( 287 ) 

 THE LATE LIEUT. FRANCIS A. MONCKTON. 



The study of Ornithology and especially of the birds of 

 Staffordshire has recently sustained a great loss by the 

 death of Lieut. Francis Algernon Monckton, 1st Battalion 

 Scots Guards, who was killed in action on November 8th. 

 1914. He was the eldest son of Mr. Francis Monckton, of 

 Stretton Hall, Stafford, and was born on the 6th of May, 

 1890, and educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford. 

 He obtained his commission as 2nd Lieutenant in the Scots 

 Guards in February, 1912, becoming Lieutenant in the fol- 

 lowing year. Around his home at Stretton, which is situated 

 in a beautiful rural district, he had a great opportunity 

 of studying the local birds and especially the wildfowl which 

 frequent the lake in Stretton Park, the River Penk which 

 runs through the estate, and a large sheet of water known as 

 Bellfield's Reservoir. This part of the county of Stafford 

 lies almost in a direct line with one of the great flight lines 

 of our winter migrants coming in from the east coast to the 

 south-west, and thus Staffordshire has obtained records, a 

 great number of them being supplied by Monckton, of most 

 of the rarer wild Geese, Ducks, Waders, etc. Here from 

 his boyhood Monckton made a study of local birds, and 

 especially of their various stages of plumage. The writer had 

 the pleasure on April 8th, 1911, of staying with him at Stretton 

 and of visiting Bellfield's Reservoir, on which occasion 

 we observed many interesting birds. Since the year 1905 

 Monckton annually contributed valuable notes on the birds 

 of Staffordshire, which appear in The Transactions of the 

 North Staffs. Field Clnb, and amongst them are to be found 

 records of some of the rarest Staffordshire species. He was 

 always ready to impart his knowledge of wild bird-life to 

 others, and spared neither time nor trouble in watching 

 any rare species for days together so as to inake sure of its 

 identity and learn more of its habits. The writer has lost 

 in Monckton a valued and sincere friend and correspondent, 

 and the study of Staffordshire Ornithology will suffer much 

 by his having given his life so nobly for his country. 



J.R.B.M. 



That Monckton was an extremely keen and enthusiastic 

 ornithologist is shown by a letter dated October 22nd, 1914, 

 from St. Nazaire, at the mouth of the Loire, where he was 

 quartered before going to the front. In this letter to me he 

 states that this place appeared to be an excellent one for 



