Person:Arthur Stark (1)

Arthur Cowell Stark (1846 – November 18, 1899) was a medical doctor and naturalist. He emigrated from Torquay, England to Cape Town, South Africa in 1885. He lived in (the British colonies of) South Africa during the last 14 years of his life and died during the Siege of Ladysmith at the age of 54. He is best known for initiating an ornithological work, The Birds of South Africa.

April 30, 1851 - United Kingdom Census

Tormoham, Devon, England

Class: HO107; Piece: 1872; Folio: 396; Page: 4

April 7, 1861 - United Kingdom Census

Tormoham, Devon, England

Class: RG9; Piece: 1411; Folio: 133; Page: 22

April 2, 1871 - United Kingdom Census

Tormoham, Devon, England

Class: RG10; Piece: 2088; Folio: 22; Page: 35; GSU roll: 831783

April 3, 1881 - United Kingdom Census

Tormoham, Devon, England

Class: RG11; Piece: 2169; Folio: 92; Page: 8

South African work

After the death of his wife he settled in Cape Town, while his daughters remained in England. Besides practicing as medical doctor he travelled regularly to collect animal specimens for the South African Museum and made sketches and extensive notes of his observations. He moved from Cape Town to Durban shortly before the outbreak of the Boer War and travelled to England in 1899 to oversee the printing of the first volume of his ornithological work, The Birds of South Africa. The completed series was meant to form part of a wider project under the editorship of William Sclater, director of the South African Museum, describing the fauna of southern Africa. Dr Stark returned to the Colony of Natal in September, 1899, where he volunteered as medical officer for the British forces when the Boer War broke out.

Death at Ladysmith

During the siege of Ladysmith he was resident in the Royal Hotel, but spent the days in shell-proof dugouts along the Klip River, or fishing, while the town was being shelled by Boer forces. Dr Stark had just returned and was standing on the hotel's veranda on the evening of November 18th, 1899, when at 19:30 the Long Tom cannon stationed on Pepworth Hill fired two shots at the hotel. These were aimed at important persons who may have assembled there, probably Dr. Jameson and Colonel Rhodes who were known to be in town.

Dr Stark's legs were mangled by the second shell and he died shortly afterwards on the operating table. Dr Stark was buried in Ladysmith. H.W. Nivenson who was present records the irony of him being a strong opponent of the Chamberlain policy, and a vigorous denouncer of the war's injustice.

Completion of project

Dr Stark's field notes were afterwards recovered from Ladysmith and his Durban home. His executors entrusted these to William Sclater, director of the South African Museum, to be prepared for the second volume of the The Birds of South Africa. This volume appeared in 1902 as part of Sclater's series The Fauna of South Africa.

In 1902 Captain George Shelley also named Stark’s Lark, Spizocorys starki, in Dr Stark's honour. William Sclater, Dr Stark's co-author of The Birds of South Africa, died in 1944 from injuries sustained from a V-1 flying bomb dropped in London.

For more information, see the EN Wikipedia article Arthur Stark.

1.   Arthur Stark, in Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia.
2. ↑ General Register Office. England and Wales Civil Registration Indexes, Newton Abbot Registration District, Quarter 4, 1846, Volume 10, Page 177