Stephen Townesend (surgeon) explained

Stephen Townesend
Birth Date:1860
Birth Place:London, England
Death Date:May 1914
Death Place:Colney Heath, England
Occupation:Surgeon, actor, activist, writer

Stephen Chapman Townesend (1860 – May 1914) was an English surgeon, stage actor, writer and anti-vivisectionist.

Biorgraphy

Stephen Chapman Townesend was the son of a rector in London. He was educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital and the University of Edinburgh.[1] He qualified M.R.C.S. in 1883 and F.R.C.S. in 1887. He was surgeon on the Orient Steamship Company's line, house surgeon at St Mark's Hospital and at Birmingham General Hospital. Townesend was a stage actor under the name Will Dennis and assisted the Amateur Dramatic Society of St Bartholomew's Hospital.[2]

In 1900, he married Frances Hodgson Burnett in Genoa.[3] He was involved with the stage adaptations of her novels. They divorced two years later.[4] Townesend was an anti-vivisectionist, who was described as loving animals more than people.[5]

Townesend died in Colney Heath from pneumonia in May 1914.[1] [6]

Selected publications

Notes and References

  1. https://archive.today/20210814122919/https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/lives/search/detailnonmodal/ent:$002f$002fSD_ASSET$002f0$002fSD_ASSET:375468/one?qu=%22rcs:+E003285%22&rt=false%7C%7C%7CIDENTIFIER%7C%7C%7CResource+Identifier "Townesend, Stephen Chapman (1860 - 1914)"
  2. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.31951d00644700d&view=1up&seq=734&skin=2021 "Who Was Who. v.1 (1897/1916)"
  3. https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=SFC19000315.2.18&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN--------1 "Stephen Townsend Weds Mrs. Burnett"
  4. Gerzina, Gretchen (2004), Frances Hodgson Burnett: The Unexpected Life of the Author of The Secret Garden. Rutgers University Press. p. 229.
  5. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/apr/04/biography.features "Up The Garden Path"
  6. https://archive.today/20210814123219/https://www.nytimes.com/1914/05/21/archives/stephen-townesend-dies-surgeon-and-author-married-frances-hodgson.html "Stephen Townesend Dies"