Guide to the Records of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (as filmed by the AJCP), 1793-1928

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Summary

Collection number:

M730-M788

Creator:

Royal Botanic Gardens. Kew

Extent:

348 items

Language:

English

Preferred citation:

Acknowledgement of use of this material should refer to the location of the original material and to the Australian Joint Copying Project.

Items from this collection should include references to the location of the original material and to the AJCP nla.obj number, which serves as the online identifier for the digital copy.

Example: M Series: Journal of Capt. James Cook, 18 February 1770, British Library Add. MS 27885 (AJCP ref: http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-1234)

Availability:

Available

Access conditions:

Available for reference.

Background

Content Summary:

Kew Collectors Series: correspondence and lists 1800-59; specimens collected by John Amstrong, George Barclay, George Caley, Allan Cunningham, William Grant Milne and Berthold C. Seemann, Correspondents include Sir Joseph Banks, William T. Aiton and James Bowie.

Official correspondence:

Letters 1825-65 addressed to Sir William Hooker, Director, from both professional and amateur botanists. Correspondents include William Archer, James Backhouse, Sir Henry Barkly, Henry S. Chapman, Allan Cunningham, Richard Cunningham, Sir William Denison, James Drummond, Ronald C. Gunn, Phillip Parker King, Ludwig Leichhardt, Sir Ferdinand von Mueller, Berthold C. Seeman and James Stirling.

Letters 1865-1928 addressed to the Director and other members of staff, relating to each of the Australian States, the Pacific and Southeast Asia. Correspondents include William Farrer, John J. Shillinglaw, Sir Julius von Haast, Sir William MacGregor, Sir John Thurston and Sir George Bowen.

Miscellaneous manuscripts: correspondence, diaries, journals, lists, maps, descriptive notes, sketches, by James Backhouse, Sir Joseph Banks, George Bentham, Isaac H. Burkill, HMS Challenger, Frederick W. Christian, Charles B. Clarke, Rev. William Colenso, H.F. Comber, Allan Cunningham, Charles Darwin, John F. Duthie, A.D.E. Elmer, Henry O. Forbes, William Forsyth, Henry B. Guppy, Clara Hemsley, William B. Hemsley, John S. Henslow, Arthur W. Hill, Sir Joseph Hooker, J. Hutton, William Kerr, Aylmer B. Lambert, L.V. Garland-Lester, John Lindley, John MacGillivray, Albert C. Maingay, Franz J.F. Meyen, Friedrich A. Wilhelm, William Mitten, Sir Ferdinand von Mueller, William Munro, William Paterson, W.W. Perry, J. Richardson, Henry N. Ridley, J. Smith, O. Stapf, F.C. Stern, William Swainson, William T. Thiselton-Dyer, L. Wigg. Also inwards and outwards books 1793-1895 containing lists of collections of plants and seeds collected for and dispatched from Kew Gardens, and plant lists of collections assembled.

Miscellaneous papers: reports, maps, dispatches, correspondence, parliamentary papers and newspaper cuttings dealing with economic botany. They include references to New South Wales 1846-1928, Victoria 1862-1916, Queensland 1857-1928, South Australia 1849-1927, Western Australia 1848-1928, Tasmania 1843-1928, New Zealand 1843-1921, New Guinea 1850-1928 and Fiji 1860-1919.

Biographical / Historical:

Between 1718 and 1904 various members of the British royal family owned or leased houses or land near the riverside villages of Richmond and Kew, about eight miles from Westminster. In 1718 Frederick, Prince of Wales (later King George III) leased Richmond Lodge as a summer residence. In 1727 the house was bestowed on his wife, Queen Caroline, and she soon extended the estate, incorporating a number of houses near Kew Green. They included the Dutch House, later called Kew Palace. In 1731 her son, Prince Frederick, leased a nearby house, the White House (later Kew House), which he enlarged and which was to serve as a rural retreat for his family. After his death in 1751, it was the home of his widow, Princess Augusta, who was to be mainly responsible for the development of the park and gardens in the next twenty years.

Queen Caroline engaged the landscape gardeners Charles Bridgeman and William Kent to design the park and gardens at Richmond Lodge, including a canal, a pond, serpentine walks, mounds and an assortment of monuments and statues. At Kew, Princess Augusta employed various gardeners and architects, including William Chambers and Lancelot (Capability) Brown. Chambers designed the Orangery and the Pagoda, which still stand today. The garden also had a lake, a flower garden, a menagerie, several temples, a Palladian bridge, glasshouses and a small physic or exotic garden 'with a prodigious variety of exotic plants'. The gardener William Aiton arrived at Kew in 1759 and within a few years he was placed in charge of the physic garden. He became the head gardener at Kew in 1784 and, following his death in 1793, he was succeeded by his son William T. Aiton. In 1795 Aiton became responsible for Richmond Gardens as well and within a few years the boundary walls between the two gardens were demolished.

From 1764 onwards Richmond Lodge was the summer retreat of King George III, Queen Charlotte and their children. In 1772, after Princess Augusta died, they moved to Kew House. Shortly afterwards, Joseph Banks began his long reign as the unofficial director of Kew Gardens. A close friend of the King, he was determined to expand the botanical functions of the gardens and thereby create a royal garden that would surpass the botanical gardens in Paris, Vienna and elsewhere. Moreover, he hoped that, by building up a network of collectors and gardeners around the world, as many new plants as possible would be acquired and grown in the royal gardens. He was supported by the Aitons and other gardeners at Kew and by colonial governors and the East India Company. Banks ensured that botanists such as David Nelson, Archibald Menzies and Robert Brown were given berths on Royal Navy ships embarking on exploring voyages. Collectors, often trained at Kew, were sent overseas for long periods, notably Francis Masson (Spain, Portugal, Africa, North America), William Kerr (China), James Bowie (Brazil), George Caley (New South Wales) and Allan Cunningham (Brazil, New South Wales). In 1793 William Roxburgh became the first superintendent of the botanical garden at Calcutta and he and Banks inaugurated the exchange of plants and seeds between Kew and botanical gardens in colonies and foreign countries.

In 1823 the walled botanic garden at Kew occupied 11 acres, compared to the surrounding pleasure ground of lawns and woodlands of 178 acres. After the death of Banks in 1820, the gardens no longer had powerful supporters. Queen Charlotte had died in Kew Palace in 1818, the new king George IV had little interest in gardens, William T. Aiton spent much of his time at Buckingham Palace and other royal gardens, and rival botanical gardens were being established in London and elsewhere. At Kew the hothouses were dilapidated, garden buildings were shabby and the lake had shrunk to a muddy pond. Allan Cunningham, the last of the Kew collectors overseas, was directed to return from Australia in 1830. In 1838, shortly after the accession of Queen Victoria, the Treasury began a review of the royal household, including the royal gardens. The future of Kew Gardens as a national botanic garden was in jeopardy. It was saved largely by a report sent to the Treasury by John Lindley, the professor of botany at University College, London. He recommended that the State take over the botanic garden and transform it into 'a powerful means of promoting national science', providing great benefits to medicine, commerce, agriculture and horticulture. It would require more space, more glasshouses, the systematic naming of all plants, nurseries, exhibitions and public lectures. There was uncertainty for two years, but in 1840 the Government declared that it had no intention of breaking up Kew Gardens and it would be transferred from the Lord Steward to the Commissioner of Woods and Forests. Sir William Hooker, the professor of botany at Glasgow University, was appointed the first director.

Hooker, an eminent scientist, able administrator and a man of great energy, remained in the post until his death in 1865. In those 25 years he carried out many of Lindley's recommendations and, to a large extent, created a national botanic garden that was the equal of any in the world. The gardens were greatly enlarged when the kitchen garden and the pleasure grounds were taken over in 1845-1846. Impressive new buildings were constructed, such as the Palm House (1848) and the Temperate House (1862). A new arboretum was begun in the old pleasure grounds, walks and parterres were built, the pond was enlarged and landscaped, and a medicinal garden and flower gardens created. A museum of economic botany and a herbarium were opened. The gardens attracted a growing number of scientists from Britain and overseas and also, rather to Hooker's dismay, the general public, especially after the railway reached Kew in 1853. The Botanical Gardens were only open to the public in the afternoons, but visitor numbers grew from 9000 in 1841 to 180,000 in 1850 and nearly 530,000 in 1865.

Hooker resumed Sir Joseph Banks's practice of sending plant collectors to distant countries and recommending the appointment of naturalists to Royal Navy exploring vessels. Like Banks, he had a huge network of correspondents and, as botanical gardens were gradually established by colonial and foreign government, Kew acquired more and more plants from overseas. In exchange, Hooker and his staff supplied other gardens with numerous plants, recommended the appointment of colonial gardeners and botanists, and provided expert advice to governors and botanic gardens. In developing this imperial role, Kew was often seen as the botanical department of the Colonial and Foreign Offices.

After 1865 the imperial role was maintained by Hooker's successors: his son Joseph Hooker, Willam Thiselton-Dyer, David Prain and Arthur Hill. They despatched large quantities of seeds and plants to the colonies and corresponded with colonial gardeners, many of whom had been trained at Kew, about new plants, crop trials, plant diseases and the exchange of plants between gardens. Increasing attention was given to economic botany and the development of colonial industries, such as coffee, tea, sugar, rubber and timber industries. In particular, Kew played a crucial part in the establishment of the rubber industry in Ceylon and Malaya. At home, the directors continued and consolidated the work of William Hooker. From time to time, more land was acquired and new walks and buildings were erected, such as the Alpine House (1887). Almost every year, private herbaria were presented to the Gardens, as well as collections of botanical drawings. Like Hooker, the directors viewed the Gardens as primarily a scientific research institution and for years they resisted pressure to extend the opening hours for the general public. In 1912, however, they were opened all day during the summer months and from 1921 onwards they were open all day every day. Annual visitor numbers first exceeded one million in 1882 and reached as high as four million during World War I.

Reference: Ray Desmond. Kew: the history of the Royal Botanic Gardens, London, Harvill Press, 1995.

Access and use

Conditions Governing Access:: Available for Access.
Conditions Governing Use:: Many of the records digitised as part of the AJCP are still in copyright. Readers wishing to publish or reproduce documents should seek permission, in the first instance, from the owner of the original material.