John Henry Constantine Whitehead, 1904-1960

Abstract

Henry Whitehead was at the height of his powers and of his mathematical influence when he died suddenly on 8 May 1960 after a heart-attack. In the last months before his death he had written several important papers, which showed how much he had still to contribute, and how keenly alive he was to the value of the newest work of young contemporaries. His life was a happy one, with little for the biographer to chronicle. He was born in India on 11 November 1904, the son of the Right Reverend Henry Whitehead, for twenty-three years Bishop of Madras and sometime Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford; and of Isobel Whitehead daughter of Canon Duncan of Caine in Wiltshire. She was one of the early mathematical students of Lady Margaret Hall. There were many clerics and teachers among earlier generations of Whiteheads; the philosopher A. N. Whitehead was Bishop Whitehead’s brother. At the age of one and a half the young Henry was sent back to England and saw little of his parents until their retirement to England in 1920. At Eton, and as a Balliol undergraduate, his high spirits and convivial habits and his many-sided successes at games gave little grounds for expecting him to excel on the academic side. He boxed and played billiards for the University, and just missed winning a blue for cricket. Even after his rather easily won First Classes in both Moderations and Finals, it seemed quite natural to his family, and to his College tutor, that he should go off to the City to start on a financial career. But after little more than a year he broke away and returned to Oxford to do more work in mathematics (1928-1929).