Heinrich Agathon Bernstein

German naturalist, zoologist and explorer (1828–1865)
Heinrich Agathon Bernstein (22 September 1828 – 19 April 1865) was a German naturalist, zoologist and explorer from Breslau (Wrocław).

Heinrich Agathon Bernstein was born on 22 September 1828 in Breslau (modern day Wrocław, Lower Silesia, Poland), and died on 19 April 1865 at Batanta (Raja Ampat Islands, West Papua, Indonesia). His father, Professor Georg Heinrich Bernstein, taught theology and oriental languages at Breslau University. By 1840 Heinrich had started at the Gymnasium in Wrocław (Maria Magdalena), but after two years he departed with his parents and a teacher for a year long in Italy. When returned to Wrocław he studied for three and a half years at the Saksian state school at Pforta, and proceeded to St. Elisabeth’s Gymnasium in Breslau and finish his education in 1849. In October 1849 he began studying medicine at the University at Wrocław, and became a doctor there on 16 November 1853 with his thesis De anatomia corvorum pars prima osteologia. Johann Ludwig Christian Carl Gravenhorst, whom he met at the university, was largely responsible for drawing out Bernstein’s interest in natural history. From 1852 Bernstein travelled extensively, visiting Poland, Austria, Hungary and France. Then in early 1854 he departed to the Netherlands, and never returned to Germany again.

Arriving in the Netherlands, Bernstein visited the large natural history collections at Leiden. Here he met Coenraad Jacob Temminck (director of the museum at Leiden), and soon enough he was ready to fulfil his dream to go to the tropics. To get to Indonesia he volunteered for the Dutch Army as medical specialist, and gained his passage as the ship’s doctor, departing on 18 June 1854. But his contract bound him to return soon afterwards. Once back in Leiden he took the exam for physician (16 April 1855), and in doing so gained some exclusive rights to work in the overseas possessions of the Netherlands.

On 10 September 1855 Bernstein arrived again in Java. Here he immediately became the first physician of the Health Establishment at Gadok near Buitenzorg (Bogor), and remained in post until 31 October 1860. Directly after arriving in Indonesia, Bernstein began collecting (either alone or with local guides) and on 8 October 1856 the first consignment of skins arrived at Leiden (some 300 birds). Bernstein also started publishing articles in Journal für Ornithologie. His articles there between 1859–1861 on the nests and eggs of Javanese birds so impressed Hermann Schlegel, director of the museum at Leiden, that he invited Bernstein to work for the museum to collect zoological items. Bernstein was duly appointed in March 1859 as official collector for the Dutch government, and in this new role he began to collect a wide range of both flora (now in the herbaria of Wrocław) and fauna. In November 1860 he got permission from the Governor Generals Charles Ferdinand Pahud and his successor Ludolph Anne Jan Wilt Sloet van de Beele; they granted him to travel to New Guinea. He was the first researcher in this region after the departure from Franz Wilhelm Junghuhn and the death of Carl Anton Ludwig Maria Schwaner in 1851. On 7 November Bernstein departed for the Moluccas, arriving a month later at Ternate (Halmahera), where he collected birds for eight days and set up “home”.