Frederick Nutter Chasen (1896 – 13 February 1942) was an

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national id ...

zoologist Zoology ()The pronunciation of zoology as is usually regarded as nonstandard, though it is not uncommon. is the branch of biology that studies the animal kingdom, including the structure, embryology, evolution, classification, habits, and ...

. Chasen was born in Norfolk, England. He was apprenticed to Frank Leney of the Norwich Museum in 1912, joining the Museum as a full-time employee in 1919. Between these dates Chasen fought in the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fig ...

(1914–1918) with the

Norfolk Yeomanry The Norfolk Yeomanry was a volunteer cavalry (Yeomanry) regiment of Britain's Territorial Army accepted onto the establishment of the British Army in 1794. After seeing action in the Second Boer War, it served dismounted at Gallipoli, in Pales ...

. His first published work of ornithology was derived from observations he made of the birds of the Struma Plain in north-east Greece made during the time of this conflict. In 1921 Chasen was appointed Assistant Curator of the

Raffles Museum The National Museum of Singapore is a public museum dedicated to Singaporean art, culture and history. Located within the country's Civic District at the Downtown Core area, it is the oldest museum in the country, with its history dating back to ...

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

. He later was promoted to Director in 1932 in succession to

Cecil Boden Kloss Cecil Boden Kloss (28 March 1877 – 19 August 1949) was an English zoologist. He was an expert on the mammals and birds of Southeast Asia. The Rubiaceae genus '' Klossia'' was named after him. Kloss was born in a family of Dutch descent who l ...

. Between these years he traveled extensively in the region on behalf of the Museum and became an authority on

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...

n birds and mammals as a result of the many scientific publications he authored in key ornithological journals such as the ''Ibis'' and ''Journal für Ornithologie''. He was an even more prolific author for local and regional journals – ''Treubia'' and his own institutions's ''Bulletin of the Raffles Museum''. From 1929 Chasen was responsible for continuing the work of H.C. Robertson. Robinson had been the Director of the Federated States of Malaya Museums until his retirement in 1926. During his career he had become an expert in the region's ornithology which he put to use preparing a monumental reference work, ''

The Birds of the Malay Peninsula ''The Birds of the Malay Peninsula'' is a major illustrated ornithological reference work conceived and started by Herbert Christopher Robinson. The full title is ''The Birds of the Malay Peninsula: a general account of the birds inhabiting the ...

''. He managed to complete two volumes of this work before his death in 1929. Chasen took up the task of using Robertson's notes to finish the third and fourth volumes. A fifth volume was in preparation at the time of his own death. In 1934 he was made a Corresponding Fellow of the American Ornithologists' Union and five years later a British Empire member of the British Ornithologists' Union. When the Pacific War broke out, the British authorities in Singapore established a Department of Information with Victor Purcell, previously the government's Protector of Chinese, as Director-General. According to Purcell, Chasen approached him soon afterwards, asking to be appointed to the department on top of his museum duties. Purcell accepted the offer and Chasen became his personal assistant, valued for his training and experience in the organisation of exhibitions. His work for the Department of Information meant that Chasen was evacuated on one of the last boats leaving the doomed colony. He sailed on the H.M.S. Giang Bee, a converted coastal steamer, which was attacked by the Japanese in the Java Sea on the 13 February 1942. Chasen was numbered among those who died in the attack. He was survived by his two daughters, actress Heather and Elizabeth.

Legacy

Frederick Nutter Chasen is commemorated in the scientific name of a venomous snake native to

Borneo Borneo (; id, Kalimantan) is the List of islands by area, third-largest island in the world and the largest in Asia. At the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, in relation to major Indonesian islands, it is located north of Java Isl ...

, '' Garthius chaseni''. Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). ''The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. . ("Chasen", p. 52).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chasen, Frederick Nutter 1896 births 1942 deaths English zoologists English ornithologists English taxonomists British curators Museum directors British civilians killed in World War II People of British Singapore Singaporean people of World War II 20th-century British zoologists Deaths due to shipwreck at sea British Army personnel of World War I Norfolk Yeomanry soldiers Military personnel from Norfolk