British Library. British Library Catalogue. EThOS (British Doctoral Thesis Database) British Library Catalogue (Advanced Search) UK Web Archive. British Library - Sounds. Manuscripts (Primo Catalogue) Digitised Manuscripts. Catalogue of Photographs. Catalogue of Photographically Illustrated Books. Blsocialsciences.
Americas Collections in the BL. Americas resources for the Social Sciences. British Library Blogs: engage with our experts. Americas Collections Blog. As a historian I get very excited about old letters, diaries, account books and inventories – but once in a while there are other ‘records’ that trump almost everything else.
I had one of those moments this week when I returned to George Washington’s Mount Vernon. Over the past six years I have been many times to Washington’s estate in Virginia (just south of Washington DC) – first to research my book Founding Gardeners and then to give talks about the book. Untold Lives. Continuing with the series on William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877), we look here at his lifelong interest in botany and some of the items now available to researchers through the British Library catalogue.
Botany was one of Talbot’s favourite fields of study although he pursued it only as an occasional interest. Nevertheless he was extremely knowledgeable and held in high regard. In 1829 he was elected to the prestigious Linnean Society, today one of the oldest active botanical societies in the world. Talbot was also a member of the Horticultural Society of London, the Royal Botanic Society of London, and the Botanical Society of Edinburgh.