Samuel Tertius Galton (23 March 1783 – 23 October 1844) was a British

business Business is the practice of making one's living or making money by producing or Trade, buying and selling Product (business), products (such as goods and Service (economics), services). It is also "any activity or enterprise entered into for ...

man and

scientist A scientist is a person who Scientific method, researches to advance knowledge in an Branches of science, area of the natural sciences. In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engag ...

Life

He was the son of Samuel "John" Galton, a prominent member of the scientific

Lunar Society The Lunar Society of Birmingham was a British dinner club and informal learned society of prominent figures in the Midlands Enlightenment, including industrialists, natural philosophy, natural philosophers and intellectuals, who met regularly b ...

, and the father of

Francis Galton Sir Francis Galton (; 16 February 1822 – 17 January 1911) was an English polymath and the originator of eugenics during the Victorian era; his ideas later became the basis of behavioural genetics. Galton produced over 340 papers and b ...

the eminent Victorian scientist. He was born in the area of Duddeston in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the Lis ...

. Samuel Tertius, though less distinguished, was not an exception to the rule of scientific endeavour in his family. In 1799 he published “Experiments on Colours” which was about colour theory. Mary Gartside mentions his work in her book ''An Essay on a New Theory of Colour'' in 1808. Galton also inherited his father's considerable business interests and quickly set about making changes—discontinuing the family's armaments business in 1815. Though fascinated by

economics Economics () is a behavioral science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interac ...

(he wrote papers on the subject), Samuel preferred to be less 'hands-on' in the running of the business than his father and spent much of his time living off the revenue of his considerable estate.

Family

Though brought up a

Quaker Quakers are people who belong to the Religious Society of Friends, a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations. Members refer to each other as Friends after in the Bible, and originally, others referred to them as Quakers ...

, Samuel converted to

Anglicanism Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

in 1807. On 30 March 1807, he married Violetta (Francis Anne Viollette) Darwin, one of the fourteen children of his father's old colleague and fellow Lunar Society member

Erasmus Darwin Erasmus Robert Darwin (12 December 173118 April 1802) was an English physician. One of the key thinkers of the Midlands Enlightenment, he was also a natural philosophy, natural philosopher, physiology, physiologist, Society for Effecting the ...

. Many of the 'Lunar children' grew up together and there were several such marriages. They had four daughters and three sons: * Elizabeth Anne Galton (1808–1906), married Edward Wheler * Lucy Harriot Galton (1809–1848), married James Moilliet * Millicent Adele Galton (1810–1883), married the Rev Robert Shirley Bunbury * Emma Sophia Galton (1811–1904) * Darwin Galton (1814–1903). High Sheriff of Warwickshire in 1850. * Erasmus Galton (1815–1909) *

(1822–1911)

References

1783 births 1844 deaths Darwin–Wedgwood family Scientists from Birmingham, West Midlands English Quakers English Anglicans English scientists English businesspeople 19th-century British businesspeople {{UK-scientist-stub