Robert Brown (botanist, 1842)

Robert Brown (born March 23, 1842 in Camster , Caithness , † October 26, 1895 in London ) was a Scottish scientist , explorer and author . Its botanical author abbreviation is " R.Br.ter ".

biography

Brown was born in Camster in the Scottish county of Caithness and studied at the universities of Edinburgh , Leiden , Copenhagen and Rostock .

He always referred to his hometown Campster ( Campsterianus ) to distinguish himself from a famous contemporary of the same name . During his student days he visited Svalbard , Greenland and the western shore of Baffin Bay , then carried out scientific research on the islands of the Pacific, as well as on the beaches of Venezuela and Alaska and on the coast of the Bering Sea , and led an expedition to map the inland areas of Vancouver Iceland and wrote a lot about the flora and fauna of these countries.

Exploration and travel

Brown arrived at Fort Victoria in early 1863 to research the Vancouver Island colony . Later in the year he explored the area from Barkley Sound to Kyuquot . The following year he took over the leadership of the Vancouver Island Exploring Expedition , a four-month expedition in which he covered over 2,000 kilometers. The expedition resulted in the naming of many mountains, rivers and lakes on Vancouver Island. Member of the expedition, in which Frederick Whymper also took part as an artist, managed to get a river named Browns River after him . They found gold on the Leech River , which caused quite a stir, but the proceeds of $ 60,000 were little success. Brown attached greater importance to their discovery of coal in the Comox Valley .

With Frederick's brother Edward Whymper , he tried to cross the interior of Greenland in 1867, making many discoveries that were later confirmed by Robert Edwin Peary . He traveled to the barbarian states and became the first British authority in Morocco . This happened almost by accident after vacationing there but unable to enjoy doing nothing.

Editing and writing

Before he was 30, Brown had written over 30 scientific papers and an advanced botany handbook, along with several popular science works. He described his travels on Vancouver Island and received his doctorate from the University of Rostock in 1869.

Brown was a lecturer in geology , botany and zoology at the Universities of Edinburgh and Glasgow and was a member of many learned societies in England , the USA and on the European continent . He was President of the Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh and a member of the Council of the Royal Geographical Society .

Brown moved to London in 1876 and devoted the rest of his life to writing. He made his living as a journalist. In addition to botany, he increasingly wrote on the subjects of zoology, geology and geography, both for an educated audience and for the general public. An example of this that he had the ability to both generalists and writing than for specialists, the extensive comment he appeared at the 1896 and 1807 re-published work is slave narrative of John R. Jewitt wrote. Brown reflected on the changes in the lives of the indigenous peoples of the Pacific northwest coast , from the time of the first European explorers to the late 18th century, through chief Maquinna and the captivity of Jewitt, through his own research trips in 1863 until the mid-1890s when many First Nations were on the verge of disintegration.

Brown had been a strong, confident, and fun-loving young man. He was unable to relax, but at the same time exhausted from the intense life of London. He was very angry that his best work was not recognized. He died on October 26, 1895 at the age of only 53. He had spent the night of his death writing. He was buried in West Norwood Cemetery.

Publications

In addition to the many scientific essays, articles and reviews in various languages, he wrote the following publications:

• Robert Brown: A manual of botany. Anatomical and physiological for the use of students. 1874 ( babel.hathitrust.org ).
• Science for All. 5 volumes, 1877–82.
• The World Its Cities And Peoples. Volume IV-IX, 1882-85.
• The Story of Africa and Its Explorers. 4 volumes, 1892–95 ( hathitrust.org ; new edition 1911 hathitrust.org ).
• The adventures of John Jewitt: only survivor of the crew of the ship Boston during a captivity of nearly three years among the Indians of Nootka Sound in Vancouver Island (1896). Reprinted with notes and a 30-page introduction by Robert Brown ( archive.org ).

literature

• Daniel Coit Gilman , Harry Thurston Peck, Frank Moore Colby: Brown, Robert (scientist). In: The new international encyclopaedia . Dodd, Mead, New York 1905, OCLC 6939919 ( Wikisource ).
• Obituary: Dr. Robert Brown . In: The Geographical Journal . 6, No. 6, December 1895, pp. 577-578.
• Biography at Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online
• A four-page description of his life and work, from "AJW", as a foreword to The adventures of John Jewitt , a memoriam to which Brown contributed with extensive commentary. It also includes a photograph of him taken in 1870 ( archive.org ).

Web links

Wikisource: Robert Brown  - Sources and full texts (English)

• Author entry and list of the plant names described for Robert Brown (botanist, 1842) at the IPNI
• Works by Robert Brown at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Robert Brown at the Internet Archive (English)

Individual evidence

1. ^ John Hayman (Ed.): Robert Brown and the Vancouver Island Exploring Expedition . University of British Columbia Press, Vancouver 1989, ISBN 0-7748-0322-3 .
2. ^ ^{A b} Captain John T. Walbran: British Columbia Place Names, Their Origin and History. 1971 ( nosracines.ca ( memento of the original from October 29, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this note. Facsimile, reprint of the edition of 1909) 
3. ^ Browns River . In: BC Geographical Names (English)
4. ↑ Richard Somerset Mackie (ed.): The Wilderness Profound, Victorian Life on the Gulf of Georgia . Sono Nis Press, Victoria, BC 1995, ISBN 1-55039-058-9 .
5. ^ The adventures of John Jewitt: only survivor of the crew of the ship Boston during a captivity of nearly three years among the Indians of Nootka Sound in Vancouver Island (1896). Reprinted with an afterword by Robert Brown and "Memory Section" ( archive.org )