George Julius Poulett Scrope FRS (10 March 1797 – 19 January 1876) was an English geologist and political economist as well as a Member of Parliament and magistrate for Stroud in Gloucestershire.
While an undergraduate at Cambridge, through the influence of Edward Clarke and Adam Sedgwick he became interested in mineralogy and geology. During the winter of 1816–1817 he was at Naples, and was so keenly interested in Vesuvius that he renewed his studies of the volcano in 1818; and in the following year visited Etna and the Lipari Islands. In 1821 he married the daughter and heiress of William Scrope of Castle Combe, Wiltshire, and assumed her name; and he entered the House of Commons of the United Kingdom in 1833 as MP for Stroud, retaining his seat until 1868.
Meanwhile he began to study the volcanic regions of central France in 1821, and visited the Eifel district in 1823. In 1825 he published Considerations on Volcanos, leading to the establishment of a new theory of the Earth, and in the following year was elected FRS. This earlier work was subsequently amplified and issued under the title of Volcanos (1862); an authoritative text-book of which a second edition was published ten years later. In 1827 he issued his classic Memoir on the Geology of Central France, including the Volcanic formations of Auvergne, the Velay and the Vivarais, a quarto volume illustrated by maps and plates. The substance of this was reproduced in a revised and somewhat more popular form in The Geology and Extinct Volcanos of Central France (1858). These books were the first widely published descriptions of the Chaîne des Puys, a chain of over 70 small volcanoes in the Massif Central.
Scrope was awarded the Wollaston Medal by the Geological Society of London in 1867. Among his other works was the History of the Manor and Ancient Barony of Castle Combe (printed for private circulation, 1852).
Contents
Biography
Early life
On 10 March 1797, George Julius Thomson was born in London to "John Thomson of Waverley Abbey, Surrey, and his wife, Charlotte" and was baptized under this name a few months later. John Thomson was the head of a successful trading firm (one source alluded that it was Roehampton and Austin Friars, London) that had dealings with Russia. His wife, Charlotte, was the daughter of well-to-do Doctor John Jacob of Salisbury.
George was the second son of John and Charlotte. Charles was the firstborn. The two brothers maintained a close friendship until Charles' "untimely death" in a riding accident in Canada. George and Charles cooperatively wrote Charles' autobiography.
Not much has been documented about George's early and teen years, and his personal letters were left to his nephew Hugh Hammersley, but have been misplaced or destroyed. The sources reviewed by this researcher almost exclusively began with the circumstances of Thomson's birth and then resumed at his entry to Harrow at roughly thirteen years of age.
Education
Thomson received his education at Harrow School, a privately funded public school in the Harrow district of London.
After Harrow, Thomson was accepted to and enrolled at Pembroke College, Oxford in 1815. After a year he left Pembroke because he found that its science departments were lacking courses of interest to him. To sate his scientific appetite, he transferred to St John's College, Cambridge in 1816. Also, during this year Thomson "acquired the additional name Poulett, which his father had recently adopted from an earlier and aristocratic branch of his family."
Once at St. John's, Thomson was introduced to Professors Edward Daniel Clarke and Adam Sedgwick who "gave him his lifelong interest in geology." At the time these men were in the early stages of their careers, Clarke having been made the first professor of mineralogy within the field of geology at St. John's; Sedgwick being known for his attention to detail and his naming of certain sections of the geologic time scale including the Cambrian. Thomson received his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1821 in geology, after having performed several years of fieldwork in continental Europe.
Social life
After a comfortable courtship, Thomson was married to Emma Phipps Scrope on 22 March 1821. She was the heiress of William Scrope (phonetically Scroop) of Castle Combe, Wiltshire, which is north-east of Bath. She was also the great-granddaughter of Sir Robert Long, 6th Baronet. After a Royal Grant he assumed the name and arms of Scrope, in lieu of Thomson. The newly renamed George Poulett Scrope and his wife resided at Castle Combe Manor House, which the Scrope family had owned since the fourteenth century. Emma had been disabled after a riding accident soon after the marriage, and no children were born of their union. Scrope had extensive alterations made to the 17th-century house and established formal gardens in the grounds.
During the marriage, George Poulett Scrope kept a mistress, an actress known as Mrs. Grey, in a comfortable existence in London. Around the year 1838 their son was born, whom they called Arthur Hamilton. Scrope sent his illegitimate son to Eton College and Christ Church, Oxford for his education, eventually securing a commission for him. In 1856, Emma and George formally adopted Arthur as their son.
After Emma's death in 1866, Scrope sold Castle Combe and moved to Fairlawn, near Cobham, Surrey. The following year he married Margaret Elizabeth Savage, who was forty-four years his junior. Both Margaret Scrope and Arthur survived him.
Study of volcanoes
During the time he attended St. John's College, Scrope had his first real experiences with what would become his geologic specialty – volcanoes – and what would be called igneous petrology. During the winter break of 1817 through 1818, George went on a vacation with his mother and father in Italy. In Naples he explored Mount Vesuvius and other areas of volcanism in the region.
In 1825, Scrope became a secretary, jointly with Sir Charles Lyell, of the Geological Society of London. His later results from Auvergne were published for his 1826 election to the Royal Society. In 1853, Scrope was instrumental in the formation of and became the first president of the Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society, contributing heavily to its magazine.
"[The] experience [in Naples] first aroused his lifelong fascination with volcanoes" and soon after his marriage to Emma Phipps he went on a series of expeditions in Auvergne, France, Southern Italy, the Pontine Islands, Eifel, and other areas of notable current or past volcanism. Scrope was present during the great Vesuvian eruption of 1822 which he deemed, according to his Geology and Extinct Volcanos of Central France, "by far the most important eruption of Vesuvius that ha[d] occurred during this century."
Upon his return to England Scrope wrote, in an effort "to put [his] views clearly before the world as a contribution to sound knowledge and a step towards the demolition of ... errors still prevalent" in the theories related to volcanism and Neptunism. This work, Considerations on Volcanoes, written in 1825, "is regarded as the earliest systematic treatise on volcanology [and] the first attempt to frame a ... theory of volcanic action and ... show the part ... volcanoes have played in the Earth's History."
At the time of publication, however, Considerations was not very well received. Scrope commented in his Geology and Extinct Volcanos that Sir Charles Lyell wrote his first essay in the Quarterly Review for May 1827 reviewing the work, and was one of the few who gave it any public praise. Scrope couldn't resist giving Lyell a little barb when he commented on Lyell's career as a critic as following "the path of geological generalisation which he has since so successfully pursued." Despite its initial poor reception, Considerations did help spark the curiosity of numerous other scientists and sent ripples in the Wernerian theory.
Political career
Around the year 1821, Scrope was made a magistrate and was affected with the hardships of the agricultural laborer. "Thenceforth his interest in economic and political affairs, tho [sic] it did not exclude his interest in geology, was unabated." Scrope turned his considerable mind and talents of persuasion to the problems he saw.
An unusually articulate magistrate, Scrope communicated his views on current problems in letters to magistrate colleagues and in many pamphlets. Over the course of his life, George Poulett Scrope wrote more than seventy politically and economically charged pamphlets, earning him a common nickname of "Pamphlet Scrope."
Scrope perhaps felt that his efficacy was limited if he remained only a local politician. In 1832, Scrope ran for the Parliamentary seat of Stroud, which he did not succeed in obtaining. However, one of the successful candidates, David Ricardo, shortly accepted the Chiltern Hundreds for reasons of family health, and Scrope was returned for the seat unopposed. He remained active in politics until 1867.
In the House of Commons, Mr. Scrope was not very vocal. He was, however, an avid writer. Professor Bonney, the original author of the Dictionary of National Biography's entry on Scrope, credited him with thirty-six papers on the subjects of volcanic geology and petrology. In his A Neglected English Economist: George Poulett Scrope, Redvers Opie estimated that if his entries to places such as the Quarterly Review, which were largely anonymous, were to be figured into the list of his total works, then "there are extant over forty books, pamphlets, and papers on political economy" concerning both practical and theoretical issues.
The first economic publication that can be definitely attributed to Scrope is "A Plea for the Abolition of Slavery in England, as produced by an illegal abuse of the Poor Law, common in the southern counties" which was written in 1829. Scrope was interested in the relationship between political economy and the other moral sciences.
Scrope heavily contributed to the Quarterly Review's Economic section. "Scrope's articles had three main themes: (1) the failure of accepted political economy to give sufficient weight to changes in aggregate demand and to the resulting possibility that under some situations an artificial demand could put to use resources … otherwise unemployed." This essentially recommended that an artificially determined demand could stimulate available capital and the market.
Later life
In his later years, Scrope began to withdraw from political life. His "decaying strength and increasing blindness compelled him to [retire]" and during this time he released new editions of earlier works. During these years he gave counsel and kind words, in addition to helpful hints in research methodology and direction, to many young geologists. Lyell was also stricken with progressive blindness, bringing another ironic note to the pair's friendship.
Scrope received numerous accolades for his ventures in the fields of geology, politics, and history. His history of Castle Combe, written in 1852, is still accepted as an important work in such scholarship, and numerous pleasant comments regarding it were made in various Stroud and local media. Scrope also penned definitive biographies and analyses on local and national British figures during his lifetime, earning him honorable mention in numerous related publications. In 1867, for his groundbreaking work in geology, the Geological Society of London awarded George Poulett Scrope the Wollaston Medal – their highest award.
The death of Lyell, his lifelong best friend, left him a broken man and he soon followed on 19 January 1876. Judd, in his Academy obituary of George Poulett Scrope, wrote that "born within a few months of one another, their deaths were separated by less than a year; 'lovely and pleasant in their lives, in their death they were not divided.'" Many would agree with Judd's statement that Scrope was an earnest worker in the task of "establishing the science of geology on a philosophical basis."