John Berry

John Berry died recently at the age of 95. He was a member of University Court from 1970-1980. This is an appreciation.

John Berry's mother died in 1907, shortly after John was born, and he was brought up in Tayfield by devoted aunts. He roamed Tentsmuir as a boy and accompanied his father on shooting and natural history trips. Despite being hampered by brittle bones and dyslexia, he nevertheless prospered at Eton and later at Trinity College, Cambridge. It was there that he met a fellow young birdwatcher, Bride Freemantle. Together they went off to study the waders on Fulbourne Fen, fell in love, married, and in due course had three children.

When John left Cambridge, his career began to prosper as a researcher into fish biology first at University College, Dundee, then at the University of Southampton. He attracted the attention of Professor D'arcy Thompson at St. Andrews, who persuaded him to enrol for a Ph.D there, and in 1936 he was elected to a Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, at the age of 29. He was a Fellow for 66 years: elected the youngest, he died the oldest, a tenure of Scotland's premier learned society of extraordinary length. From this period, too, comes his authorship of his only book. The Wild Geese and Wild Duck of Scotland (1939) was published a month before the outbreak of the Second World War.

From those days during the 1940s there is the well authenticated story of the visit to Tayfield of a Spanish gentleman known by the authorities to be a German spy, who was entertained with lavish butter, cream and eggs to show there was no shortage of food in Britain; who found warships offshore and endless Spitfires screaming overhead (actually the same three flying round) to show how well defended Scotland was; who wanted to see Leuchars but could not see past the lines of army trucks drawn up outside, and who, above all, was persuaded by his genial host and by his German-speaking relations that the landed classes did not think too badly of Hitler after all. When, some weeks later, Hess parachuted into Scotland in an attempt to meet up with the Duke of Hamilton, the only man who did not seem greatly surprised was John Berry.

If John's fragile health precluded him from service on the front, he certainly served his country in other and remarkable ways. He was appointed press censor, cover for his real job as head of counter intelligence for Scotland. He was not a complete novice on this side of things, having become involved with the secret service in the 1930s, apparently combining a scientific trip to Germany and later to Hungary with intelligence gathering in the national interest. He had nearly died of typhus on a trip down the Danube in 1935, and had to be rescued by gypsies.

In time he gained the confidence and respect of Tom Johnston, wartime Secretary of State for Scotland and later head of the fledgling Hydro Board, and when the war came to an end John was appointed both as fish scientist and head of public relations to the Board. He neatly combined the posts by designing the fish ladder at the new dam at Pitlochry so that people could enjoy the sight of salmon moving up river: a demonstration of his long-held belief that development, if well planned, did not have to harm wildlife or spoil the pleasures of nature for people.

In the post-war years he was moving closer and closer towards the world of professional nature conservation, where, both nationally and internationally, there were exciting initiatives. In 1948 he was sent by the Secretary of State to the founding meeting of what was to become the International Union for the Preservation (later Conservation) of Nature, and helped to draft the subsequent agreement. The British Nature Conservancy was established by the 1949 National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act, but the new Scottish Director was actually in post before the NC itself came into being. The Secretary of State was determined to get Dr. Berry, a man he could trust, in place. John's tenure as Head of Nature Conservancy in Scotland lasted until 1967.

Perhaps his greatest and most personal achievement of these years with the Conservancy was to get established the great series of Scottish National Nature Reserves, beginning with Beinn Eighe in 1951. The story of how he was sent to negotiate the purchase of a pine wood for £4,000 and returned with the whole mountain has often been told. A whole stream of other nature reserves were added to Beinn Eighe - Tentsmuir, Morton Lochs, Loch Leven, the Cairngorms, Rum, and many more. Whether you go to Unst in Shetland, to St. Kilda, or to Caerlaverock on the Solway, you see the fruits of his vision. John's charm, his persuasive powers, his love of a good story, his passion for nature conservation combined with his understanding of the world of landowning, shooting and farming, enabled him to move with great skill and considerable speed to secure the best places as nature reserves. 'I am not a Scottish Nationalist', he was wont to say, 'I am a Scottish Naturalist', and Scottish people owe him a debt for his stewardship of Scottish nature that is hard to calculate.

When he retired from the Nature Conservancy, he threw himself into the activities of nature conservation worldwide. He furthered marine research on the Tay; he was a member of Court of the University of Dundee for ten years, he helped to found Dundee Botanic Gardens, received honorary degrees both from Dundee and St. Andrews; he was busy everywhere with societies that were involved in wildlife. He was rightly proud of what he had done yet so unassuming in other ways, always willing to help a student or pass the time of day with a naturalist of any description.

This obituary has been edited. Original text by Professor Chris Smout.

Next Page
Return to May 2002 Contact