ABSTRACT
Alfred Newton was a professor of comparative anatomy at Cambridge University but is most renowned as a zoologist and a major pioneering figure in ornithology. In particular, he published several important works on birds, was the founder of the British Ornithologists Union and campaigned successfully for the legal protection of sea birds. Utilizing a research grant, Newton travelled with his friend Jon Wolley – whom he had met as a student at Cambridge – to Scandinavia in 1855 hoping to find that the great auk had not been rendered extinct by hunting, as had come to be reported. Sadly, however, he learned that this was indeed the case from meeting Icelandic bird hunters in the course of his research. The world’s last pair of great auks (also known as gare-fowls as Newton refers to them) had been killed and their eggs also smashed. In 1846 Eldey was visited by Vilhjalmur and a party, and no gare-fowls could be found.
