Dorothea de Winton (b. 1890): Geneticist

As a young woman Dorothea de Winton became interested in gardening and between 1916 and 1919 worked as a professional gardener.

In 1919 she wrote to William Bateson enclosing a card of introduction from Ernest Innes, Trustee of the John Innes Horticultural Institution.She expressed her interest in gardening and her wish to ‘go in more for the scientific side of it’. She asked for a job on the outdoor staff at JIHI, hoping to work on the culture of experimental plants with a view to later qualifying for research work. She wrote ‘At present I know a little botany & the first principles of Mendelism but am intensely interested in it all’.

In April 1920 she was appointed to the JIHI staff on a salary of £150 per year and worked on Primula sinensis. She was continuing the late Reginald Gregory’s experiments on tetraploid forms.

In 1922, when the Genetical Society visited JIHI, Dorothea gave demonstrations on the genetics of peas and Primula sinensis. She was now a ‘technical assistant’ at £200 p.a; her salary increased again to £250 in 1923 and £350 in 1925.

Between 1920 and 1926 Dorothea collaborated with Bateson on Primula sinensis (linkage studies), taking charge of the experiments after his death. Dorothea also drew on Caroline Pellew’s work on linkage in peas; together they visited Vilmorin’s pea nurseries near Paris in 1927. (She was en route to present her work at the International Genetical Congress in Berlin).

In 1929 she was given the title ‘Geneticist’ at JIHI. Between 1927 and 1941 Dorothea continued to work on the genetics of peas and P. sinensis, initially with supervision from J. B. S. Haldane, but the Primula work dominated after 1936. (The disease problems experienced by staff looking after Dorothea’s experimental seedlings led directly to the development of John Innes composts).

In her last years at JIHI she collaborated with Kenneth Mather on breeding systems in Primula and together they made important contributions to the genetics of heterostyly. Dorothea’s twenty years breeding work on P. sinensis and her knowledge of the forty mutants, half of which she had discovered, formed the basis of linkage studies. The innumerable gene combinations she was able to demonstrate were appreciated each year by large numbers of students. However, when Haldane left in 1937 Dorothea, who had closely collaborated with him, was left in a vulnerable position. Her salary was increased to £370 p.a. and the intention was to retain her until she reached 60 years of age. However, a new Head of Genetics (Mather) and a new Director (Cyril Darlington) in 1939 meant changes were sweeping through the Institution. In 1941 she was told a drop in the Institution’s income meant her post would be terminated, but she was to be re-appointed at £200 p.a. Dorothea found this unacceptable and left JIHI to become a plant breeder at Messrs Ballard in Worcestershire, a firm of aster specialists.