Rendel Sebastian Pease. 2 November 1922 — 17 October 2004

Rendel Sebastian Pease, universally known to his friends and colleagues as Bas Pease, came from good political, scientific and Quaker stock. On his father's side he was descended from a long line of distinguished Quakers with an interest in social issues, including his grandfather Edward Pease, who was a co–founder and first secretary of the Fabian Society. On his mother's side his forebears included Josiah Wedgwood FRS, the founder of the Wedgwood pottery dynasty, whose descendents included no less than 10 Fellows of the Royal Society, including Charles Darwin and Francis Galton. The fourth generation of this remarkable family included Josiah Clement Wedgwood MP, First Lord Wedgwood of Barlaston, who became a Cabinet Minister under Ramsay McDonald in 1924. Bas's father, Michael Pease, a Cambridge geneticist, married Helen Wedgwood in 1920, and Bas was born on 2 November 1922.