Edwin Leonard Gill

Edwin Leonard Gill (1877 –1956) was a British ornithologist, taxidermist, and museum curator.Edwin Leonard Gill (17 November 1877 – 5 July 1956) was a British ornithologist, taxidermist, and museum curator. He was usually known as E. Leonard Gill. He first directed the Hancock Museum of Natural History (1901–1922), then the National Museum of Scotland (1922–1924), and finally the Iziko South African Museum (1925–1942). He was a Fellow of the Royal Society of South Africa and President of the South African Ornithological Society. He served in a volunteer ambulance unit during the First World War.

Early life Edwin Leonard Gill was born in Redhill, Surrey, on 17 November 1877, into a Quaker family. After going to a Quaker school, he studied at Owens College, then a constituent college of Victoria University of Manchester and graduating in 1899. He subsequently became assistant curator at the Manchester Museum. During the First World War, he took leave to join the Friends' Ambulance Unit and he was demobilised in February 1919, at which time he returned to his post. In August 1922, he left the Hancock Museum for the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, where he was put in charge of the ornithology department and remained for two years.

Cape Town In 1924, he accepted the directorship of the Museum of South Africa (now the Iziko South African Museum) in Cape Town, where he took up his post on January 1, 1925; he oversaw many renovations and expansions. In 1925, upon arriving in South Africa, he became a Member of the Royal Society of South Africa and was elected to a fellowship in 1929.