Bell, Thomas

Thomas Hornsey Bell was an English zoologist, dental surgeon and writer, born in Poole, Dorset, England. Bell, like his mother Susan, took a keen interest in natural history which his mother also encouraged in his younger cousin Philip Henry Gosse. He was the first president of the Ray Society, and President of the Linnean Society in 1858. When Charles Darwin returned to London from the Beagle expedition, Bell was quick to take on the task of describing the reptile specimens. He was also entrusted with the specimens of Crustacea collected on the voyage. He played a significant part in the inception of Darwin's theory of natural selection in March 1837 when he confirmed that the giant Galapagos tortoises were native to the islands, not brought in by buccaneers for food as Darwin had thought