Memoirs of the Botanic Garden at Chelsea

Henry Field (1755-1837) was a British apothecary and member of the Society of Apothecaries of London. Besides serving in various administrative capacities for the Society, as well as for the London Annuity Society (founded by his father), he was nominated in 1831 as one of the medical officers for the City of London board of health, charged with taking precautions against an outbreak of cholera in the city. A lecturer and regular contributor to medical journals, Field is also the author of this history of the Chelsea Physic Garden, first published in 1820. The present reissue, published in 1878, was revised and extended by Robert Hunter Semple (1815-91). The garden was originally created by the Society as a professional resource in 1673 and the book covers its development up to 1878, and also includes a ground plan of the garden in that year.