[NORTH CAROLINA BOTANICAL MANUSCRIPT]. Catalogue of Plants Growing Spontaneously Around Wilmington, NC, from the Boston Journal of Natural History, Volume 1, 1834-37, P. 82-141, 1834 de Curtis, Moses A - 1874

Wilmington, N.C., 1874. Hardcover. Very good. Manuscript on paper, 58 unnumbered pages, written in an octavo ruled notebook, the MS occupying the first half, the second being blank. Contemporary American binding (sheepskin over boards), light wear to binding extremities, hinges cracked but firm, marbled edges. An attractive manuscript in very good antiquarian condition. ¶ AN AMERICAN MANUSCRIPT CATALOGUE OF PLANTS GROWING AROUND WILMINGTON, N.C., being hand-written transcript of another manuscript of Moses Curtis's "Catalogue of Plants Growing Spontaneously Around Wilmington, NC." On the first leaf is the note: "Copied by Dr. E. Foreman from a Mss [manuscript] presented to him by Mr. S.A. Story of Wilmington NC, October 1874." Dr. Foreman's additions to the work appear at the end.

¶ Beautifully and articulately written by hand in ink, bound in a full leather booklet. Moses A. Curtis (1808-1872) was a noted American botanist. Curtis was born in Stockbridge, Massachusetts and educated at Williams College in Massachusetts. After graduating, he became a tutor for the children of former Governor Edward Bishop Dudley in Wilmington, North Carolina, returning to Massachusetts in 1833 to study theology. He married Mary de Rosset in 1834, was ordained in 1835 and obtained a post to teach at the Episcopal school at Raleigh, North Carolina. He became rector of the Protestant Episcopal Church at Hillsborough, North Carolina in 1841 and in charge of a parish at Society Hill, South Carolina in 1847 before returning to the Protestant Episcopal Church at Hillsborough in 1857. He died in Hillsborough, North Carolina in 1872.

¶ As a botanist, Curtis explored the southern Appalachian Mountains, embarking on a major expedition in 1839. He maintained a herbarium of dried specimens and contributed specimens to John Torrey and Asa Gray. He collected lichens for Edward Tuckerman and corresponded with many other botanists, including Miles Joseph Berkeley to whom he sent many specimens with descriptions and notes. Gray said of him that "No living botanist ... is so well acquainted with the vegetation of the southern Allegheny Mountains ..." and that he "...was among the first to retrace the steps and rediscover the plants found and published by the elder Michaux, in the higher Alleghany Mountains. For the last twenty-five years of his life, he studied and became an authority on mycology."

¶ A VERY CURIOUS AMERICAN BOTANICAL MANUSCRIPT IN EXCELLENT CONDITION.