George Bax Holmes

He was married on 19 October 1826 to his third cousin Mary Burns of Chichester at which time his occupation was recorded as "chemist and druggist" of Horsham.

As a Quaker in these times Bax Holmes was still regarded as a dissenter from the mainstream Church of England, even though the religious Act of Toleration had been passed in 1689.

Bax Holmes is perhaps best known for his discovery of the Great Horsham Iguanodon, a plant eating dinosaur, in building works on the future site of the Royal & Sun Alliance (now RSA) headquarters.

Bax Holmes identified them as fossilised iguanodon bones, the largest found since the name was coined by Gideon Mantell of Lewes some 15 years earlier.

After Bax Holmes died his daughter sold his collection of 767 (some say 764) fossils to the Corporation of Brighton for £55 and they later went on display at the Booth Museum of Natural History.