PENGELLY, WILLIAM (1812-94), English geologist and anthropologist, was born at East Looe in Cornwall on Jan. 12, 1812, the son of the captain of a small coasting vessel. He began life as a sailor, after an elementary education in his native village, but in 1828 he abandoned a seafaring life. He had developed a passion for learning, and about 1836 he removed to Torquay and started a school; in 1846 he became a private tutor in mathematics and natural science. Geology had in early years attracted his attention, but it was not until he was about 3o years of age that he began seriously to cultivate the study. In 1837 he was instru mental in the reorganization of the Torquay Mechanics' Institute, in 1844 mainly owing to his energy the Torquay Natural History Society was founded and in 1862 he assisted in founding the Devonshire Association for the Advancement of Literature, Sci ence and Art. Meanwhile he had been occupied in collecting fos sils from many parts of Devon and Cornwall, and in 186o the Baroness Burdett-Coutts acquired and presented them to the Ox ford Museum, where they form "The Pengelly Collection." The
same lady provided funds to enable him to investigate the lignites and clays of Bovey Tracey, in conjunction with Dr. Oswald Heer, who undertook the determination of the plant remains. Their report was published by the Royal Society (1862), and Pengelly was elected F.R.S. in 1863. He aided in the investigations of the Brixham bone-cavern from its discovery in 1858, the full report being issued in 1873; and he was the main explorer of Kent's Hole, Torquay, and from 1864 for more than 15 years he examined and recorded the exact position of the numerous organic remains that were disinterred during a systematic investigation of this cave. His observations assisted in establishing the important fact of the contemporaneity of Palaeolithic man with various Pleistocene mammalia, such as the mammoth, cave-bear, etc. He was awarded the Lyell medal by the Geological Society of London in 1886. He died at Torquay on March 16, See Memoir of William Pengelly, ed. by his daughter Hester Pengelly, with a summary of his scientific work by T. G. Bonney (1897).