Stephen Townesend (surgeon)

Stephen Chapman Townesend (1860 – May 1914) was an English surgeon, stage actor, writer and anti-vivisectionist.

Biography Stephen Chapman Townesend was the son of a rector in London. He was educated at St Bartholomew's Hospital and the University of Edinburgh.. Royal College of Surgeons of England. Retrieved 14 August 2021. He qualified M.R.C.S. in 1883 and F.R.C.S. in 1887. He was surgeon on the Orient Steamship Company's line, house surgeon at St Mark's Hospital and at Birmingham General Hospital. Townesend was a stage actor under the name Will Dennis and assisted the Amateur Dramatic Society of St Bartholomew's Hospital."Who Was Who. v.1 (1897/1916)". p. 712

In 1900, he married Frances Hodgson Burnett in Genoa."Stephen Townsend Weds Mrs. Burnett". San Francisco Call, Volume 87, Number 105, 15 March 1900. He was involved with the stage adaptations of her novels. They divorced two years later.Gerzina, Gretchen (2004), Frances Hodgson Burnett: The Unexpected Life of the Author of The Secret Garden. Rutgers University Press. p. 229. Townesend was an anti-vivisectionist, who was described as loving animals more than people.Up The Garden Path The Guardian 4 April 2004 Retrieved 14 August 2021.

Townesend died in Colney Heath from pneumonia in May 1914. New York Times 21 May 1914 Retrieved 14 August 2021.

Selected publications

A Thorough-Bred Mongrel: The Tale of a Dog, Told by a Dog to Lovers of Dogs (1900) Dr. Tuppy (1912)

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References