Clement Wragge

Clement Wragge
Clement Wragge, circa 1901
Born	(1852-09-18)September 18, 1852 Stourbridge, Worcestershire, England
Died	December 10, 1922(1922-12-10) (aged 70) Auckland, New Zealand
Nationality	British
Occupation	Meteorologist

Clement Lindley Wragge (18 September 1852 – 10 December 1922) was a meteorologist born in Stourbridge, Worcestershire, England, but moved to Oakamoor, Staffordshire as a child. He set up the Wragge Museum in Stafford following a trip around the world. He was a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and in 1879 was elected Fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society in London. To the end of his life, he was interested in Theosophy and spiritualism and during his tour of India, met with Mirza Ghulam Ahmad of Qadian, founder of the Ahmadiyya movement in Islam who had claimed to be the Mahdi, the messianic redeemer awaited by Muslims. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle sought him out in New Zealand to ask for his views on spiritualism before writing The Wanderings of a Spiritualist in 1921. After training in law, Wragge became renowned in the field of meteorology, winning the Scottish Meteorological Society's Gold Medal and years later starting the trend of using people's names for cyclones. He travelled widely giving lectures in London and India, and in his later years was a reliable authority on Australia, India and the Pacific Islands.

Wragge was originally named William, but this was changed to Clement (Lindley was the name of his great uncle). He lost both of his parents at a young age: his mother at five months and his father, Clement Ingleby Wragge, at five years following a fall from his horse. He was raised for a number of years by his grandmother, Emma Wragge (formerly Ingleby) at Oakamoor, Staffordshire who taught him the rudiments of cosmology and meteorology. Emma's husband George had died in 1849 and had managed the Oakamoor works of the Cheadle Brass Wire Company before it was sold to Thomas Bolton in 1852. CLW became an avid naturalist at a young age, being surrounded by the beauty of the Churnet valley. Clement was educated initially at the Church school in Oakamoor and then his formal education was at Uttoxeter Thomas Alleyne's Grammar School. Clement hated being a boarder at Uttoxeter and ran away, but was returned to the school where he excelled. Upon the death of his grandmother in 1865 his uncles George and William decided that he should he move to London to live with his Aunt Fanny and her family in Teddington. He was considered by his Aunt to be spoilt and he rebelled against he harsh treatment. There he later boarded at the Belvedere school in Upper Norwood and at the end of his education he improved his Latin in Cornwall. He then followed in the footsteps of his father, studying law at Lincoln's Inn. He also attended St Bartholomew's Hospital alongside medical students to watch operations. Wragge travelled on the continent of Europe extensively with his Uncle William of Cheltenham. His second cousin was Clement Mansfield Ingleby a partner in the family law firm Ingleby, Wragge, and Ingleby (which later became known as Wragge & Co of Birmingham), and who became famous for his Shakespearean literary writings after he left the family legal partnership to pursue his scholarship. At the age of 21 he could now control his destiny and came into his inheritance left to him by his parents and a legacy and family silver left to him by his Aunt on his mother's side of the family. He decided to take eight months break from Lincoln's Inn to visit the Egypt and the Levant.