The RC Dening Collection - Butterflies collected by TR Beadle

The R.C. Dening Collection

Case 46: Butterflies collected for T.R. Beadle

The butterflies in this case were not collected by Richard (Tim) Dening. They were collected for T.R. Beadle, his father-in-law, in Sierra Leone in 1915. The butterflies eventually came into the possession of Elisabeth Dening, Tom Beadle's daughter and became incorporated within the R.C. Dening Collection.

This case has been retained by the family and does not form part of the main collection held by the Glasgow Museums.

Charaxes pollux	Charaxes zingha	Charaxes pleione		Charaxes etesipe	Charaxes tiridates
		Bematistes epaea			Charaxes brutus
Charaxes varanes	Palla usheri	Salamis cytora		Danaus chrysippus	Protogoniomorpha parhassus
	Pseudacraea semire	Precis oenone	Aterica galene	Hypolimnas misippus	Euphaedra inanum
Charaxes eupale		Precis antilope	Vanessa cardui		Charaxes anticlea
	Bebearia arcadius

T. R. (Thomas) Beadle

Tom Beadle,
daughter Molly and wife, Emily ca. 1930

Tom Beadle was in Sierra Leone for about 18 months prior to the First World War. He was a railway engineer at the time, prospecting for government railways. As entomology was not one of his hobbies, it is likely that he paid someone to collect the butterflies for him. His daughter, Elisabeth Dening, passed on an intriguing story concerned with this period of his life, told to her in her childhood.

While working in Sierra Leone, Tom Beadle shared a house with two other bachelors. Between them, they hired the services of a local woman to do their washing. When the time eventually came for them to return to England, the washer woman presented her bill. They all protested that the bill was far too high and refused to pay it. She retaliated by cursing them, saying that if they didn't pay her, they would never live to see England again. Tom Beadle was Irish and highly superstitious, so he paid up his share of the bill immediately. The other two bachelors refused to do so. Strangely enough, neither was to see England again. One died of a mysterious disease before he could get passage on a boat, while the other went overboard on the trip home!

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