Caroline Molesworth (4 November 1794 - 29 December 1872) was a British botanist and meteorologist.[1]
She moved from London to Cobham in Surrey in 1823 and immediately began a series of regular observations which continued until 1858 and in part until 1867.[1] Each day she recorded data in 19 columns, including the date, hours of sunset and sunrise, several temperature readings, barometer pressure, observations on animals and on plants, and Tagliabue's storm glass reading.[1][2] This storm glass has been described by Anderson as "a mixture of camphor, potassium nitrate and ammonium chloride in alcohol and water, in which particles apparently crystallized more or less strongly under different weather conditions"; the same author notes that "it was described by her biographer dismissively as 'scarcely more than a scientific toy' ".[2]
Molesworth's records covering 1825-1850 were published in 1880 as The Cobham Journals: abstracts and summaries of meteorological and phenological observations made by Miss Caroline Molesworth, at Cobham, Surrey, in the years 1825-1850, edited by Eleanor A. Ormerod (the first female fellow of the Meteorological Society), and reviewed in The Spectator.[3] This was republished in 2015 by Cambridge University Press.[4]
She was the daughter of Sir William Molesworth, 6th Baronet, of Pencarrow, and Caroline Treby Ourry.[1] The Baronetcy went to her brother Arscott Ourry Molesworth and then his son William Molesworth. Caroline's nephew Hugh Molesworth inherited the title as 9th Baronet, and remained in Cornwall as a country parson: she sent him many gifts of flower and vegetable seed for the garden he planted at the Parsonage House, Little Petherick in 1857.[5]
Molesworth's letters and her herbarium are held at Kew Gardens, London.[1] Her diaries of observations are held by the Met Office and are accessible online as .pdf files.[6]
References
edit- ^ a b c d e Ogilvie, Marilyn; Harvey, Joy (2003). The Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science: Pioneering Lives From Ancient Times to the Mid-20th Century. Routledge. pp. 907–908. ISBN 9781135963439. Retrieved 13 June 2017.
- ^ a b Anderson, Katharine (2010). Predicting the Weather: Victorians and the Science of Meteorology. University of Chicago Press. pp. 11–12. ISBN 9780226019703. Retrieved 14 June 2017.
- ^ "The Cobham Journals (Stanford)". The Spectator: 31. 31 July 1880.
- ^ Caroline Molesworth (5 March 2015). The Cobham Journals. Cambridge University Press. pp. 5–. ISBN 978-1-108-07768-2.
- ^ Donaldson, David. "The Flower and Vegetable Gardens Planted at the Parsonage House, Little Petherick in 1857". Cornwall Gardens Trust. Retrieved 13 June 2017.
- ^ "Cobham Weather Diaries 1825 - 1867". Digital Library and Archive. Met Office. Retrieved 13 June 2017. Click "Browse record" to access large .pdf files
External links
edit- "Private Weather Diaries". Met Office. Retrieved 13 June 2017. Includes two images of Molesworth's observations
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