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Earth, Sea and Sky: the new Special Collections exhibition
As the British Science Festival returns to Southampton in September 2026, we take this opportunity to explore material within the Archives and Special Collections that relates to science and the themes of Earth, Sea and Sky in the new Special Collections exhibition. We hear much about the work of "citizen scientists" whose important work recording information underpins other scientific discoveries. Under the theme of “Earth”, the work of a number of individuals are featured, from Emma Delmé Radcliffe who collected samples of plants and flowers around Shawford in Hampshire in July 1838, which were later arranged meticulously into eight volumes of herbarium, to Revd Gilbert White, the renowned naturalist who is said to have inspired Charles Darwin, and the geologist Thomas Webster.
![Diagram drawn by William Morgan, 26 New Street, Brompton, of the room at Walmer Castle, in which Arthur Wellesley, first Duke of Wellington, died September 1852 [MS 69/4/1]. It is a simple ink outline sketch with notes](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:256ibdqx32qzse2yjipsba7g/bafkreifgn4ibeaf5ah35yavlujjphkay24fehh4hedxjk5hwllbapry7zy)
![Part of a handwritten letter showing a flourishing signature: "Your most devoted faithful humble servant Lancelot Brown". It is part of a letter from Lancelot ["Capability"] Brown to Henry Temple, second Viscount Palmerston, concerning work undertaken at Broadlands, 1766-79, 17 Nov 1779](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:256ibdqx32qzse2yjipsba7g/bafkreierrnzqiynbjcjvfybsji3vfxu5uyt5gfi5nssuvgfvheqk5feyy4)
