Dame Miriam Louisa Rothschild (5 August 1908 – 20 January 2005) was a British natural scientist and author with contributions to zoology, entomology, and botany. Early life Miriam Rothschild was born in 1908 in Ashton Wold, near Oundle in Northamptonshire, the daughter of Charles Rothschild of the Rothschild family of Jewish bankers and Rózsika Edle Rothschild (née von Wertheimstein), a Hungarian sportswoman, of Austrian-Jewish descent. Her brother was Victor Rothschild, 3rd Baron Rothschild and one of her sisters (Kathleen Annie) Pannonica Rothschild (Baroness Nica de Koenigswarter) would later be a bebop jazz enthusiast and patroness of Thelonious Monk and Charlie Parker. Her father had described about 500 new species of flea, and her uncle Lionel Walter Rothschild had built a private natural history museum at Tring. By the age of four she had started collecting ladybird beetles and caterpillars and taking a tame quail to bed with her. World War I broke on the eve of Miriam's sixth birthday in 1914, while the Rothschilds were holidaying in Austro-Hungary. They hurried home on the first westward train but, unable to pay, had to borrow money from a Hungarian passenger who commented "This is the proudest moment of my life. Never did I think that I should be asked to lend money to a Rothschild!" Her father took his own life when she was 15, after which she became closer to her uncle. She was educated at home until the age of 17, when she demanded to go to school. She thence attended evening classes in zoology at Chelsea College of Science and Technology and classes during the day in literature at Bedford College, London. Personal life During World War II, Rothschild was recruited to work at Bletchley Park on codebreaking with Alan Turing and was awarded a Defence Medal from the British government for her efforts. Additionally, she pressed the UK Government to admit more German Jews as refugees from Nazi Germany. She arranged housing for 49 Jewish children, some of whom stayed at her home at Ashton Wold. The estate also served as a hospital for wounded military personnel, including her future husband, Captain George Lane. Lane, a Hungarian-born British soldier, had changed his name from Lanyi in case of enemy capture. They had six children, four biological: Mary Rozsiska (1945–2010), Charles Daniel (born 1948), Charlotte Teresa (born 1951) and Johanna Miriam (born 1951); and two adopted. The marriage was