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WILLIAM COLE, 1844-1922.
AN OBITUARY.
TO but few people, not born to greatness nor with any special
advantages of station, is it given to originate movements
which will influence the lives of thousands of others and the
effect of which will continue unabated after their own passing.
William Cole may be counted among these few.
A chance meeting in Epping Forest in the late sixties of the
last century, between two young men, each engaged in insect-
hunting, began an acquaintance which was destined to ripen
into lifelong friendship and, in the fullness of time, to the birth
of the Essex Field Club, with its deep influence upon the scientific
culture of the County. A poor photograph of this historic meet-
ing, in the Club's possession, shows Raphael [afterwards Pro-
fessor] Meldola and William Cole reclining on the ground beneath
the Forest trees : Meldola's handwriting in pencil on the back
of the photograph records this as "My first meeting with William
Cole. Taken by W. J. Argent, in 1869. Epping Forest." Cole
was at this time aged 25, Meldola was but 20 years old.
It is with William Cole's intimate connection with our Club,
of which he was Founder and for 42 years the chief executive
officer, that we are chiefly concerned here ; his work is enshrined
in the pages of this Journal, which he edited for so many years,
and in the two Museums, at Stratford and in Epping Forest,
which he organised and curated. The manifold activities of the
Club in its earlier days were largely due to his initiative : we
need only recall as specially worthy of remembrance the spirited
stand made when a railway (of course, in the public interest only !)
sought to encroach upon one of the fairest portions of the Forest
by a proposed extension, and the action taken in opposition
to the uninstructed outcry of a portion of the London press
against the judicious thinning of the Forest trees by the
Conservators. It will suffice to pass somewhat rapidly through
the events of his earlier life.
Born at Islington, on February 11th, 1844, he was the sixth
son of Mr. Julius William Cole, of Kimberton, in Huntingdon-
shire, an official of the Trinity House, and his wife Frances (née
Love), a grand-daughter of John Love, of Crostwick Hall, North
Walsham, in Norfolk. Besides William, his parents had seven