22 THE PLUMS OF NEW YORK. 



trees," with the further statement that these fruits grew so exceedingly 

 well that there was no need of grafting or inoculating them. Lawson, 1 

 in his history of North Carolina, written in 1714, says that the Damson, 

 Damazeen and a large, round, black plum were the only sorts of this fruit 

 grown in that state in 1714. 



In South Carolina Henry Laurens, who should be accounted a bene- 

 factor not only of that State but of the whole country as well, about the 

 middle of the Eighteenth Century grew in Laurens Square in the Town of 

 Amonborough all the plants suitable to that climate that widely extended 

 merchantile connections enabled him to procure. Thus among fruits he 

 grew olives, limes, Alpine strawberries, European raspberries and grapes, 

 apples, pears and plums. John Watson, one of Laurens' gardeners, planted 

 the first nursery in South Carolina. His plantation was laid waste in the 

 Revolution, though it was afterwards revived by himself and his descen- 

 dants and was still further continued by Robert Squib. The plum in 

 several varieties was largely grown and distributed from this nursery. 



Charleston, South Carolina, was at the beginning of the Nineteenth 

 Century the southern center of horticultural activities and the European 

 plum was widely distributed from here at this time. Of the several botanic 

 gardens, really nurseries, in Charleston, one was conducted by Andre" 

 Michaux who was sent by the French Government in 1786 to collect Amer- 

 ican plants. Another was owned by John Champneys at St. Pauls, near 

 Charleston, and was managed by a Mr. Williamson who grew all of the 

 species of trees, fruits and shrubs, native and foreign, which could be 

 procured. 2 The third of these gardens was owned by Charles Dray ton 

 at St. Andrews in which not only exotic fruits were grown but those of the 

 region as well. The plum trees frequently mentioned in the records of 

 the time as growing in this region came from these nurseries. 



In Florida, as has been stated, the peach was introduced by the Span- 

 ish explorers, but if the plum were also planted by the Spaniards it quickly 

 passed out with the cessation of cultivation. But later there are records' 

 of this and nearly all of the fruits of temperate and sub-tropic climates 

 having been grown at St. Augustine and Pensacola. In the remarkable 

 colony 4 founded by Dr. Andrew Turnbull at New Smyrna, Florida, in 



'Lawson, John History of North Carolina no. 1714. 

 'Ramsey's History of South Carolina 2:128, 129, Ed. 1858. 

 8 Forbes, James Grant Sketches of the Floridas 87, 91, 170. 1821. 



4 In 1763 Dr. Andrew Turnbull established a colony of fifteen hundred Greeks and Minorcans 

 at New Smyrna, Florida, for the cultivation of sugar and indigo. But they cultivated other plants 



