John Fraser (botanist)
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John Fraser FLS, F.R.H.S. |
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John Fraser
(lithograph of an 18th-century portrait) |
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| Born | 14 October 1750 |
| Died | 26 April 1811 (aged 60) |
| Occupation | Botanist and plant collector |
| Years active | 1780–1810 |
| Known for | Discovery and introduction of the flora of the Americas to Europe |
John Fraser, FLS, F.R.H.S., (14 October 1750 – 26 April 1811) was a Scottish botanist who collected plant specimens around the world, from North America and the West Indies to Russia and points between, with his primary career activity from 1780 to 1810. Fraser was a commissioned plant collector for Catherine, Czar of Russia in 1795, Paul I of Russia in 1798, and for the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna in 1806; he issued nursery catalogues c. 1790 and 1796, and had an important herbarium that was eventually sold to the Linnean Society.
Fraser was born during the Age of Enlightenment at Tomnacross, the Aird, Inverness-shire on 14 October 1750. His father was Donald Fraser, (a.k.a. Donald Down, a patronymic descriptive of hair color traditional amongst the Scots Highlanders); his mother was Mary McLean, and his siblings included a brother James (b. 16 March 1753) and sister Christiana (b. 5 December 1756). Fraser's eldest son John Jr. (c. 1779–1852) continued in his father's footsteps as a plant hunter after Fraser's death and became a respected nurseryman in his own right (ALS 1848). John Jr. also owned the Hermitage Nursery at Ramsgate (1817–1835) and when he retired he sold his nursery to William Curtis in 1835. John Jr. met with the celebrated American botanist Asa Gray in 1839, early on in Gray's career, and ultimately sold the Fraser herbarium to the Linnean Society in 1849. Fraser's younger son James Thomas directed the family nursery at Chelsea with his older brother until 1811 and then on his own until 1827. Fraser's grandson John became a member of the Royal Horticultural Society, attending meetings in 1877.
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