FORTUNE's BOUNTEA
See Also: KEW GARDENS Rubber; NAUTICAL Captain Bligh; TEA
Robert
Fortune was born into modest circumstances in the Scottish Borders. Through his intelligence and his application,
he became a respected horticulturalist.
The Royal Horticultural Society appointed him to run the hothouse
department of its garden in Chiswick.
Following
the Opium War of 1840-2 the European powers compelled China to become more open
to foreigners than she had been previously.
In 1843 the Society sent Fortune to the country both to collect plants
and to gather botanical information.
Wardian cases enabled specimens to be shipped across the world with only
peripheral attrition rates. The
plantsman learnt a basic level of Chinese.
He then used his ingenuity to travel widely within the country. By claiming to be from another distant part
of the Middle Kingdom, he was able to visit regions of it, such as Suzhou, that
were still officially closed to occidentals.
During his travels he had a number of adventures. These included being attacked by bandits and
being shipwrecked. There had long been a
belief in the West that green tea and black tea were derived from different
plants. Through the discoveries that
Fortune made he was able to correct this misapprehension.
China
had been held to be the world's only source of tea (Camellia sinesis var.
sinesis). However, since the early
1820s the East India Company had known that a variety of the shrub (Camellia
sinesis var. assamica) was growing wild in Assam in eastern India. Therefore, its officers had appreciated that
there was potential for growing tea there.
To do so would end China's control of the supply of the commodity. The initial efforts at commercial cultivation
of assamica had been unsuccessful.
This was because the taste of the beverage that had been brewed from it
had been regarded as being unpalatable.
In 1834 the Company's desire to grow tea in India had been given
additional impetus by the British government's termination of its monopoly on
trade with South Asia. This had caused
the enterprise to shift its focus from international commerce to optimising the
exploitation of its economic opportunities within the sub-continent.
Following
Fortune's return to London, he had been appointed to be the Curator of the
Chelsea Physic Garden. Subsequently, the
East India Company asked the horticulturalist whether he would be prepared to
try to secure for it some specimens of the sinesis var. sinesis shrub so
that it could try to grow them in India.
Fortune accepted the commission.
He managed to transport thousands of plants and seeds from China s
Fujian region to Assam. These were
planted there. For the most part, they
perished. However, his exertions and the
knowledge that he brought with him stimulated an effort to cultivate the local
strain of the plant. As a result, it
became possible to produce infusions from it that were much more acceptable
than the ones that had been created previously.
The surviving sinesis var. sinesis plants were transplanted to
Darjeeling, which had a higher elevation than Assam. There, they flourished, creating a second
tea-growing region in India. The
traveller-botanist ended his days a prosperous and respected person.
Location:
9 Gilston Road, SW10 9SJ. Mr Fortune s
final home. It testified as to his
worldly success. (blue, purple)
Website:
www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-great-british-heist-9866709
David
Backhouse 2024