Person

Bannerman, David Armitage, 1886-1979

1886-1979

David Armitage Bannerman was born on November 27, 1886, in Chichester, Sussex, England.

He was a British ornithologist and author. He was educated at Wellington College, Berkshire, and Pembroke College, Cambridge. In 1909, Bannerman travelled extensively in Africa, the West Indies, South America and the Atlantic Islands. Despite being rejected by the military on health grounds, he served as a stretcher-bearer with the Red Cross for four years in France during World War I and earned the Mons Star. Following the war, he worked part-time at the Natural History Museum until his retirement in 1951, having twice declined the directorship of the British Museum. He was also the chairman of the British Ornithologists' Club from 1932 to 1935, having previously edited their Bulletin from 1914 to 1915. He also held positions as Vice President of the British Ornithologists Union and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. From 1952 to 1979, he farmed in Dumfriesshire. He was the author of "The Birds of the British Isles" (in 12 volumes, illustrated by George E. Lodge, 1953-1963).

In 1911, he married Muriel Gertrude Morgan (1884–1945), and, in 1952, he remarried Winifred Mary Jane Holland. He died on April 6, 1979, in Pendleton, Lancashire, England.