Obituary from TDGNHAS, Series III, Vol. LIII, p.196
The Society lost one of its most active members on the death of Mr Henry McA. Russell on 24th April, 1978.
Born in 1898 in London, Mr Russell on leaving school entered the Civil Service as a boy clerk and quickly earned promotion through various posts by his efficiency and high examination passes, until eventually in 1920 he joined the Inland Revenue Service as Assistant In-spector of Taxes in Ripon. In the meantime he had enlisted in the Army on his 18th birthday and served from 1916 to the end of the War in 1918, by which time he was in action in France with the Seaforth Highlanders. His career in the Inland Revenue service took him to a variety of places in the London district, then to Northern Ireland, and eventually to Dunoon, from where he finally moved to Dumfries as H.M. Inspector of Taxes, the post from which he retired in 1961.
Among Mr Russell's diverse interests was a great love of the countryside and of Natural History, particularly ornithology, as is demonstrated by the fact that in 1960 he became a founder member and the first Secretary of the Dumfries and Galloway Branch of the Scottish Ornithologist's Club.
It was just after he came to Dumfries that he joined our Society in 1953, and immediately began to participate in its activities with the same earnestness and drive as he had had shown in his professional career. Elected to Council in 1955 he was made a vice-president from 1956 to 1960. From 1962 to 1966 he served as Honorary Treasurer, an office in which he devoted his administrative experience and his high standard of precisiqn to organising the finances of the Society. Thereafter he continued as member of Council, until in 1970 he again became vice-president. Although he was prevented by ill-health from accepting the office of President, he was honoured in 1975 for his services to the Society by being made a Fellow of the Society.
Our sympathy is extended to his widow, Mrs Russell and to his son and daughter.
A.R.