Crouch, Jonathan
1789-1870

Born on 15 March 1789, he came from a family long connected with Polperro. He was initially educated in Cornish schools and then as the pupil of two local doctors. He entered the joint Guy's and St. Thomas's Hospitals in 1808, returning to Polperro in 1809/10. A local antiquarian, he became one of the leading nineteenth century naturalists with a substantial number of publications.

The family had been Methodists since the 1760s, but Jonathan Crouch supported Samuel Warren and led the secession in the village into the Wesleyan Methodist Association in 1837, building a chapel in the following year. On his death on 13 April 1870 a memorial in his memory was erected in the chapel; this is now in the garden of his former home by the Saxon Bridge. 

A son by his second wife was Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch (1863-1944), who wrote under the pseudonym 'Q'.
Sources
  • Jeremy Rowett Johns, 'Dr. Jonathan Couch and Methodism in Polperro', Cornish Methodist Historical Society Journal 12(3) (2017) pp.27-29.
  • Jeremy Rowett Johns, Doctor Nature – Jonathan Crouch: surgeon of Polperro (Polperro, 2016)

Entry written by: DCD
Category: Person
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