3 Rare Elaphes, 5 Red-marked Burrowing Snakes, 1 Boie's Cat Snake, 3 Grass Green Tree Snakes, 3 Two-banded Monitors, 1 Baska Water Tortoise, 7 Elephant Water Snakes, 3 Eight-lined Snakes, 5 Ornate Tree Snakes, 1 Striped Blind Snake, 4 Fin-tailed Lizards, 1 Sun Lizard, 1 Olive Skink, 1 Reticulated Python, 26 Broad-headed Water Snakes, 1 Sealing Wax Snake, 2 False Sea Snakes, 1 Red-banded Snake, 1 Jasper Tree Snake, 1 King Gecko, 2 Peron's House Geckos, 3 Sun Skinks, 1 Sumpah Sumpah, 2 Two-banded Monitors, 2 Dumeril's Monitors, 8 Oldham's Terrapins, 11 Spiny Terrapins, Spotted Callagurs, 2 Reeves's Terrapins, 3 Three-banded Terrapins, 3 Common Asiatic Toads, 9 Gold-lined Frogs, 2 Long-nosed Tree Snakes, 4 Malayan Giant Frogs, 8 Common Sea Snakes, 5 Amboina Box Tortoises, 1 Starred Tortoise, 7 Japanese Newts, 10 Bridled House Geckos, 5 Schlegel's Gharials, 1 Yellow Monitor, 3 Great Moluccan Skinks

Stirling WG. 7 Common Seasnakes, 1 Black-necked Grackle, 2 Malayan Giant Frogs

Neale Mrs. 2 Slow Loris, 4 Domestic Cats

Burleigh A. 1 Sun Bear

Glenister AG 2 Tigers, 1 Sun Bear (with Mrs Glenister and Mrs Evans)

Edwards, Major A. 1 Pig-tailed Monkey

Mian, Goh Keng.  6 Broad-headed Water Snakes

Smediey, Norman. 6 Cerberus Water Snakes

1931

3 Amboina King Parrakeets, 2 White-rumped Lories, 1 Aru Island Parrakeet, 2 Fishing Cats, 1 Long-nosed Tree Snake, 16 Black-and-gold Tree Snakes, 4 Gray’s Temple Vipers, 1 Broad-headed Water Snake, 3 Madagascar Weaver Birds, 5 Green Sunbirds, 1 Malay Orange-bellied Flower-pecker, 1 Brahminy Kite, 1 Javan Fishing Owl

1933

2 Blood Pythons, 1 Black & Gold Tree Snake, 3 Red-marked Burrowing Snakes, 4 Orange-striped Snakes, 1 Tail-lined Tree Snake, 2 Indian Cobras, 2 Speckled Water Snakes, 2 Geckos, 3 Painted Tree Snakes, 1 Peron’s House Gecko, 4 Bridled House Geckos, 2 Hamadryads, 2 Common Big-toothed Snakes, 1 Flat-tailed Gecko, 5 Common Malayan Frogs, 1 Common Malayan Tree Frog, 1 Dog-faced Snake, 7 Emerald Tree Snakes, 2 Black & Gold Tree Snakes, 1 Reticulated Python, 1 Eight-lined Snake, 1 Sealing Wax Snake, 1 Frog, 2 Malayan Grass Snakes

1934

39 Hamadryads, 44 Black & Gold Tree Snakes, 11 Orange Striped Snakes, 7 Emerald Tree Snakes, 1 Sealing Wax Snake, 9 Common Malayan Tree Frogs, 2 Wagler's Pit Vipers, 3 Gold-lined Frogs, 5 Broad-headed Water Snakes, 8 Gray's Temple Vipers, 2 Red-marked Burrowing Snakes, 1 Iridescent Snake, 6 Common Malayan Frogs, 1 Edeling's Grass Snake, 4 Reticulated Pythons, 2 Fordonia Water Snakes, 6 Painted Tree Snakes, 2 Malayan Grass Snakes, 2 Black Cobras, 6 Cerberus Water Snakes, 2 Boie's Cat Snakes, 1 Tail-lined Tree Snake, 1 Ganjam Snake, 1 Eight-lined Snake, 2 Indian Wolf Snakes, 2 Reddish Rat Snakes

1935

The size of the larger of the two Reticulated Pythons donated by St Alban Smith was of particular interest to the press. It was 28 feet long and needed 14 men to wrangle it out its crate.

14 Emerald Tree Snakes, 28 Gray’s Temple Vipers, 11 Waglers Pit Vipers, 2 Malayan Grass Snakes, 5 Tail-lined Tree Snakes, 4 Black Cobras, 8 Orange-striped Snakes, 3 Hamadryads, 6 Reticulated Pythons, 1 Iridescent Snake, 1 Malayan Grass Snake, 4 Red Big-toothed Snakes, 6 Banded Kraits, 9 Painted Tree Snakes, 12 Black and Gold Tree Snakes, 2 Ornate Tree Snakes, 1 Red-ringed Tree Snake, 1 Schneider’s Water Snake, 2 Sealing Wax Snakes, 1 Indian Wolf Snake, 1 Red-tailed Tree Snake,12 Bridled House Geckos, 2 Common Malayan Frogs, 2 Common MalayanTree Frogs, 2 Reddish Rat Snakes, 1 Cerberus Water Snake, 5 Gold-lined Frogs, 3 Blood Pythons

1936

Straits Times 26 April 1936

St Alban Smith kept snakes at his estate while awaiting shipment. In January 1936 a Mr E.A. Chard, manager of the estate at Peradin, Johore, was bitten on the left hand by a ‘big black cobra’. Chard caught two other snakes in danger of escaping and then sought treatment:

Tourniquets were applied, the wound scarified with a razor blade, and permanganate crystals rubbed in. Mr. St. Alban Smith, who has had long experience with snakes, having sent many shipments to the London Zoo, also injected 50 c.c. of cobra anti-venene [sic] which he had got from the Kasauli Institute, India, and Mr. Chard made a rapid recovery.

This shipment was taken was to be to taken to London by St Alban Smith. However, he postponed his trip. It included two baby Orang-utans from Sarawak. They may be the ones attributed to a donation by E. Banks CMZS that year. The report in the Straits Times noted that they were being looked after by St Alban Smith on his estate at Peradin, Johore.

Other newspapers noted the large size of the Hamadryads as well as St Alban’s Smith’s capture of the white snakes in the Batu caves of Johore:

Mr. St Alban Smith writes that the present specimens were caught, by the aid of electric torches, a mile and a half from the entrance and separated from it by an underground river. It is thought that they feed on the "devil" bats, which inhabit the caves in such huge numbers that their guano has accumulated in places to a depth of 10ft., though how the snakes are able to catch such active prey in the complete darkness is unknown.

The News Chronicle of 23 October 1936 had on article on new gibbons at the Zoo. They were, it was noted, brought to Singapore from an area beyond Bangkok through the efforts of St Alban Smith and then to London by Walter Goodfellow.

6 Ornate Tree Snakes, 1 Eight-lined Snake, 2 Indian Wolf Snakes, 4 Boie's Sea Snakes, 2 Black & Gold Tree Snakes, 1 Malayan Grass Snake, 7 Sacred Cave Snakes, 1 Eastern Rat Snake, 1 Indian Changeable Lizard, 1 Island Gecko, 1 Bridled House Gecko, 1 Well-spotted Snake, 4 Emerald Tree Snakes, 14 Painted Tree Snakes, 4 Red-Marked Burrowing Snakes, 1 Red Big-toothed Snake, 1 Lesser Indian Rat Snake, 5 Tail-lined Tree Snakes, 3 Reticulated Pythons, 3 Orange-striped Snakes, 32 Gray's Temple Vipers, 13 Wagler's Pit Vipers, 13 Black Cobras, 2 Hamadryads, 1 Reddish Rat Snake, 1 Branded Krait, 1 Blood Python, 1 Common Malayan Tree Frog, 2 Common Malayan Frogs, 154 Cerberus Water Snakes, 1 Triton Cockatoo, 1 Lesser Sulphur-crested Cockatoo, 1 Iridescent Snake, 9 Siamese Fighting Fish, 2 Gouldian Grass Finches, 7 Yellow-breasted Buntings, 3 Malay Orange-bellied Flowerpeckers, 1 Japanese Waxwing, 1 Green Sunbird, 2 Malaccan Sunbirds, 2 Van Haselt's Sunbirds, 5 White Eyes

Snake Venom Research

St Alban Smith also sent snakes to the Staten Island Zoo, New York City, that was in 1935 and probably beyond. In 1939 The Straits Times noted that cobras he had sent had been used at Mount Sinai Hospital to make a preparation of serum for the cure on intense pain and that venom had been used to treat haemophilia. Now these were of course the interests of Burgess Barnett, Curator of Reptiles at London Zoo, until his removal from the job by ZSL’s Council in 1937. St Alban Smith was clearly in constant touch and I suspect was in close rapport with Barnett and I suspect was asked by the latter to send venomous snakes to New York. Bartlett wrote an article for the London Evening News in 1933 explaining how the Reptile House dealt with shipments of snakes from St Alban Smith in Singapore. Warily was the method.

The End

St Alban Smith’s donations to London Zoo slid out of view after his death in 1940. On 28 September the Straits Times included a snippet from its London correspondent. ‘Goliath’, the 28-foot Reticulated Python sent by St Alban Smith in 1935, ate a whole goat—horns included. But then, on 23 November 1942, Craven Hill, the zoo correspondent for the London Evening Standard, reported that Goliath had died.

Part Two will cover the life and times of Alfred St Alban Smith.

...and what on earth are sumpah-sumpahs?

Thomas Henry Huxley’s message to the USA in his address at the opening of Johns Hopkins University in 1876

Darwin's bulldog was invited to give an opening address at the opening of Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, on 12 September 1876. The address included:

I am not in the slightest degree impressed by your bigness or your material resources, as such. Size is not grandeur; territory does not make a nation. The great issue, about which hangs a true sublimity, and the terror overhanging fate is - What are you going to do with all these things?…The one condition of success, your sole safeguard, is the moral worth, and intellectual clearness of the individual citizen.

 

Thomas Henry Huxley
Photograph by Lock & Whitfield
Wellcome Collection

Hong Kong: A Crake and IKEA

Sometimes birds turn up in unusual places. Birders in Hong Kong were out in force in February--not to some remote parts of the New Territories but to a landscaped building in the heart of Kowloon. There, in the patches of garden around Kowloon Bat Sports Centre, was a crake, a Slaty-legged Crake (Rallina eurizonoides) to be precise, going about the business of searching for food, moving around a bit and having a nap.

In recent years these crakes which are summer visitors to shrubland in the New Territories and passage migrants have been seen occasionally in Hong Kong's parks behaving rather like this one and ignoring the human inhabitants. Those in shrubland make their presence known by calling at night but are extremely difficult to spot. My guess is that a tired passage migrant will drop down on any bit of flat land in order to recover and stock up its reserves. Tired birds, desperately hungry, can appear to be very tame. In a game of die of starvation or risk predation, the former course wins.

AJP, having photographed the bird, then walked the short distance to IKEA to get what he needed there. There was no report on the consumption, or not, of Swedish meatballs.

Black-winged Cuckooshrike in Hong Kong

 This male Black-winged Cuckooshrike (Lalage melaschistos) posed for AJP in Hong Hong. A bird of south and southeast Asia it is classified as a scarce winter visitor and passage migrant in Hong Kong. However, we have seen at least one on our stay in and visits to Hong since the 1960s. There are early records of this species breeding in Hong Kong but that no longer seems to be the case. It preys on invertebrates.

Pygmy Marmosets in Colombia. The smallest monkeys in the world

Last November we saw these Pygmy Marmosets in Putomayo, a department in south-west Colombia. We flew to Villagarzon from Bogota, staying at the Portal del Sol, an ecolodge owned by a family rewilding the farmland which runs down to the river. And it was by the river that the troop of marmosets appeared. We had already seen the holes they had gnawed in the trees and which they visit to gather the material the tree has extruded.

The shape of their lower incisors is a clear adaptation to gnawing holes in trees. The exudate the marmosets eat is said to be mainly gum rather than sap and to comprise their main source of carbohydrates. Fruit, flowers, buds and nectar also feature in their diet. For protein they catch insects and other small invertebrates as well as small lizards which they search for in the vegetation.

Pygmy marmosets inhabit forests along rivers, spending a great deal of their time gnawing the holes in trees, exhausting it and then moving on.

Both troops had a couple of young. Only one female in the small troop breeds.

These Pygmy Marmosets were of the species originally named and when only one was recognised. Cebuella pygmaea. Those south of two large rivers were considered a subspecies. But the splitters rife in mammalian taxonomy who ignore the biological species concept erected it as a separate species. Cebuella niviventris. To confuse matters further the one we saw has two common names: Northern or Western Pygmy Marmoset as does the other: Southern or Eastern. Taken as a whole or, if you will have it that way, as the two species together Pygmy Marmosets occur in amazonian Brazil, Ecuador, Peru and Colombia. In Colombia it only occurs in the extreme south of the country.

Both groups we saw were low in the trees and made no attempt to flee. They did though carefully inspect us as we did them.

Holes gnaws in trees

Lots more monkeys from Colombia to come.

Edith Durham: from drawing Surinam Toads to Balkan anthropology and supporting Albania

In 1901, a book appeared which is still worth reading or simply for looking up what was known at the time. It is remarkable because the author was not known for his research on reptiles and amphibians but for birds in particular and vertebrates in general. He was Hans Gadow who was born in Prussia in 1855. After working with the big names in German zoology, he arrived in London to take a job at the Natural History Museum. From there he moved to Cambridge as Curator of Birds in the university’s zoology museum but after two years he was also appointed Lecturer in Vertebrate Morphology at which time he became a naturalised British subject. He was elected to the Royal Society in 1892 but the weird world of Cambridge only promoted him to a Readership in 1920, only eight years before he died.

Gadow's biographer for the Royal Society, David Meredith Seares Watson FRS (1886 –1973) palaeontologist and professor of zoology in University College London wrote:

…and he was greatly interested in the problems of animal colour and of geographical distribution.

In order to have first-hand knowledge of these matters, he travelled extensively in Spain and Mexico, observing amphibians, reptiles, and birds in their natural environments. The results are recorded in two books of travel, and in many papers.

In some ways, the best and certainly the most characteristic work which Gadow published was the volume on Amphibia and Reptiles in the ‘Cambridge Natural History.’ In this book, morphology holds a subordinate place, the greater part of it consisting of short and often most entertaining accounts of individual species regarded as animals living in the world.

It is full of observations of habits of all kinds—food preferences and the capture of food, locomotion, breeding habits, colour changes, the musical appreciation of Tortoises—many of them original, and most confirmed by his own observations of animals which he kept in his house outside Cambridge. Indeed, the whole book well displays the real love and understanding he had of these beasts.

The success of Gadow’s book which appeared in 1901 can also be attributed to the illustrations. Gadow in the preface explained: 

The drawings on wood were, with few exceptions, made by Miss M.E. Durham, mostly from living specimens—a procedure which has to a great extent determined the selection of the illustrations.

Why Edith Durham got the commission for illustrating Gadow’s book I do not know, other than, of course, her undoubted talent in drawing living animals that looked like living animals. Her father was a well-connected London surgeon. She was the first of nine children, a number of whom became well known in fields from science from suffragism.

A reminder that if you are reading this article other than on 'Zoology Jottings' it has been stolen from me.

Having used one of Miss Durham’s drawings of Tuataras to illustrate an article, I wondered what else she had produced and was surprised to discover that she had become famous in another field entirely.

Edith Durham

A great deal has been written on Mary Edith Durham (1863–1944) and what follows is a brief outline of her life. She was a student at Bedford College and then the Royal Society of Arts. Some of her works are held in galleries and museums. After her father’s death in 1895 she looked after her ailing mother. Utterly exhausted by this role her doctor advised a holiday. That advice taken she travelled by ship from Trieste to Kotor and then inland in Montenegro. That trip changed her life. She learnt Serbo-Croat on her return and delved into the history of the Balkans. After further extensive travel in the region she published her first book in 1904. Then she concentrated on Albania. Over twenty years she championed the Albanian people. The Balkans were a major cause of interest and indeed political obsession in Britain in the early decades of the 20th century. Edith Durham was known to be eccentric and ‘difficult’ getting up the noses of both London intellectuals and the Foreign Office for her advocacy of the people of Albania, particularly those who lived under dire conditions in the north of the country. She published her studies in anthropological journals and books; she was involved in aid organisations; she drew and painted the areas she studied, and she collected costumes, jewellery, textiles and artefacts. She was the first woman to be elected vice-president of the Royal Anthropological Institute.

Dubbed the ‘Queen of the Highlanders’ Edith Durham is still celebrated as a national heroine in Albania.