The Royal Society and the Empire: The colonial and commonwealth fellowship part 2. After 1847

Abstract

In the first part of this paper I provided a systematic historical analysis of the election of residents of Britain's colonial territories to The Royal Society of London in the period before the reform of the Society's rules in 1847. Residents of the colonies were always eligible for election on the Home List and significant numbers of Fellows were elected on the basis of colonial careers. In the present paper the analysis is extended to reveal the changing pattern of elections from different parts of the Empire after 1847. After the reform of 1847, election came to be regarded as the ultimate accolade that could be bestowed on a scientist working in the colonies, as it did for scientists wo..