Bartram's Garden

Philadelphia, Monday, November 3rd, 1823 – In company with Mr Nuttall I set out this morning to the residence of the late Mr Bartram; his niece is a considerable botanist and draws well. Mr Carr, to whom she is married, has but a share of knowledge; this deficiency, however, is made up by his pleasing manner.

In front of the house stands a very large cypress, 90 feet high and 23 round, planted by the first John Bartram; his son William (the late) held the tree while his father put the earth around; it is eighty-five years old. At the foot of this is a small pond in which many little and valuable treasures were; but since the death of the worthy protector, have been suffered to remain in a deplorable state.

I made enquiries about Quercus heterophylla, as it would be an acquisition, but found it had been cut down by a servant of the person on whose estate it grew – cut down by mistake. Mr Bartram was not reconciled about it so long as he lived.

On the margin of the pond Andromeda arborea (latterly Oxydendrum arboretum)….Mr Bartram tried for upwards of forty years to raise it from seed and was always unsuccessful till this season, when he had the gratification of transplanting and abundance of them in small boxes two days before he died. I have got a small box containing about twelve plants on condition that half should be given to Mr George Loddiges [of the eponymous nursery in Hackney, London]

Some fine specimens of Magnolia. I have not seen any like those in Chelsea Botanical garden or at Kew…… Sagittaria sagittifolia florepleno, I recollect being told of it by Mr Loddiges when I was at Hackney a few days before leaving London [A-Ha – so Douglas has, as I suspected, visited the famous Loddiges Nursery in Hackney. It would be very surprising if he hadn’t but this is the first confirmation, and from his own pen. Attaboy!!]

On our way through the wood got three species of oaks on rocky soil. Mr Nuttall showed me Asplenium rhisophyllum on a rock on our way home, four miles from Philadelphia. Called on Messrs Landreth….Got two fruits of Maclura and I shall put them with the other one: I shall pack in charcoal. Mr Landreth [of Landreth’s nurseries and seeds, still extant now] expresses himself happy to do anything in his power for the Society. He is an acquaintance of Mr Richard Williams, Turnham Green [near Kew], to whom I am cordially to remember him. Got to town by 10 o’clock at night; put away seeds etc.

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This will have been a fantastic day for Douglas. Bartram's Garden is THE botanical site on the east coast of the USA in 1823. The Bartram's were a plant collecting dynasty. John Bartram was the King's Botanist; his son William carried on his work and William's niece, Ann Bartram Carr (who Douglas mentions above) carried on the work into a third generation. And we see here together three giants of the botanical & plant collecting world - David Douglas, just starting on his career; Thomas Nuttall, already well established and internationally renowned; and the spirit of William Bartram, only six weeks deceased. What a day! Go, Douglas!!

The layout of Bartram's Garden. Note the small figure in the middle of the picture, believed to be of Bartram himself. It was common for artists to include a small representation of their patron in commissions of this kind. And the pond, precisely where it still is!

 

The oldest Gingko in North America, which was already there at the time Douglas visited