Hugh Miller
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Hugh Miller (1802 - 1856) was a self-taught Scottish geologist and writer and an evangelical Christian.
Born in Cromarty, he had an ordinary parish school education, but soon showed a remarkable love of reading and power of story-telling. At 17 he was apprenticed to a stonemason, and his work in quarries, together with rambles among the rocks of his native shore, led him to the study of geology. In 1829 he published a volume of poems, and soon afterwards threw himself as an ardent and effective combatant into the controversies, first of the Reform Bill, and thereafter of the Scottish Church question.
In 1834 he became accountant in one of the local banks, and in the next year brought out his Scenes and Legends in the North of Scotland. In 1840 the popular party in the Church, with which he had been associated, started a newspaper, The Witness, and Miller was called to be editor, a position which he retained till the end of his life.
Among his geological works are:
- The Old Red Sandstone (1841)
- Footprints of the Creator (1850)
- The Testimony of the Rocks (1856)
- Sketch-book of Popular Geology
Other books are:
- My Schools and Schoolmasters, an autobiography of remarkable interest
- First Impressions of England and its People (1847)
- The Cruise of the Betsey
Of the geological books, perhaps The Old Red Sandstone was the most well-known.
Miller's strong religiosity led him to bitterly oppose the emerging theories of evolution. [1]
For most of the year 1856, the brilliant researcher and speaker had been bothered by terrible headaches that seemed to burn inside his head. Had he lived in the 20th century, Miller's doctors could have diagnosed the problem. Perhaps it was a tumor that caused the headaches, and later, the awful hallucinations. Alas, Victorian-era medicine could not help. He feared that he might harm his wife or children during his delusions in which he pursued imaginary robbers with his gun. Miller committed suicide the night he finished checking printers' proofs for his book on Scottish fossil plants and vertebrates, The Testimony of the Rocks.
A shocked Western world mourned him, and his funeral procession was among the largest in the memory of Edinburgh residents.
Miller's death was very tragic, and his life brief, but he left a heritage of new discoveries of several Silurian sea scorpions, and many Devonian fishes, intriguingly described in his popular books. Though he had no academic credentials, he is today considered one of Scotland's premier paleontologists
[edit] Reference
- Peter Bayne, The Life and Letters of Hugh Miller (2 vols, 1871)
- Anderson, Lyall I. 2005. Hugh Miller: introducing palaeobotany to a wider audience. In: Bowden, A. J., Burek, C. V. & Wilding, R. (eds). History of Palaeobotany: Selected Essays. Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 241, 63 - 90.
This article incorporates public domain text from: Cousin, John William (1910). A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature. London, J.M. Dent & sons; New York, E.P. Dutton.
