Editing Roderick Murchison (section)

==Later life==
[[File:Tarradale House-Geograph-4704758-by-Julian-Paren.jpg|thumb|300px|Tarradale House]]
[[File:RoderickMurchisonBrompton.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Funerary monument, [[Brompton Cemetery]], London]]

In 1845, whilst visiting [[Carclew]] in [[Cornwall]], he met several [[Cornish people|Cornish]] miners who were going to Australia. Believing that there might be gold there, he asked them to send back likely samples. They did this, and thus Murchison knew of the existence of gold in Australia before [[Edward Hargraves]]' discovery.<ref name="Bonython1933"/>
In 1857, Murchison was elected a member of the [[American Antiquarian Society]].<ref name="AAS"/> Three years later, he was elected to the [[American Philosophical Society]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=APS Member History|url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Roderick+I.+Murchison&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced|access-date=2021-01-15|website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref>

In 1863 he was made a [[Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath|KCB]], and three years later he was created a [[baronet]]. The learned societies of his own country bestowed their highest rewards upon him: the [[Royal Society]] gave him the [[Copley Medal]], the Geological Society its [[Wollaston Medal|Wollaston medal]], and the [[Royal Society of Edinburgh]] its Brisbane Medal. There was hardly a foreign scientific society of note without his name among its honorary members. The [[French Academy of Sciences]] awarded him the prix Cuvier, and elected him one of its eight foreign members in succession to [[Michael Faraday]]. In 1855 he was elected a foreign member of the [[Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences]] and in 1871 awarded the [[Founders' Medal]] of the Royal Geographical Society.<ref name="rgs.org"/>

One of the closing public acts of Murchison's life was the founding of a chair of geology and mineralogy at the [[University of Edinburgh]]. Under his will there was established the [[Murchison Medal]] and a geological fund ([[The Murchison Fund]]) to be awarded annually by the council of the Geological Society in London.

Murchison died in 1871 and is buried in [[Brompton Cemetery]], London, near the north end of the arcade on the west side of the central path.