KEW GARDENS

 

See Also: EXPLORATION; PLANTS; THE ROYAL PARKS

 

The Royal Botanic Gardens

The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew is a government body. The land it occupies was formerly a royal rural retreat.

In 1728 Queen Caroline acquired the Kew Park estate. This was used by the royal family as an informal residence. Princess Augusta commissioned the architect Sir William Chambers to design several structures for it. Of these, the China Pagoda (1761) survives. Augusta's son King George III took a keen interest in Kew. He had Sir Joseph Banks and William Aiton advise him about the property's gardens. These started to be treated in a more botanical manner than had been the case previously; in 1771 the plant collector Francis Masson was hired to search out new plants for it. A decade later the monarch bought the neighbouring Dutch House estate. In 1797 Banks was formally appointed as Kew's Director. He is reputed to have stated that the gardens might become a great botanical exchange house for the empire .¹

Joseph Banks and George III colluded together to secure a flock of merino sheep from. These were cross-bred with Lincolns. Descendants of these were bought by the McArthur family who used them to establish Australia's wool industry.

Napoleon s (1769-1821) wife Josephine (1763-1814) had, to the emperor's distaste had a taste for jardin l anglaise. However, she found some plants had to secure. Despite France and Britain being at war, Sir Joseph Banks sent her seeds and specimens. British vessels would meet with French ones in the Channel so that she could have the latest roses, etc..

Queen Victoria succeeded to the throne in 1837. Not having been raised at Kew, she did not have the same degree of identity with the estate that her three predecessors had had. In 1840 the property became the national botanical garden; this was done with an appreciation of the economic ramifications that botany could have. The following year William Hooker was appointed to be Kew's Director he was appointed because he was willing to accept a lower salary than the rival candidates. He helped to turn botanists from plant collectors into plant scientists. Under his leadership, the grounds were extended so that they covered 300 acres (120 ha.). The Palm House (1848) was designed by Decimus Burton. It was the first large building to be constructed from wrought iron.

The great water lily (Victoriana amazonica) turns from female into male in 24 hours. It been known to science but had then been lost. In 1837 Robert Schomburg rediscovered it growing on the River Demerara. He sent seeds to William Hooker and a number of other Britons. The 6^th Duke of Devonshire ensured that Kew passed on some of them to Paxton. He appreciated that he had to create an environment akin to the plant's native one. Therefore, the water was kept in motion, it was kept warm, and it was kept nutrient rich. It became the first one to transition in the U.K.. Kew responded by commissioning Decimus Burton to design the Palm House (1848). This eclipsed the Great Conservatory that Paxton had constructed at Chatsworth. Its construction utilised cast and wrought iron techniques that had been developed by the shipbuilding industry. As a result, its form has a degree of resemblance to an upturned vessel. Paxton, in his turn, created the Lily House (1850) at Chatsworth. Its leaves came to inform his thinking on how glass and iron might work together to create built structures. The House enabled him to go to design the Crystal Palace.

In 1979 Kew started issuing The Red Data Book of plants, which tracked the histories of plants and sought to explain why there were disappearing. The first edition was co-edited by Hugh Synge (1951-2018) and Gren Lucas.

In 2017 it was reported that historic Royal Palaces was going to install 80 newly made Chinese dragons on the Kew Pagoda. There had ones on it when it had been newly built but they had all fallen off it by the 1790s,

The Gardens have a second property at Wakehurst Place in Surrey.

Location: Royal Botanic Gardens, Richmond, TW9 3AQ

See Also: EXHIBITIONS The Great Exhibition of 1851; MUSEUMS The Natural History Museum; ROYAL RESIDENCES; THE ROYAL SOCIETY Sir Joseph Banks

Website: www.kew.org

¹. Kew's Joseph Banks Centre for Economic Botany opened in 1990.

 

Japanese Knot Weed

The Dutch physician and botanist Dr Philipp von Siebold (d.1866) introduced the piano into Japan. In 1829 he imported 12,000 Japanese plants into The Netherlands. In 1850 he made an unsolicited gift of plants to Kew. Most of these were already known to the Royal Botanical Gardens staff. However, among those that were not was the shrub Japanese knot weed (Fallopia japonica). By 1854 this was being sold in Kingston-upon-Thames. The plant proved popular with those Victorians who sought to create gardens that looked wild. It proved adept at spreading on its own through its rhizomes. However, by the 1930s people were beginning to become concerned that the shrub was becoming ubiquitous, that it could undermine building foundations, and clog up waterways. The Wildlife & Countryside Act of 1981 made it illegal to spread the plant.

In 2008 it was the case that all the Japanese knot weed plants in Britain were clones of the single female plant that Dr von Siebold had presented to Kew 158 years earlier.

 

Rubber

In the mid-19^thC the burgeoning railway industry became a major market for rubber. The material was used to manufacture hoses and springs for rolling stock, as well as buffer springs in termini. The rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis) was native to the Amazon Basin. Henry Wickham's first commercial activity in the tropical forests of Latin America was an attempt to supply London's milliners with exotic feathers from Nicaragua. In Brazil he became the first Briton to learn how to tap rubber. He tried to establish a plantation in the country. The venture failed.

The India Office proposed Wickham to Hooker. The Director regarded the man as being both spurious and having insufficient botanical knowledge. Therefore, did not take up the proposal. When the price of rubber passed that of silver, the official proved to be willing to send him.

In 1876 Wickham exported 70,000 rubber tree seeds out of Brazil. At the time, it was not technically a crime to do so. However, in order to try to develop an image of himself as a maverick individual, he chose to foster a myth that he had had to steal them. He gave the seeds to Kew. Three months later almost 3000 of them were dispatched to botanical gardens in Singapore and Sri Lanka.

Wickham had hopes of being made the superintendent of one of the principal colonial gardens. Joseph Hooker, the Director of Kew, secretly vetoed any such appointment. The adventurer was given 700 as a reward. He also received shares in a commercial rubber business. However, these were to prove to be worthless. Subsequently, he was knighted and received some financial acknowledgement of his achievement.

In 1913 the first non-Brazilian rubber crop was harvested. Within six years the British Empire was supplying 95% of the world's demand for the commodity. The market for Brazilian wild rubber collapsed.

See Also: CARS The Michelin Building; FORTUNE's BOUNTEA; NAUTICAL Captain Bligh; PLANTS The Chelsea Physic Garden, Cotton

¹. A footnote in the book stated that Professor Woodruff had been able to find only one 19^thC article on contraceptives. This had been entitled Questionable Rubber Goods.

Fordlandia

The town of Fordlandia was established in Brazil's Amazon rainforest in 1928 by Henry Ford. The American car manufacturer's intention was that the settlement should act as a source of rubber. The venture failed.

David Backhouse 2024