Margaret Crosfield (1859-1952) and her work
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| Margaret Crosfield (centre), 1912. Permit Number CP19/039 BGS © UKRI 2019. All rights reserved. |
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Born in Reigate, where she lived all her life, Margaret Crosfield entered Newnham College, Cambridge in 1879, but left after a year due to ill health. She re-enrolled in 1890 and took geology as her sole subject, rather than the usual natural tripos.
Crosfield was a woman of independent means who was able to pursue her own scientific and educational interests. She travelled widely, particularly being a keen attendee of the meetings of the British Association both in Britain and abroad.
Her major geological papers, co-written with Ethel Skeat and Mary Johnston (who were also among the first elected batch of female Fellows) were on the Palaeozoic strata of Wales and Shropshire. Crosfield’s and Skeat’s paper, “On the Geology of the Neighbourhood of Camarthen”, QJGS (1896), was so highly regarded that it formed the basis of the geological map produced by the British Geological Survey for the area.
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| Notes on the Clwydian Range, by Margaret Crosfield [1906-1925], Crosfield/Wood Archive, British Geological Survey. Permit Number CP19/039 BGS © UKRI 2019. All rights reserved. Click to enlarge. |
These geological notes were made during Crosfield’s and Ethel Woods’ (née Skeat) research on the Clwydian Hills between 1906 and 1925, which resulted in the paper: “The Silurian Rocks of the Central Part of the Clwydian Range”, QJGS (1925).
Of particular interest are the loose sheet of notes on the left. Crosfield was an ardent advocate for Women’s Suffrage: her geological notes are written on old National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies membership forms.
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