Matthew Forster Heddle

Mathew Forster Heddle worked as a doctor in Edinburgh and then as Professor of Chemistry at St Andrews University in the years when the survival of the University was threatened, but every spare moment was spent on his real passion, mineralogy. Through fieldwork and membership of learned societies Heddle knew most of hte great geologists of the day.

In St Andrews he is commemorated by a blue plaque on St Leonards House where he worked on his book The Mineralogy of Scotland (1901), still regarded as the bible of Scottish mineralogy. His huge collection of minerals is with National Museums Scotland.

The book presents Heddle's life (both personal and professional) against the historical, social, scientific and educational background of mid- to late nineteenth century Scotland.

Among many other topics it describes West Africa during the Napoleonic Wars; medical education in Edinburgh in the days of James Young Simpson; the exploration and mapping of Scotland's landscape and geology; mountaineering - Heddle was nearly the first Munroist; the goldfields of South Africa; and women's education, of which he was a champion.

Written by his great-great-grandson, the book combines several years' original research and family records to create the first full biography of a larger-than-life man.