A message from William ‘Strata’ Smith

It affords me great satisfaction to find that so long after my death I am still remembered as the Father of English Geology. Yet I little imagined that my Map of the Strata of England and Wales would be celebrated two hundred years after its first appearance [in 1815], for it was not many years after made redundant by the publication of that rival map of Mr. Greenough, which not only derived much from my own Map, but gained advantage from the labours of those Gentlemen of the Geological Society, who had the leisure and pecuniary means to travel more widely through this island than was granted me by the demands of my profession. Such trials and unhappy memories as are associated with that time are now long past, and it is indeed a great comfort to find that my name is held in such high regard by geologists now living.

Through the kindness of the Geological Survey, which I find was removed some years ago from London to the village of Keyworth, outside Nottingham, I am able to come to you in spirit, if not in body. I was present at the birth of the Geological Survey, when Mr. De la Beche established that institution as a Department within the Trigonometrical Survey in about the year 1835. A few years later I accompanied that Gentleman when he invited me to assist himself and the Architect, Mr. Barry, in visiting the principal Stone Quarries to select a stone suitable for building the Houses of Parliament following the devastating fire―though I did not live to see its fulfilment. I have been asked to speak more of this matter in a future communication.

Until then I bid my readers a happy and prosperous new year, and I look forward to fulfilling the task laid upon me by my advisor here, Mr. Gamolfeax―to say something, so far as memory will allow, of my life and work, and of the very different times in which I lived.

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Gamolfeax says:  William Smith (1769–1839), nicknamed ‘Strata Smith’, is justly celebrated as the ’father of English geology’. This year of 2015 marks the bicentenary of the publication of Smith’s pioneering ‘map of the strata of England and Wales’ as he usually styled it. This map is regarded as the world’s first national geological map, and was almost certainly the first to be based on the principals of biostratigraphy: utilising the evidence of fossil organisms contained within rock strata, both to determine the succession of geological strata, and to map and correlate individual units across country.

The full title of Smith’s great map is  A delineation of the strata of England and Wales, with part of Scotland; exhibiting the collieries and mines, the marshes and fen lands originally overflowed by the sea, and the varieties of soil according to the variations in the substrata, illustrated by the most descriptive names. It was engraved and published by John Cary and issued in 15 sheets at a scale of 5 miles to an inch. Although bearing the date 1 August 1815, copies of the map were available for colouring under Smith’s supervision some months before. The first finished copy (mounted on canvas) was presented by Smith at a meeting of the Board of Agriculture on 23 May 1815, as recorded in his diary for that year.

Smith continued to modify the geological information depicted on the map until the appearance in 1820 of a rival map at a slightly smaller scale (about 6 miles to an inch), which was more complete and more accurate. Prepared by George Bellas Greenough (1778–1855) and sponsored by the Geological Society, this new map, which very likely derived much of its basic information from Smith’s hard-won labours, immediately superseded Smith’s own, thus robbing him of any further income from the sale of his large map. And whereas Smith’s map embodied the distillation (by 1815) of some 24 years of personal observation, the rival map derived great advantage from the combined efforts of several prominent geologists of the day, many of whom were applying the principals of stratigraphy established by Smith.