Arthur C. Stark (1846 – November 18, 1899) was a medical doctor and naturalist. He emigrated from Torquay, England to Cape Town, South Africa in 1885. He lived in (the British colonies of) South Africa during the last 14 years of his life and died during the Siege of Ladysmith at the age of 54. He is best known for initiating an ornithological work, The Birds of South Africa.
South African work
After the death of his wife he settled in Cape Town, while his daughters remained in England. Besides practicing as medical doctor he travelled regularly to collect animal specimens for the South African Museum and made sketches and extensive notes of his observations. He moved from Cape Town to Durban shortly before the outbreak of the Boer War and travelled to England in 1899 to oversee the printing of the first volume of his ornithological work, The Birds of South Africa. The completed series was meant to form part of a wider project under the editorship of William Sclater, director of the South African Museum, describing the fauna of southern Africa. Dr Stark returned to the Colony of Natal in September, 1899, where he volunteered as medical officer for the British forces when the Boer War broke out.
Death at Ladysmith
During the siege of Ladysmith he was resident in the Royal Hotel, but spent the days in shell-proof dugouts along the Klip River, or fishing, while the town was being shelled by Boer forces. Dr Stark had just returned and was standing on the hotel's veranda on the evening of November 18th, 1899, when at 19:30 the Long Tom cannon stationed on Pepworth Hill fired two shots at the hotel, aimed at any important persons who may have assembled there. Dr Stark's legs were mangled by the second shell and he died shortly afterwards on the operating table. Dr Stark was buried in Ladysmith.
Completion of project
Dr Stark's field notes were afterwards recovered from Ladysmith and his Durban home. His executors entrusted these to William Sclater, director of the South African Museum, to be prepared for the second volume of the The Birds of South Africa. This volume appeared in 1902. In 1902 Captain George Shelley also named Stark’s Lark, Spizocorys starki, in Dr Stark's honour. William Sclater, Dr Stark's co-author of The Birds of South Africa, died in 1944 from injuries sustained from a V-1 flying bomb dropped in London.
References
- Auk, XVII, April 1900, pp. 189, 190. A review of volume 1 of The Birds of South Africa
- Auk, XIX, Jan 1902, pp. 106, 107. Completion of volume 2 of The Birds of South Africa
- Birding in SA 42 (1), 1990, Whose name for the bird?, Craig, A.
