Henry Baker Tristram was an English clergyman, Bible scholar, traveller and ornithologist. As a parson-naturalist he was an early supporter of Darwinism, attempting to reconcile evolution and creation. In 1858 he read the simultaneously-published papers… read more
Henry Baker Tristram was an English clergyman, Bible scholar, traveller and ornithologist. As a parson-naturalist he was an early supporter of Darwinism, attempting to reconcile evolution and creation. In 1858 he read the simultaneously-published papers by Charles Darwin and Alfred Russell Wallace that were read in the Linnean Society, and published a paper in Ibis. He attempted to reconcile this early acceptance of evolution with creation. Following the Oxford debate between Thomas Henry Huxley and Samuel Wilberforce, Tristram, after early acceptance of the theory, rejected Darwinism. Tristram was a founded and original member of the British Ornithologists' Union, and appointed a fellow of the Royal Society in 1868. Edward Bartlett, an English ornithologist and son of Abraham Dee Bartlett, accompanied Tristram to Palestine in 1863-1864. During his travels he accumulated an extensive collection of bird skins, which he sold to the World Museum Liverpool
