CARRUTHERS, Alexander Douglas Mitchell (1882-1962)

Identity Statement

Reference code(s)	: GB 0402 ADC
Held at	: Royal Geographical Society   Click here to find out how to view this collection at http://www.rgs.org/OurWork/Collections/Collections.htm ›
Full title	: CARRUTHERS, Alexander Douglas Mitchell (1882-1962)
Date(s)	: 1904-1957
Level of description	: Collection level
Extent	: 3 boxes, 8 box files and 1 tube
Name of creator(s)	: Carruthers | Alexander Douglas Mitchell | 1882-1962 | explorer and naturalist

Context

Administrative/Biographical history:

Alexander Douglas Mitchell Carruthers was born in London on 4 October 1882; educated at Haileybury College and Trinity College, Cambridge; worked as secretary to a number of people active at the Royal Geographical Society, and underwent training in land survey work, also becoming an expert taxidermist. He took part in the British Museum expedition to Ruwenzori and the Congo, 1905-1906 and sent home specimens of birds and mammals. He later joined John H Miller and Morgan Philips Price in an expedition through the desert of Outer Mongolia, publishing two volumes on Unknown Mongolia in 1913.

During the First World War he was employed mainly at the War Office compiling maps of the Middle East; his later career consisted largely of map making and working with explorers and travellers. Carruthers was awarded the Gill memorial, 1910 and the patron's gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society, 1912, which he was to serve as honorary secretary in 1916-1921 and Fellow in 1909-1962 and was awarded the Sykes medal of the Royal Central Asian Society in 1956. Carruthers died in the Royal Free Hospital, Islington, on 23 May 1962.

Content

Scope and content/abstract:

Papers of Alexander Douglas Mitchell Carruthers, 1904-1957, comprise travel diaries and notebooks from Syria and Lebanon, Central Africa, Turkestan and Arabia; correspondence, notes, published articles and cuttings about birds, mammals and other natural history topics.

Access & Use

Language/scripts of material:
English

System of arrangement:

Lists of the boxed material are held by the RGS

Conditions governing access:

Accessed via the Foyle Reading Room. Free of charge for Fellows, Members and those with valid academic identification. All other users pay a charge and must bring identification in order to register on arrival.

Conditions governing reproduction:

Photocopying at Archivist's discretion, and subject to completion of 'application for copies' form. No reproduction or publication without permission of the RGS-IBG Archivist.

Finding aids:

Catalogue entry available online at Access to Archives.

Archival Information

Archival history:

Immediate source of acquisition:

Most of the material was donated by the creator's widow in 1988. Other material presented by Prof. Robert F Lewis and V Winstone.

Allied Materials

Related material:

RGS Archives - Correspondence blocks 1881-1910, 1911-1920, 1921-1930 and 1931-1940 Carruthers, Douglas. Geog. Jnl. Mss: Middle East 1910, Central Asia 1912, Miscellaneous 1917.

Publication note:

Description Notes

Archivist's note:
Sources: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography online and an obituary in The Geographical Journal volume 128 pp. 368-9.
Prepared by an archives volunteer using existing finding aids and edited by Samantha Velumyl, AIM25 cataloguer.

Rules or conventions:
Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal Place and Corporate Names 1997.

Date(s) of descriptions:
27 November 2000 and modified May 2008.