William MacGillivray worked with John James Audubon. As Audubon was working on his beautiful paintings for Birds of America, MacGillivray was working on a companion book, Ornithological Biography, or, An account of the habits of the birds of the United States of America. The two men were long time friends with shared interests and beliefs.
McGillivray, even though he worked with Audubon in North America, primarily studied British birds and worked with several museums in Britain and Ireland. As a naturalist he worked with collections of specimens to study, analyze and catalog many species. Sadly this included the skulls of humans from races other than the white race.
Once again it was that nasty business of human skull collecting for phrenology and the use of the data from studying these skulls to support racist beliefs.
However there are very few extant sources of MacGillivray’s own writings to truly determine the depth of his involvement in racist “science.” Most of his writings were destroyed in a fire. What does exist are writings by his friends and colleagues that point to some pretty racist actions and tendencies.
While Audubon was out taking skulls from deceased Mexican soldiers in Texas, Bachman (see Bachman’s Sparrow) wrote a letter to George Morton, the wealthy Philadelphia phrenologist and arch racist. In this correspondence it is revealed that MacGillivray had asked to see skulls of Native Americans collected by Audubon and wished them to be sent to Edinburgh. It is unknown if MacGillivray got to see those skulls. Shortly before this MacGillivray had asked Audubon to see skulls “heads of Negroes” and of alligators.
These references to MacGillivray by known skull collectors and phrenologists are pretty telling about MacGillivray’s feelings on non white humans, if he even considered them human.
There are some existing journal entries by MacGillivray in which he complains about the Irish and describes them in broad, negative terms, especially those of the “lower orders.” This indicates to me that the man was racist in thoughts, words, deeds, and the with company he kept.
In my drawing MacGillivray holds up a skull. We don’t know what race of human it belongs to because you can’t tell from skulls. He also has that alligator skull in his other hand. This is to indicate that he thinks of some people, or races of people, as animals. He sits on the Flag of Ireland from the time. His disdain for the Irish people leads him to use their flag as a bit of fabric to keep his pants dry as he sits on the sod.
The warbler is about to fly off, as warblers do. But you can hardly blame this particular bird.
Bird Names For Birds 