14 



ALEXANDER GARDEN 



One of the most famous physicians of Colonial times, 

 and according to Ramsay in his history of South Carolina, 

 "a botanist of no low degree" was Dr. Alexander Garden. 

 He was born in Scotland about the year 1728, and was the 

 son of the Rev. Alexander Garden, of the Parish of Birse, 

 in the shire of Aberdeen, a clergyman of high respecta- 

 bility w^ho during the rebellion of 1745 was distinguished 

 by his exertions in favor of the family of Hanover, and 

 still more so by his humane interposition in behalf of the 

 followers of the house of Stuart after their defeat at Cul- 

 loden. 



Dr. Garden received his philosophical and classical edu- 

 cation in the University of Aberdeen at the Mareschal 

 College there. His early medical training he received un- 

 der the celebrated Dr. John Gregory, and studied also for 

 a year in Edinburgh. 



He arrived in South Carolina about the middle of the 

 eighteenth century and began the practice of medicine in 

 Prince William's Parish in connection with Dr. Rose. 

 Here his interest for botanical studies began to assert it- 

 self more strongly. But having lost his health, he was 

 obliged to take a voyage to the North for his recovery. In 

 1754 he went to New York, where a professorship in the 

 college recently formed in that city was offered him. 



With improved health he returned to Charleston and 

 continued the practice of medicine there for about thirty 

 years, acquiring a considerable fortune in this way. He 

 seems also to have attained at the same time a high dis- 

 tinction in the literary circles of this city. Ramsay says: 

 "He was well acquainted with the Latin and Greek classics 

 and was a considerable proficient in the knowledge of belles- 

 lettres, in mathematics, philosophy, history and miscellan- 

 eous literature, but his attention, when the duties of his 

 profession permitted any relaxation, was chiefly directed to 



