Facts and Figures

Charles Babington (1808-1895)

Charles Babington was an English botanist, entomologist, and archaeologist. He studied at St John's College, Cambridge under Henslow.  In 1861, Babington became the Chair of Botany and oversaw many changes to the Herbarium during his tenure. He acquired some of the Herbarium’s most valuable collections, assembling a world-class resource for botanical research.

Babington oversaw a period of significant growth for the University Herbarium, thanks to several large purchases, bequests and the incorporation of Babington’s personal Herbarium (c 55,000 sheets) and superb botanical library. Among his major acquisitions were the herbaria of John Lindley (1799-1865), Charles Fox Bunbury (1809-1886), John Edward (1800-1875) and Maria Emma Gray (1787-1876) and Leon Gaston Genevier (1830-1880). The Herbarium also underwent several organisational changes during Babington’s tenure. The post of Herbarium Curator was established in 1880, with the appointment of William Hillhouse. In the 1890s, fourth curator Isaac Henry Burkill (1870-1965) reorganised the entire Herbarium in line with the taxonomic system of Bentham and Hooker’s Genera Plantarum (1862-1883).

Eliza Catherine Jelly (1829-1914)

The sheets marked with a pencil note "purchased of Miss Jolley in 1876" were likely owned by the English byrozoologist Eliza Catherine Jelly. Correspondence between Jelly and Charles Babington, the Cambridge Professor of Botany from 1861 - 1895, reveals that in 1876, Jelly offered to sell her collection of ferns (GBR/0012/MS Add.8182/56-59). The Cuming specimens attributed to "Miss Jolley's" collection are all ferns, making it likely that Miss Jolley and Jelly are one and the same. 

Jelly was a pioneering byrozoologist and was one of the first women to publish in the field. She was born in Bath, but then later lived in Devon, Bristol and Cheshire. Throughout her career she collected and studied local Byrozoa as well as sea-weeds, algae, lichens and mosses. Many of these specimens were donated to collections including the Sheffield Museum,  the Liverpool Museum, the Cambridge Museum of Zoology and the Natural History Museum. Jelly also corresponded with several  botanists and zoologists. 

Charles Morgan Lemann (1806-1852)

Charles Lemann was an English botanist and physician. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge and University College London.

Lemann visited Italy as a private physician to Lord Warwick's family, and also Madeira and Gibraltar. During these excursions, he laid the foundations of a collection of over 30, 000 specimens.

 His herbarium was catalogued by George Bentham, and donated to the Herbarium of Cambridge University

George Bentham (1800-1884)

George Bentham was an English botanist. He is best known for his work Genera Plantarum, which was a taxonomic classification of plants in collaboration with Joseph Dalton Hooker. 

Bentham was the secretary of the Horticultural Society of London from 1829 to 1840 and sustained close relations with other prominent botanists including William Jackson Hooker and Charles Morgan Lemann. Much of the correspondence between Cuming and Bentham is located in the Kew archives.

Bentham's relationship with the Cambridge Herbarium comes via Lemann's collection. When Lemann bequeathed his herbarium of 50,000 specimens to Cambridge in his 1852 will, he stipulated that Bentham must be allowed to name and arrange it first. In 1860, following Bentham's careful curation, the collection came to Cambridge. Many of the Cuming specimens attributed to Bentham's herbarium may actually have belonged to Lemann, but were labelled using Bentham's labels. 

George Gardner (1810-1849)

George Gardner was a Scottish biologist, surgeon and botanist. 

Gardner developed a close relationship William Jackson Hooker who encouraged him to publish his Musci Britannici (1836). Shortly afterwards, he travelled to Brazil where he collected natural history specimens. In 1843, the colonial government of Ceylon appointed him as superintendent of the botanic garden in Peradeniya and island botanist. 

Specimens collected by Gardner himself are located in the Cambridge Herbarium. 

Jules Paul Benjamin Delessert (1773-1843)

Benjamin Delessert was a French banker, botanist and conchologist. His botanical library contained 30,000 volumes, of which he published a catalogue Musée botanique de M. Delessert (1845). A prolific collector, his herbarium of 300,000 specimens formed the basis of the Geneva Herbarium. 

John Smith (1798-1888)

John Smith was a British botanist. He was the first curator at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and worked alongside William Jackson Hooker and Joseph Hooker. 

When Smith first started working at Kew in 1821, he was a stove boy (in charge of stoking stoves to warm the greenhouses).He was particularly fond of the ferns, expanding the collection from 40 species to over 1,000. 

Most of the Cuming specimens owned by John Smith are located in the Natural History Museum, however a few are located in the Cambridge Herbarium.

"Ex Herb Cuming" 

These elegant labels are perhaps some of the most exciting. It is possible that these specimens belonged to Cuming himself. The date on these labels is 1840, which is when Cuming returned from the Philippines, before he began distributing specimens to purchasers.