MEMBERS of Thurrock Local History Society learned about a local legend at their most recent meeting.

After the society's AGM at the April meeting members welcomed Dr George Beccaloni, a new patron for the Society, talking about Alfred Russel Wallace.

Wallace discovered the process of evolution by natural selection. He was born in 1823, leaving school at 14, when he worked for a land surveyor. Making maps began his interest in natural history and he collected specimens. He was an avid reader, being inspired by books on selection.

Aged 25 he went up the Amazon with his friend Henry Bates to seek evidence of evolution.

He first collected butterflies and birds. He travelled up the Rio Negro and produced a map, which is now used as a standard, together with several hand-drawn maps. Poor health led him back to the UK but tragically the ship caught fire and sank, losing specimens and his travel notes, only a few drawings being rescued.

After spending ten days adrift he landed at Deal. He had come to the conclusion that creatures separated by water evolved into a different species.

In 1854 he left on a collecting expedition to the Archipelago in Indonesia for eight years. This was a resounding success, resulting in 10,000 specimens, many of which were unknown, with some being named after him.

He also came to the conclusion that the geographical distribution of plants and animals had evolved through natural selection and the survival of the fittest. He divulged this theory in 1856 and was urged to publish his findings. In 1867 he published an essay on the Sarawak Law, showing how new species evolved. He proposed the imaginary line between Asia and Australia, now known as the Wallace line.

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He contacted Charles Darwin who had also come to a similar conclusion and had sat on his theory for 20 years. They had mutual respect for each other and jointly sent a paper to the Linnean Society, which was much praised, but it was Darwin who published his findings first in The Origin of Species by Natural Selection. Wallace wrote many articles and books, including two volumes of The Geographical Distribution of Animals.

He moved to Grays, where he obtained the lease of four acres of land which included an old chalk pit, on which to build a house in concrete because there was a nearby cement works and a supply of gravel on the site.

He named it The Dell, a large three-storey house, paid for by his earnings and his book on spiritualism.

The Dell in Alfred Russel Wallace's day.

He had a well dug and piped water to the house. He moved in in 1872 amid well laid out picturesque gardens, with the entrance from Dell Road. He planned to settle there for life, but sold up after four years, perhaps for financial reasons or the death of his son.

There were several owners, including Grays Convent and in 2002 a plaque to Wallace was unveiled there. It is now a Grade-II listed owing to its concrete construction and was sold to a property developer in 2017 who turned the house into flats and built several others around it.

Alfred Russel Wallace died in 1913, aged 90. He is widely respected and Dr Beccaloni's very detailed and informative story of his life and findings made this 'Grays boy' come alive, remembered today by roads named after him.

Many other recollections and pictures by Dr Beccaloni can be found on the The Alfred Russel Wallace Website

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The society's next meeting is at 8pm on Friday 19 May at St John's Church hall, Victoria Avenue, Grays when Gray Jones will be talking about his amazing life as an A&E nurse. All visitors are welcome.