QTRbooora 
JOURNAL OF 
THE NEW ENGLAND BOTANICAL CLUB 
Vol. 16. June, 1914. No. 186. 
WILLIAM WHITMAN BAILEY. 
WALTER DEANE. 
One by one our older botanists are leaving us and their places are 
being taken by the younger generation in their turn. We miss the 
familiar faces, the spoken and the written words, and the warm friends 
who have cheered and encouraged us in our pursuits. But we must 
rather rejoice than mourn when a life filled with much suffering in the 
midst of botanical activity has at last been ended and the body is at 
rest. . 
William Whitman Bailey died in Providence, Rhode Island, on 
February 20, 1914, within two days of 71 years of age. He was born 
at West Point, New York, on February 22, 1843, and was the son of 
Jacob Whitman Bailey of West Point and Maria Slaughter, daughter 
of Samuel Slaughter of Culpeper, Virginia, through whom he was 
connected with many prominent Virginians. He was descended 
from John Bayley, of Newbury and Salisbury, Massachusetts, who 
emigrated from Chippenham, England in 1635. His father was born 
in Ward, now Auburn, Massachusetts, in 1811, and was graduated at 
West Point in 1832 where, after serving for some years in the First 
Artillery, he became in 1838 Professor of Chemistry, Mineralogy and 
Geology. There he remained till his death on February 26, 1857, a 
man in the very front of American science and a leader in microscopical 
research. Bailey’s great grandfather on his mother’s side was Colonel 
James Slaughter of Virginia who served in the Continental Army. 
Young Bailey’s early life was spent at West Point. He writes 
later, “My very earliest memories were associated with the military 
life at West Point. I never knew any other till I was fourteen years 
