I seat by the window at my desk in Kew Gardens Herbarium, I look around myself, and I see cabinets and cabinets filled with plants from all over the world. Kew’s Herbarium contains around seven million preserved plant specimens collected over the past 150 years. How funny to imagine the adventures and stories of the human beings behind this collection. Who were them? What led them to travel to distant places to collect the specimens?
This Herbarium was founded in 1853, but its inception stems from a private collection. Kew's Herbarium website tell us the story :
"When William Hooker was appointed Director of Kew in 1841 there was no official herbarium. Before then, Sir Joseph Banks’ herbarium and library in Soho Square had been used for queries on plant names and classification. Hooker then made his own collection, perhaps the largest in private hands, available to staff and visitors at his home close to Kew. The ground floor of Hunter House became available in 1852 and was used to house Hooker’s herbarium, alongside the herbarium and library of Dr William Arnold Bromfield. The first curator, Allan Black, was appointed in 1853. Subsequently, eminent botanists, including George Bentham, donated their own collections to that of the herbarium of William Hooker.In 1877, the need for greater space, due to botanical exploration of the British Empire, led to the first wing being added. Three further wings were added between 1903 and 1969, with further expansion into the quadrangle in 1989, and a modern wing with climate control was added in 2010. Although the Herbarium was founded in 1853, many of the subsequently donated collections contained earlier material. An important example of this is the Herbarium of the East India Company, housed separately from the main collection, including Wallich’s collection from British India 1822–1829. The oldest collections in the Kew Herbarium are a few specimens from the Petiver Herbarium, collected by Samuel Brown in India and dated 22–27 April 1696. "
With my interest in story telling , I just read about Samuel Brown, or Samuel Browne. Quite a fascinating character! Browne was a Surgeon and Botanist that worked at English East India Company factory at Fort St. George, Madras. He collected plants, and corresponded with other naturists such as James Petiver. Petiver's collections were bought by Sir Hans Sloane and became a part of the natural history museum.
Anyway, it seems Browne had a life filled with adventures. As a Surgeon, he was accused of mal practice once. According to Henry Davison Love (1913), in his book, Vestiges of Old Madras 1640-1800, the story happened like this:
"James Wheeler, a member of the Council took a dose of medication prepared by an assistant on the morning of 30 August 1693. He failed to turn for a Council meeting and died before noon. The medicine had apparently been pounded by Browne's assistant, using a mortar that had previously contained arsenic. Browne took responsibility for the death and wrote to the President of the Council- "I have Murthered Mr. Wheeler by giveing him Arsenick. Please to execute Justice on me the Malifactor as I deserve." The autopsy was conducted by Dr Bulkley and this was possibly the first post-mortem report published by the East India Company. Browne was acquitted by the Grand Jury."
It would be interesting to discover where those few specimens are, here at Kew.