George Luxford (7 April 1807 – 12 June 1854) was an English botanist, printer and journalist.
Life edit
Luxford was born at Sutton, Surrey on 7 April 1807. At age 11 he was apprenticed to Allingham, a printer in Reigate, with whom he remained 16 years, and where he studied.[1]
In 1834 Luxford moved to Birmingham. His obituary notice in The Phytologist states he worked there in the printing and engraving business of "Mr. Allen".[1][2] Under the legislation of the time, a printer had to apply for the licensing of a new press; and in April 1845 Josiah Allen of Birmingham, brother of James Baylis Allen, submitted an application witnessed by "Geo. Luxford" for a recent press. (Business partners could and did act as witnesses.)[3][4] Luxford was elected an associate of the Linnean Society in 1836.[1]
Returning south in 1837, Luxford started in business as a printer in London the next year,[1] and shortly was given a contract by Longmans, to print a magazine edited by John Claudius Loudon.[5] In 1838 he became a Fellow of the Botanical Society of Edinburgh, with address on Ratcliffe Highway;[6] he was also a member of the Botanical Society of London.[7] In 1841 he took on the editorship of The Phytologist for Edward Newman, who that year bought his printing business.[1][8]
For some years Luxford was sub-editor of the Westminster Review.[1] He was also associated with The Globe, in 1844–5.[2][9] According to Rosemary Ashton, as publisher also of the Westminster Review, Luxford made false accounts to the owner, William Edward Hickson, who sold out to John Chapman in 1851.[10]
From 1846 to 1851 Luxford was lecturer on botany in St. Thomas's Hospital.[1] He worked on The Phytologist, in the capacity of compositor and reader, until his death on 12 June 1854, at Walworth.[1][8]
Works edit
- A Flora of the neighbourhood of Reigate, Surrey, containing the flowering plants and ferns, 1838.[1][11]
Reviews by Luxford in the Westminster Review, by convention unsigned, have been attributed:
- Popular Works on Natural History in 1845;[12]
- Of A History of British Ferns, 1847;[13]
- Of Birds of Jamaica by Philip Gosse;[13]
- Of Illustrations of Instinct by Jonathan Couch;[14]
- Of Lecture on Instinct by Richard Whately;[14]
- Of Vestiges of Creation, sixth edition 1847;[15]
- Of John Lindley's Vegetable Kingdom and other works, including Natural Systems of Botany by James Lawson Drummond, in 1850, attacking in particular the Linnaean system.[16] Drummond replied in 1851 in The Phytologist.[17]
The standard author abbreviation Luxf. is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.[18]
Notes edit
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Jackson, Benjamin Daydon (1893). . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 34. London: Smith, Elder & Co. p. 302.
- ^ a b George Luxford; Edward Newman (1856). The Phytologist: A Popular Botanical Miscellany. J. Van Voorst. p. v.
- ^ Hunnisett, B. "Allen, James Baylis". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/374. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ Paul Morgan (1970). Warwickshire printers' notices, 1799-1866. The Dugdale Society. pp. 36, xxxii–xxxiii. ISBN 9780852200025.
- ^ Laurel Brake; Marysa Demoor (2009). Dictionary of Nineteenth-century Journalism in Great Britain and Ireland. Academia Press. pp. 383–4. ISBN 978-90-382-1340-8.
- ^ Botanical Society of Edinburgh (1840). The Botanical Society of Edinburgh: Instituted 17th March 1836. Neill. p. 27.
- ^ Ray Desmond (25 February 1994). Dictionary Of British and Irish Botanists and Horticulturists, including plant collectors, flower painters and garden designers. CRC Press. p. 443. ISBN 978-0-85066-843-8.
- ^ a b Allen, D. E. "Luxford, George". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/17231. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ Samuel Austin Allibone (1871). A Critical Dictionary of English Literature and British and American Authors, Living and Deceased, from the Earliest Accounts to the Latter Half of the Nineteenth Century: Containing Over Forty-six Thousand Articles (authors) with Forty Indexes of Subjects. J. B. Lippincott Company. p. 1145.
- ^ Rosemary Ashton (11 January 2011). 142 Strand: A Radical Address in Victorian London. Random House. p. 85–. ISBN 978-1-4464-2678-4.
- ^ George Luxford (1838). A Flora of the neighbourhood of Reigate, Surrey, containing the flowering plants and ferns.
- ^ Gillian Beer; Helen Small; Trudi Tate (2003). Literature, Science, Psychoanalysis, 1830-1970: Essays in Honour of Gillian Beer. Oxford University Press. p. 52 and note 2. ISBN 978-0-19-926667-8.
- ^ a b Walter Edwards Houghton; Jean Harris Slingerland (January 1989). The Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals, 1824-1900. University of Toronto Press. p. 483. ISBN 978-0-8020-2688-0.
- ^ a b Linnean Society of London (1851). Transactions. p. 490.
- ^ James A. Secord (20 September 2003). Victorian Sensation: The Extraordinary Publication, Reception, and Secret Authorship of Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation. University of Chicago Press. p. 486. ISBN 978-0-226-15825-9.
- ^ Martin Daunton (26 May 2005). The Organisation of Knowledge in Victorian Britain. OUP/British Academy. pp. 73 note 37, 74. ISBN 978-0-19-726326-6.
- ^ George Luxford; Edward Newman (1851). The Phytologist: A Popular Botanical Miscellany. J. Van Voorst. pp. 366–8.
- ^ International Plant Names Index. Luxf.
External links edit
Media related to George Luxford at Wikimedia Commons
- Attribution
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Lee, Sidney, ed. (1893). "Luxford, George". Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 34. London: Smith, Elder & Co.