Report of Events

              WEST MIDLANDS BRANCH VISIT TO MIDDLETON HALL

                                  SUNDAY 15^th May 2011

A group of members and guests enjoyed a visit to Middleton Hall near Tamworth on Sunday 15^th May. We were welcomed by Prof Ian Dillamore, a trustee, who took us into the Hall and gave an illustrated talk on its history, the work of John Ray and his connection with the Hall, suggesting reasons why so little is known of him today.

‘For 500 years Middleton Hall belonged to the Willoughby family and the Hall itself is the nearest that Elizabeth I ever came to Birmingham. She slept at the Hall for two nights following the famous celebrations at Kenilworth in 1575. In the seventeenth century it was the home of Francis Willoughby the noted naturalist who encouraged and supported John Ray, the first great English Natural Scientist. It was John Ray who specifically defined what was meant by a species, subsequently used by Linnaeus as the building blocks of his classification system. Indeed a biography of Charles Darwin concluded that the theory of evolution began with the work of John Ray!’

The talk was followed by a guided tour round the Hall and gardens, much of which has been carefully restored, including where John Ray slept and worked, though sadly the rooms occupied by Elizabeth I no longer exist. The whole site, which includes a nature reserve, is an SSSI and the RSPB has recently opened a reserve nearby (perhaps reflecting that John Ray was also a keen ornithologist).

Following our visit we are more aware of the important work of John Ray and shall certainly view Linnaeus in a different way!