Arthur Dukinfield Darbishire

Arthur Dukinfield Darbishire FRSE (14 February 1879-26 December 1915) was a short-lived but vital British zoologist and geneticist who helped pave the way for Dolly the Sheep. He was the first person to lecture in Genetics in Britain. He caused a stir in the world of genetics in the early 20th century in the debate over theory, sometimes referred to as The Mendel Wars.

From 1901 onwards he conducted a series of experiments (working under Raphael Weldon) on the hybridisation of mice in the laboratory.

He was author of the highly influential book Breeding and the Mendelian Discovery.

He was born in Kensington in London on 14 February 1879, the son of Dr Samuel Dukinfield Darbishire (1846-1892) and his wife Florence Eckersley (1848-1917). Soon after he was born, the family moved to Oxford, when his father was appointed Physician at the Radcliffe Infirmary. In 1881 the family are listed as living at 15 New Inn Hall Street with four servants. In 1888 his father took early retiral on health grounds and the family moved to Plas Mawr in Wales. However, the family returned to Oxford following his father’s premature death in 1892. Having suffered from rheumatic fever as a child he was considered unsuitable for boarding school and was taught locally at Magdalen College School before receiving a place at Oxford University.

He graduated MA in Natural Sciences and Zoology from Balliol College at Oxford University in 1902. He stayed on to act as Demonstrator in Zoology at the college. In 1911 he became Lecturer in Genetics at Edinburgh University and in July 1912 was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were James Cossar Ewart, James Hartley Ashworth, Sir James Anderson Scott Watson and Ramsay Heatley Traquair. Whilst in Edinburgh he was greatly influenced by Henri Louis Bergson who was visiting to give the Gifford Lectures in the spring of 1914.

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