Early Life and personal life

Samuel was born in London on 15th January 1798, the third of ten children. His parents were Joseph Sidney Stutchbury, a gauging instrument maker, and Hannah (née Smith). He had some training in medical and natural science.

In 1820: married Hannah Louisa Barnard at St Giles Cripplegate, London and in 1822 their only child Louisa Mary Stutchbury was born in London. They appear to move to Bristol around 1834 and live in Bristol at various addresses until his death in 1859

Career

He was a geologist, palaeontologist and naturalist with a wide-ranging career in a variety of important institutions. 

He began his career assistant to the conservator of the Hunterian museum, Royal College of Surgeons, London. He is know to have contributed to Gideon Mantell’s identification of Iguanodon in 1824.

In 1825 he started as the naturalist to the Pacific Pearl Fishery Company’s expedition to New South Wales and the Tuamotu archipelago. His scientific observations published in 1835 were widely quoted up to 1842 when Charles Darwin’s work superseded his.

This job finished in 1827 where he then became a dealer in natural history specimens with his brother Henry Rome Stutchbury.  In 1831 the curator of the Bristol Institution’s museum, a post he held until 1850 .

Thecodontosaurus

Along with Bristol surgeon Henry Riley, identified and named Thecodontosaurus (‘the Bristol dinosaur’) in a scientific paper in 1836. They published their full illustrated account in 1840. The Thecodontosaurus bones are on display at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery and at M-Shed, along with information about Bristol University’s ongoing Bristol Dinosaur Project.

Stutchbury also published other significant scientific papers.

He was:

• Associate of the Linnean Society from 1821.
• Fellow of the Geological Society of London from 1841.
• Plus honorary member of a number of European scientific bodies.

In addition he was ‘Coal viewer’ for the Duchy of Cornwall’s mines and was a government adviser at the inquest into the 1844 Haswell Colliery explosion. He was also involved in the Geological Survey of Great Britain’s early work.

Stutchburia

The molluscan fossil genus Stutchburia was named in his honour, and a number of recent Australian and New Zealand shells bear his name.

Travels to the Australasia

In 1850 he travelled abroad and took up the post of mineral surveyor for the British colonial administration of New South Wales during the early years of the Australian gold rush. Mapped around 32,000 square miles/ 82,880 square kilometres of eastern Australia. However in December 1855 he left Australia after his appointment was terminated.

In 1856 he returned to Bristol in ill health but continued to in 1866 work as a mineral surveyor carrying out consulting work on the coalfields up to his death in 1859.

Death

Samuel Stutchbury died of haematemesis at 3 Park Street, Bristol on 12th February 1859. He was buried on 17th February 1859. Probate was granted to Hannah Louisa Stutchbury, his widow and sole executrix on 13th May 1859, his estate was under £450.