Read The Map That Changed the World Online
Authors: Simon Winchester
In writing this book I owe the very greatest debt to Professor Hugh Torrens, the renowned historian of geology latterly based at Keele University in the English Midlands, who probably knows more about William Smith than anyone else alive, and is indeed himself in the process of writing the definitive academic study of Smith’s career and legacy. He gave generously of his time, his advice, and his help, and handed me an immense number of his own most useful papers, both published and unpublished, from which I learned much; a lesser man, on learning that a rival biography was in the making, would certainly have reacted more coolly. I thank Professor Torrens for his magnanimity, and can only repeat now what I suggested to him at the time—that this short book should be thought of simply as the hors d’oeuvre while we wait in eager anticipation for his main dish, soon to come. I earnestly hope that he will find that this brief account—while not so scholarly as the work he plans—will be a worthy enough tribute to the shadowy and half-forgotten figure whom we both so much admire. I wish also to record my thanks to the tireless and indefatigable Soun Vannithone, who, though taking no time off at all from cooking his legendary Laotian cuisine at a pub (the Racing Page, in Richmond, well worth the detour), managed to complete, precisely on time, the intricate and delicate illustrations on these pages. Alan Davidson, who since his time as British ambassador in Vientiane, has kept in close touch with Soun, helped at all stages; and to Alan and Jane Davidson I offer my sincere gratitude.
Professor Jim Kennedy, at the University Museum, Oxford, kindly made available the papers of William Smith, William Buckland and John Phillips; Stella Brecknell, the librarian and archivist who oversees this magnificent treasure-trove of documents, proved of enormous assistance, seeing to it that almost all of the most interesting items in her care made their way to me on the remote Scottish island where, perhaps perversely, I chose to write this book. Professor Keith Thomson, also at the University Museum, gave me helpful advice about the impact on pre-Darwinian thought that came about as a result of William Smith’s discoveries and theories.
Many of those who lectured in geology at Oxford when I was an undergraduate there in the mid-sixties remain in what is now grandly called the Department of Earth Sciences, and were each in their own way keen to help their prodigal student who, after so long a time away, decided to stumble back into writing about their discipline. In particular I wish to thank David Bell, Steve Moorbath, and Stuart McKerrow, whose lectures on igneous geology, geochemical dating techniques, and Jurassic paleontology respectively evidently left more of an impression on me than my generally lackluster examination results suggested.
Ron Oxburgh—now the Lord Oxburgh—was also at the Department in the sixties, and lectured on structural geology: he too has been helpful in more ways than the simply technical, not least because of his presidency of the Geological Society of London: I have many reasons for wishing to offer my gratitude for his efforts and enthusiastic support of this project. Rachel Laudan, from her home in Mexico, wrote helpfully about her own early interest in William Smith, and kindly sent me her entire doctoral thesis and several other papers that threw new light on Smith’s many achievements. That her position has long been generally critical of Smith did not in the least diminish her support for this book: the fact, she wrote, that he had mapped all England, and essentially on his own, has long since persuaded her that Smith was indeed a remarkable man, and she has long thought he deserved a biography—providing only that it stopped short of suggesting that he deserved a sainthood. I hope that in this I have been temperate, and fair.
For various specific items of help and advice I wish also to thank: Robin Cocks, Jill Darrell, Richard Fortey, Ann Lum, Susan Snell and Brian Rosen at London’s Natural History Museum; Wendy Cawthorne at the Geological Society of London; David Buchanan of the Scarborough City Museums; my friend Francis Herbert at the Royal Geographical Society; my long-term traveling companion Kirk Johnson at the Denver Natural History Museum in Colorado; his colleague there, Bob Raynolds; Ian MacGregor of the Meteorological Office Archive, who seems to be able to
find out what the weather was like on any particular day in the last three centuries; the authors Simon Knell and Roger Osborne, who have both written fascinating recent books on the development of geological thought; Nicolaas Rupke, who is an academic specialist in Holland researching this the same, very English field of study; Patrick Wyse-Jackson, the geology archivist at Trinity College, Dublin; Robert Millspaugh of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists; Professor Ronald Numbers at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, for his views on evolutionists; Joanna Innes of Somerville College, Oxford, a specialist on early London prisons, for her help with details of life in the King’s Bench debtors’ prison; Derek and Eileen Brown for their hospitality and friendship in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, close to where William Smith was born; Brian Excell and Fiona Ann Drury for their comments on the Tisbury Coral; Denys Brunsden, winner of a William Smith Award, for his help on the Jurassic of Dorset; Lord and Lady Derwent of Hackness Hall, near Scarborough, for their hospitality and help when I arrived to ask about William Smith’s Yorkshire exile; and Heather MacFadyen of Bristol, who kindly searched, with great professional expertise, the famous collection of the late Victor and Joan Eyles, a couple who—because of their profound knowledge of the subject—should by rights have long ago written the book I am writing now. My hope is that they would approve of the work I have done in their stead. My son Rupert Winchester also searched the papers in the Public Records Office at Kew—under the invigilation of a supremely helpful staff, he says—for details of Smith’s imprisonment, and less fruitfully, his marriage. Juliet Walker was tirelessly helpful, as she has been for so many of my projects: I hope she finds the Aeron chair I sent from Oklahoma at least a comfortable small recompense for all she managed to do.
My editors in London, Anya Waddington, Juliet Annan, and Clara Farmer, have proved wonderfully sympathetic in dealing with the complications inherent in a book about so curious a subject as geology—with Clara especially so since her father, David Farmer, is a geologist and very kindly looked over his daughter’s shoulder to make sure there were not too many errors of fact or judgment. Donna Poppy in London and Sue Llewellyn in New York, each deploying her remarkable copyediting skills, helped make sure that such infelicities as remained were ironed out and smoothed away. The proofreading phase of this book happened to coincide with my brief stay as a visiting professor at the University of Chicago, where I decided to take advantage of my situation by asking the members of my writing class if they would each care to look at a couple of chapters to try to spot the most egregious of errors. They managed to detect some;
and so I am happy to record my thanks to a group of clever and talented young men and women who I suspect—since most of them hope to become writers—will become distinguished and familiar bylines before very long. The names for which editors should thus be on the lookout are those of Amy Biegelsen, Robert Peter Cuthbert, Melissa Klimala Dean, Gina DiPonio, Kristen Ina Grimes, Kurt Hagstrom, Frank Karabetsos, Daniel Lavetter, Kathleen Lingo, Zachary Martin, Kristen Morgan Miller, Casey Sanchez, Vanessa E. Raizberg and Leslie Synn. Responsibility for those mistakes that managed to survive their scrutiny—and I hope there are few—should be laid squarely at my door alone. In New York the legendary Larry Ashmead—who, by extraordinary chance, was once a geologist too, but moved on to become one of the most cherished editors in American publishing—seemed to think the manuscript passed muster, and made criticisms that were as constructive as they could only be, coming from a publisher who knew his rocks. My agents—Peter Matson in New York and Bill Hamilton in London—were also enthusiastic about my telling the tale of William Smith, L.L.D.: I hope they will think the finished product lives up to their own expectations, which they communicated with such early eagerness to the publishers.
I wish finally to make mention of my unforgettable tutor at Oxford, the great stratigrapher, field-trip speed-walker, longtime supporter, and friend Harold Reading, who over three long years hammered geology into my head with about the same energy that, in the field, he hammered fossils out of limestones. Harold succeeded, if not in winning me the greatest of all degrees, nor in persuading me to follow a glittering career in oil, or gold, or academia, but in keeping strongly alive my interest in the earth, for all the decades that have passed since he taught me. It is with the deepest gratitude for his wisdom, kindness and friendship, that I dedicate this book to him—the longest of all my essays, and thirty-five years late, but well meant all the same.
Note: Entries in this index, carried over verbatim from the print edition of this title, are unlikely to correspond to the pagination of any given e-book reader. However, entries in this index, and other terms, may be easily located by using the search feature of your e-book reader.
Page numbers in
italics
refer to illustrations.
Accurate Delineations and Descriptions of the Natural Order of the Various Strata That are Found in Different Parts of England and Wales
(Smith), 156–57
Adam brothers, 6, 205
Adelard of Bath, 122
Adelphi houses, 6–7, 204–5,
205
Agassiz, Louis, 295
Age of Reason, The
(Paine), 22
Agricultural Magazine
, 202
Agriculture, British Board of, 198, 199, 211, 217
Aikin, Arthur, 225
Allen, William, 224
Allen & Hanbury, 224
ammonites, 189
descriptions of, ix–xi, 165–66, 172–73, 179–80
evolution of, ix–x
found by author, 165–66, 170, 172–74
illustrations of, ix–xi,
173, 181, 188, 271
origin of name, ix
Annalis Veteris et Novi Testamenti
(Ussher), 15
n
Anning, Mary, 108–9, 112, 128, 240
Aptyxiella,
179–80
Arbuthnot, Charles, 246
Arkwright, Richard, 17
Art of Measuring, The
(Fenning), 53
Ashmolean Museum, 35, 179
Asteroceras, 188,
189
Austen, Jane, 121
Baily, Francis, 295
Baker, George, 299
Banks, Sir Joseph, 204, 242, 261, 262, 266
Bounty
expedition and, 200
Geological Society’s dispute with, 227
WS’s map dedicated to, 220
as WS’s patron, 149, 200, 201–3, 209–10, 217, 245, 246, 247
Barne, Barne, 246
baronets, 277
n
Barry, Edward, 296
Barry, Sir Charles, 296, 298
Bath, 51, 59, 95, 101, 114, 115, 118, 146, 148, 161, 169, 180, 181
Billingsley and Davis’s maps of, 124–25, 127
hot springs of, 121–22, 208–9, 253
population of, 122
Roman naming of, 121
Warner’s guide to, 214
Warner’s map of, 148
WS’s map of, 126–28,
126,
142, 148, 289
WS’s plaque in, 102,
103
Bath Agricultural Society, 130, 149
Bath and West of England Society, 123–24, 129
Bath Chronicle,
101, 122, 197
Bath Corporation, 208, 209
Bath stone, 82, 243
Bedford, Francis Russell, fifth duke of, 153–55, 205
estates of, 154, 209
sheepshearings of, 154–55
WS’s relationship with, 149, 156, 160, 196, 197, 209
Beeching, Richard, 79
Bennett, Etheldred, 110, 113–14, 233
Berisford, John, 255
Bevan, Benjamin, 201
Bible, 12–13,
13,
112, 248
Big Ben, 296
Billingsley, John, 124–25, 127
Birmingham, 24
n
bituminous coal, 48
bivalves, 71, 111
Blessed Order of the Visitation, 163
Bligh, William, 200
Board of Agriculture, British, 198, 199, 211, 217
bombazine, 113
Booth, Junius Brutus, 22
n
Bounty
expedition, 200
Bowdler, Thomas, 260
n
Bowerbank, James, 240
brachiopods, 33, 71–72
Bridgewater, Francis Egerton, third duke of, 42–43, 45, 77
Brisbane, Sir Thomas, 295
British Association for the Advancement of Science, 292, 294–95, 296, 299
British Geological Survey, 109
British Museum, 94, 111, 241, 246, 253, 263
see also
Natural History Museum, London
Brogden, James, 245–46, 248, 251–52, 261
Brunsden, Denys, 170
n
–71
n
Buckland, William, 109, 270–71, 284–86, 287
n,
300
Burdett-Coutts, Angela, 57
n
Burke, Edmund, 22
Burlington House,
see
Geological Society of London
Cambrian epoch, 176
n
Cambridge University, 236, 286
camera lucida, 281–82
Camerton & Limpley Stoke Railway (the Clank), 79–82,
80,
83 camlets, 113
canals, 18, 49, 129, 150, 207
economic effects of, 43–45
“mania” for building of, 43–44, 51
WS as surveyor for, 51–52, 58, 61, 77–78, 83–91, 92–101, 115
Candler, E., 104
Carboniferous Coal Measures, 47
Carboniferous period, 134, 174
Upper, 64, 76, 83
Carter, John, 147
Cary, George, 7
Cary, John, 6, 142, 144
as mapmaker, 139–40
WS’s maps published by, 7, 8, 214–15, 218, 237, 261, 268, 271, 290
WS’s relationship with, 140–41, 215, 290
Cary
atlases, 7, 8, 139–40, 142, 261
Cary’s New Itinerary
(Cary), 140
Catalogue of English Fossils
(Woodward), 93
Catalogue of the Organic Remains of the County of Wilts, A
(Bennett), 110
chalk, 52, 132–33, 168, 170, 189–90, 216–17
Character of Moses Established, The
(Townsend), 214
Chedworth Buns, 29, 93
n
Christian, Fletcher, 200
chronostratigraphy, 173
“chums,” 258
Churchill, xvii, 11, 12, 15–16, 17, 18, 21, 22
n,
29, 32, 52, 54, 55, 187, 241–42, 290
Clarke, Edward, 236–37
Clink Prison, 254
n
Clipsham stone, 298
Clunch Clay, 142
Clypeus ploti,
33,
33,
93
n
coal, 18, 60, 83, 133, 196, 207–8
bituminous, 48
effects of mountain-building on, 48–49, 68, 71
n
formation of, 38, 47–48
map needed for locating of, 47
miner names for seams of, 70 mining history of, 45–47
seam depths of, 71–72
sequence of rock types found near,
49,
71–75
transportation of,
see
canals
coelacanths, 112
Coke, Thomas William, 20, 149, 151–53, 156
Collett, Samuel, 161
Collyweston slate, 187
n
Combe Down quarry, 243–44, 245, 256, 268
Conolly, Charles, 212, 243, 245
Tucking Mill House sold to WS by, 136–37, 256
WS sent to debtors’ prison by, 255–57, 261
Conybeare, William, 109
Cotswold stone, 183–84
Cottage Crescent, 102
County Agricultural Report,
Somerset, 124–25
Course and Phenomena of Earthquakes, The
(Michell), 94–95
Court of Common Pleas, 256–57
Craven Coffee House, 204
Crawshay, Richard, 210 Creation, 285
Ussher’s dating of, 12–15, 24, 25, 38
n,
41, 69
n,
285
Cretaceous period, 168–69, 170, 179, 216
Middle, 110
Upper, 141
Crompton, Samuel, 17
n
Crook, Thomas, 151, 156
Cruse, Jeremiah, 197, 203
Cunnington, William, 113, 115
cyclothems,
49,
177
Darby, Abraham, 18
Darwin, Charles, xvi, 8, 16, 24, 106, 182, 240, 287
n,
300
Darwin, Erasmus, 24 Davis, Thomas, 124–25, 127
Davy, Sir Humphry, 123, 224
Debrett, John, 157–60, 196, 201, 210
Debrett’s Peerage,
158
debtors’ prisons, 2–6,
3
description of, 258–59, 260
see also
King’s Bench Prison
de la Beche, Sir Henry, 109, 296, 298
Delineation of The Strata of England and Wales with a part of Scotland, A
(Smith), xv–xviii, 192–222, 246, 267
Cary’s topographic map used as base for, 215–16
color scheme of, 125, 127, 142–43, 144–45, 216
completion of, 217–19
delays in work on, 209–10
description of, xv–xvi, 219
editions and prices of, 218, 235
engraving of, 216
Geological Society delegation’s viewing of, 222–23, 227–28
Greenough and Hall’s plagiarism of, xviii, 193, 228–31, 234–35, 237–38
importance and legacy of, xvi–xvii, xix, 7–8
number of copies of, 20
precursors to,
xiii,
126–28,
126,
142–45, 202
reasons for making of, 195–97
sales of, 235, 268 scale and size of, xvi, 215
Society of Arts prize awarded for, 196, 219
title of, xvi, 7, 219–20
WS’s first idea for, 124–25, 138, 161–62
Derbyshire, 94, 198, 200, 210, 230
Devonian period, 68, 69, 270, 278
Dickens, Charles, 122, 206, 254
n,
296, 298
Dictionary of National Biography
(DNB), 107, 110, 154, 204, 294
n
Dictionary of the English Language, A
(Johnson), 21, 139
Difficult Times Briefly Investigated, by an Accurate Observer of Passing Events
(Smith), 262–63
Dissenters, 195
divines, as fossilists, 111
divine virtue, and placing of fossils, 36
Dogger epoch, 173
n
Dosse & Co., 256
Dover, White Cliffs of, 168, 170, 216–17
Dublin, 265
Dundry Hill, 131–32
Dunkerton, 82, 85, 86, 87, 88, 103, 124
Earth:
geological questions on age of, 24–26
tectonic movements and, 48, 68, 116,
116,
175
Ussher’s dating of, 12–15, 24, 25, 38
n,
41, 69
n,
285
East India Company, 111
echinoderms, 30 echinoids, 33, 40
Edinburgh, 9, 266
Edinburgh Review,
267
Egerton, Francis, third duke of Bridgewater, 42–43, 45, 77
Egremont, Lord, 196
enclosure acts, 18–19, 151, 153
Encyclopædia Britannica,
25
n
England:
agricultural innovations in, 19–20, 151, 153
birth and death rates in, 20–21
class discrimination in, 8, 149–50, 199–200, 225–26, 228
enclosure acts in, 18–19, 151, 153
geologic tour of, 166–74, 176
n
industrialization of, 17–18, 45
Jurassic era location of, 116,
116
Jurassic rock outcroppings in,
178
social changes in, 11–12, 15–26
titled ranks in, 277
n
WS’s surveying expeditions in, 90–91, 92–101, 160, 190, 192, 203, 207, 242
English Diatesseron
(Warner), 114
n
eons, 168
n
epiboles, 168
n
epochs, 168
n
eras, 168
n
Etruria, 17
evolutionary theory, 8, 16, 62
fossil hunting and, 106, 112–13, 118
Eype, 164, 167–68
Farey, John, 157, 197–200, 225, 262, 266
n
Greenough aided by, 229, 230–31
WS’s relationship with, 156, 198–99, 201, 209, 210, 230, 231–32
Fenning, Daniel, 53
Fenning, Elizabeth, 53
n
figured stones, 34–35, 39
Fitton, William, 262, 265–68, 287
n
Floating Egg, The
(Osborne), 98–99
Flood, 39, 40, 214 “Fossilogical Map of Bath and Its Environs, A”(Warner), 148
fossils, 106–20,
108, 109,
188–89
collections and collectors of, 106–15, 129–31, 224, 277
early theories about, 34–41, 112–13
found or purchased by author, 165–66, 168
n,
170, 172–74
as key to geological dating, 105, 117–20, 168
n
at Natural History Museum, 108, 111, 239–41, 245–50
at Scarborough City Museum, 275
used as poundstones and marbles, 28–29,
31,
32–33,
33
WS’s collection of, 105, 118, 197, 204, 205–6, 222, 227, 240–41, 245–50
see also specific fossils
fuller’s earth, 105, 133, 186
fulling, 104–5
Garrard, George, 154–55
“General Map of Strata in England and Wales”(Smith),
xiii,
142–43
General Post Office (GPO), 140
Genesis, Book of, 16, 39
Geological Atlas of England and Wales
(Smith), 7, 8, 261
Geological Inquiries,
233
geological map, Smith’s,
see Delineation of The Strata of England and Wales with a part of Scotland, A
Geological Society of London, 199, 245, 247, 266, 277
bust and portrait of WS at, 300