Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward

Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward ( 1791 - 4 June 1868, St Leonard's, Sussex) was an English doctor who popularized a case for growing and transporting plants which was called the Wardian case.

Ward was born in London to Stephen Smith Ward, a medical doctor. He is believed to have been sent to Jamaica at the age of thirteen where he may have taken an interest in plants. He practised medicine in the East End of London and took an interest in botany and entomology in spare time or when on vacation in Cobham, Kent.

"What is known is that Wellclose Square, that part of dockland where he lived, was a Sherlock Holmes sort of place; not exactly producing lepers, abominable lascars and wicked Chinamen, but giving that impression all the same. And had Holmes and Watson been acquainted with their contemporary, Dr. Nathaniel Ward, undoubtedly they would have admired his scientific method of observing and deducing"

He became a Fellow of the Linnean Society in 1817.

Read more about Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward:  Ward and The Wardian Case

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