Alfred Edwin Eaton
[7] Young Alfred later attended Reverend James Penny's Grammar School in Blandford, Dorset,[5] before he began studies at Trinity College Cambridge.
Walter Eaton, assisted by Alfred, officiated at the wedding of their sister Frances in 1870 to Edward Pinney, who was also from a clergy family.
[15] Eaton resumed work as a Curate again in 1882, at Thorncombe,[16] filling in for the usual Vicar Charles A. Bragge who had departed on a continental tour to recover from illness in 1881.
Eaton opened up the village church and vicarage to assist those who had been made homeless,[19] and was involved in the fundraising efforts to rebuild, writing an appeal letter which was printed in The Western Gazette in which he noted that 70 people, mainly the village's poorest residents, had lost their homes.
[31] Eaton's own collection of 200 microscope slides and c.1800 pinned insects, mostly Psychodidae, were donated to the British Museum by his widow Mary after his death.
'[32] Arctic explorer Benjamin Leigh Smith selected his friend Eaton to accompany him on the screw steamer Diana, to bring supplies to the Swedish ships of Nordenskiöld's 1872 Svalbard Expedition, which Leigh Smith suspected had become beset by ice in Mossel Bay.
[33] The Diana was successful in its relief mission and continued on to survey areas of Svalbard which had not yet been documented by Swedish scientists.
[34] Eaton's official position on the Diana was Ship's Surgeon and General Practitioner,[15] but he was also the Svalbard Expedition's naturalist.
[34] Eaton prepared a list of known flora and fauna of the region, to compare with what he was able to discover while surveying the northern part of Svalbard.
Eaton noted that Leigh Smith and his other companions spent much of their spare time deer-stalking, leaving him to his natural history pursuits.
[15] Eaton felt that carrying arms and ammunition while exploring was cumbersome considering his other equipment, and that if attacked by a Polar Bear he would be able to drive it off.
The deceased person had been in possession of a rosary and images of saints, and Eaton performed a Christian burial service as best he could before the men had to return to the ship.
[33] Eaton's collections from this Expedition were distributed among other scientists, with the Lepidoptera being first sent to Philipp Christoph Zeller and then Henry Tibbats Stainton.
[37] Of Eaton's plant collections, the Phanerogams and Cryptogams were examined by Spencer Le Marchant Moore, the Algae by George Dickie, and the Diatioms by Eugene O'Meara.
[39] Eaton was with one of the British parties that travelled to the Kerguelen Archipelago to observe the 1874 Transit of Venus, from October 1874 to February 1875.
[40] After an initial leg of the journey that stopped in South Africa at the Cape (where Eaton collected Fungi[41]), Eaton's specimen collecting when he reached the Kergulen Islands was mainly conducted at Royal Sound, Swain's Bay and Observatory Bay.
[40] Eaton could not speak any Portuguese at first and spent some time with a phrasebook trying to build his confidence before venturing out into the countryside to look for insects.
'[43] Eaton stayed at Almodóvar from 6–12 May, and then took a walking tour in Algarve – his destinations included Serra do Caldeirão, São Bartolomeu de Messines, Silves (14–17 May), Monchique (19–21 May), Alferce and São Marcos da Serra, Santa Clara-a-Nova before heading back to Almodôvar.
[45] The Portuguese Macrolepidoptera collected by Eaton were sent for description to Otto Staudinger,[46] and the Microlepidoptera sent to Émile Louis Ragonot.
