BIOGRAPHIES OF WORCESTERSHIRE BOTANISTS NO.1. WILLIAM GROVES PERRY 1796 - 1863

J J Day

Perry was a Warwick man. He published several significant works on the flora of Warwickshire and was, in his day, one of its leading botanical authorities. His Warwickshire work is well documented by Bagnall, 1891, pp.494-502 and Cadbury et al, 1971, pp.52-54. His activities relating to Worcestershire botany are less well known. This note seeks to fill that gap.

Perry was born in Warwick and was a bookseller in the High Street.
The Warwickshire Natural History & Archeological Society was formed in 1838, he was secretary for many years and keeper of their Herbarium from 1841/1842. After his death, his own herbarium was incorporated into that of the Society. His principal collection is now housed in Warwick Museum, (Bagnall 1891; Cadbury 1971).

Bagnall (1891) describes Perry as "a truly enthusiastic botanist", "an able linguist, well skilled in mathematics, and an accomplished musician" and as "an amiable man, and always ready to lend a helping hand".

He took up the study of botany early in life. He left notes and specimens from 1812. His first published list (for Warwickshire) was in 1817 (Perry 1817).

His first Worcestershire contribution was early. It is a good one. There is a specimen in Warwick Museum of Clinopodium ascendens, from Hampton Magna, Evesham, collected in 1812, when he was 16. This remains the sole record for hectad SP04.

Perry's Published Records Relating to Worcestershire
Perry, W.G., Loudon's Magazine of Natural History Vol.IV., 1831, p.450. A list of the rarer plants of Worcester, dated Warwick March 12 1830. 128 records.

Leighton, W.A., Flora of Shropshire, 1841; Leighton acknowledges Perry as a correspondent. 26 records from Wyre Forest area attributed to Perry. The precise locations indicate that the majority of records are from Worcestershire.

Bagnall, J.E., Flora of Warwickshire, 1891. Single record (Perry 1839), from Ipsley in vice-county 38.

Newman, E., Phytologist Vol.I, March 1843, pp.508, 512-514, A List of the Ferns and Fern Allies from the counties of Stafford, Warwick, and Worcester, contributed by the Editor Edward Newman, from various sources. Perry contributed Royal Fern, Osmunda regalis from Moseley. This is cited in Lees, E., Botany of Worcestershire, 1867.

Total number of published Worcestershire records : 157

In addition to the published sources, Perry' herbarium is in Warwick Museum. The catalogue of the Warwick collection lists 118 sheets of Perry's relating to vc37 (Copson, P. c1990).

Total traced Worcestershire records : 275 (38 published records are duplicated by herbarium material). These contain records for 133 species. Of these, 50 species are the earliest traced county record.

W.G.Perry's Visits to Worcestershire

Perry was a frequent visitor to Worcestershire. The following is a tabulation, in chronological order, of Perry's visits.

1812 Hampton Magna, Evesham

1813 Worcester / Bevere / Ombersley / Kidderminster

1816-1839 Kidderminster / Wyre Forest area :-

pre-1839 Ipsley

29 January 1841 Malvern

9 September 1841 Worcester

21 September1841 Malvern & Worcester

pre-1842 Moseley

30 June 1856 Bromsgrove (probably Lickey Hills)

The visit to Worcester, 1813

The 1813 records are of interest. It appears probable that they resulted from a single visit over a couple of days. This can be reconstructed from his herbarium specimens. The youthful, he was 17, and, apparently energetic Perry had the opportunity to visit Worcester in the mid to late-summer of 1817. He, very likely, came in search of a new plant, a national rarity, the Twiggy Mullein, Verbascum virgatum.

In Withering's Botanical Arrangement 1787, the editor Dr.J.Stokes (who named the species), published a record for V.virgatum. He gives precise details of location :- "The side of the Turnpike road from Worecester to Ombersley, opposite to the lane leading to Beverley." It appears that Perry held a copy of this or a later edition.

He collected a specimen from the roadside at Bevere. It seems he had an early start, for he had already collected Snapdragon, Antirrhinum majus, from the Cathedral Walls in Worcester. Having secured his rare Mullein, he went north towards Ombersley, collecting from by the roadside Wood Spurge, perhaps at Bourne's Dingle, where it still survives. Reaching Ombersley Common (its demise is documented by Hastings 1832), with its giant chestnut trees he began to explore; he found the Spreading Bellflower, a wood-pasture speciality of Worcestershire (it would be another four years before he secured a Warwickshire specimen, Bagnall 1891). Then, in the way of a good field botanist, he hunted out the wet spots. He discovered and left record of a mesotrophic assemblage, currently, extinct to the county. Perry's records are our sole source of knowledge of this site and its native fen communities.

Having secured his rarities he appears to have proceeded hot-foot, as far as Kidderminster, where he collected Erica tetralix and Eriophorum angustifolium from a lost bog, near to Round Hill Bridge.

His vasculum was full of new and exciting captures, it had been a red-letter day, he determined to return.

1813

Kidderminster / Wyre Forest area 1816 - 1839

The 1813 excursion seems to have sparked Perry's botanical enthusiasm. The sandstone country around Kidderminster was novel terrain for a Warwickshire botanist but close enough to visit regularily. Over the period between 1816 - 1839, Perry visited the area on at least twelve occasions. Several visits extended over one or two week periods. The dated labels on his herbarium specimens, from the years 1816 and 1827, arranged in chronological order, not only provide a diary of his excursions in the Kidderminster area but also indicate the range and pattern of his activities :-

The maps of Perry's Worcestershire records indicate that he covered the ground around Kidderminster and Bewdley, in some detail.

W.G.Perry Worcestershire Records are mapped below

Map shows Perry records allocated to tetrads (2x2 km squares) of the national grid.

Map shows Perry records allocated to monads (1x1 km squares) of the national grid

It is mainly, due to Perry's work that the early nineteenth century botanical landscape of the sandstone country around Kidderminster is known (a full list of his records appears in the Appendix). Scott (1832) worked the Stourbridge area but no-one had seriously explored the Bromsgrove Sandstone country, further to the south. Perry was the principal early worker on the sandstones, east of the Severn. This was at a time of significant change in the agricultural landscape. Much of the botanically productive ground was lost before the later part of the nineteenth century.

The highlight is his wetland records. As with many experienced field naturalists, Perry's attention seems to have been drawn to wet places, a third of his surviving records are wetland plants.

His records document wetlands at Oldfield, Fenny Rough, Falling Sands Common, Abberley Hill, Park Brook, Devils Spittleful, Rock Coppice, the Great Bog in Wyre. The lists are brief but can be presumed relative complete, for the uncommon species. They include good indicator species for specific fen and bog conditions.

The native flush communities of the Worcestershire sandstone country are virtually lost. Perry's are the best and often only record of the natural flush assemblages in the district. Several of the communities indicated are extinct as Worcestershire habitats.

In March 1830, he wrote up some of his records for Loudon's Magazine, although, curiously, he fails to make reference to his visits of 1821 and 1823. Later, c1840, he supplied a list of plants from Wyre Forest to W.A.Leighton for the latter's Flora of Shropshire (1841). His herbarium specimens provide a record of his continuing activity in the Kidderminster area which apparently ceases after 1840. Subsequently, only occasional visits to Malvern and Worcester are recorded. His last known trip to the county was to Bromsgrove, probably Lickey, on 30th.June 1856.

Footnote

Perhaps the most curious fact concerning Perry is that he and his records are almost entirely ignored by Edwin Lees. The only reference by Lees (1867) traced to date concerning Perry is a repeat of the 1843 record of Osmunda regalis on Moseley Bog (Newman 1843). Lees (1867) also notes four other recorders.

The two men's career's seem to run parallel and in adjoining counties. Perry was born in 1796 and Lees in 1800. Both were involved in the book trade. Perry had a bookshop on the High Street, Warwick. Lees' early career had been in publishing and bookselling, when he occupied an establishment on the High Street, Worcester. Both were interested in natural history from a young age, and devoted much of their adult life to its contemplation and study. Both were intimately connected with their Natural History Clubs, whose areas of study bordered each other. Both published early lists for their respective counties. Both published lists of Worcestershire plants in the same volume of a national journal (Lees 1830, Perry 1831, Lees 1831). Both were known to Leighton in Shropshire and provided records for his flora of that county, 1841. It seems probable that they were acquainted; they had shared interests and moved in the same local circles.

So why did Lees maintain a silence? Record keeping was not Lees' strongpoint. He was disorganised, as any serious study of his Botany of Worcestershire (Lees 1867) will indicate. But Perry's list (Perry 1831) is of considerable interest to a Worcestershire botanist, with many new county records. It was only 13 pages away from a published article of Lees (Lees 1831). Lees was a regular contributor to and therefore, presumably, a reader of this journal. It would seem he deliberately ignored Perry's published records. Is this a case of botanical rivalry, concerning first county records? Did Lees resent a Warwickshire man beating him into print? This seems unlikely as Lees freely acknowledges the contributions of others in his work. Does the explanation lay elsewhere, perhaps through shared business interests? Whatever the explanation, Lees seems to have held silent, throughout. His friend, William Mathews, co-founder with Lees of the Worcestershire Naturalists Field Club in 1847 (ed.Rea 1897), appeared nonplussed when writing on the matter, in 1888, "Perry's list appears to have escaped Mr.Lees's attention."

References

AMPHLETT, J. AND REA, C., Flora of Worcestershire, 1909.

BAGNALL, J.E., Flora of Warwickshire, 1891 (biography pp.494-502).

CADBURY, D.A. ET AL; A Computer-mapped Flora of Warwickshire, 1971 (biography pp.52-54).

COPSON, P., Worcestershire Vice County 37 Catalogue of Specimens in Warwickshire Museum herbarium. Typescript manuscript undated, c1990.

HASTINGS, DR.C., Illustrations of the Natural History of Worcestershire, London 1834.

LEES, E., Loudon's Magazine of Natural History, Vol.III., 1830, p160.

LEES, E., Loudon's Magazine of Natural History, Vol.IV., 1831 p.437.

LEES, E. Botany of Worcestershire, 1867.

LEIGHTON, W.A., Flora of Shropshire, 1841.

MATHEWS, W., History of the County Botany of Worcester, Midland Naturalist Vol.XI, 1888, p.123.

NEWMAN,E. Phytologist Vol.I, March 1843, pp.508, 512-514.

PERRY,W.G., A Select List of Plants found in Warwickshire. Appeared in Dugdale's Warwickshire, 1817.

PERRY,W.G., Manuscript notes interleaved in Perry's personal copy of Plantae Varvicenses Selectae, compiled c.1823-1839.

PERRY,W.G., Loudon's Magazine of Natural History Vol.IV., 1831, p.450.

REA, C editor, Transactions of the Worcestershire Naturalists' Club Vol.I 1897.

SCOTT W., History of Stourbridge and its Vicinity, 1832.

WITHERING,W., ED.STOKES, DR.J., Botanical Arrangement of British Plants, Second Edition, 1787.

Appendix : W.G.Perry's Worcestershire Records

Records in bold are the current known First County Records, by date. Many of these pre-date the records in Amphlett and Rea, 1909, and are published here for the first time.

237 Rows (38 literature records duplicate herbarium material, in these the date is taken from the specimen).