Albert Brydges Farn


Albert Brydges Farn was a British amateur entomologist, chiefly remembered nowadays for a letter he wrote on 1878 to Charles Darwin describing industrial melanism in the annulet moth.
Farn was born at Hackney on 9 October 1841, son of a solicitor. Though he began medical training he appears to have given it up on inheriting a large legacy, and devoted himself to pleasure. He was a noted shot, once famously bagging 176 snipe with 176 shots, as well a practical joker and an excellent billiard player; at the same time he was quick to take offence and never forgot any perceived slight. He worked as an inspector of vaccine at Dartford, until 1906, when he retired to Hereford. In 1912 he moved to Doward Cottage, at Ganerew near Monmouth, largely to study the comma butterfly, which was at that time rare in England. He died on 31 October 1921 after failing to recover from an operation, and is buried at Ganerew.
Farn was a respected entomologist. In 1880 he revised and extended The Insect Hunter's Companion, and in 1890 he was elected a fellow of the Entomological Society. The extensive collection of Lepidoptera which he had amassed was dispersed after his death.