Sherard , William , 1659-1728 , botanist

Education: Merchant Taylors' School; St John's College, Oxford; BCL (1683), Incorporated at Cambridge (1685), DCL (1694); studied botany under Tournefort in Paris (1686-1688); Leyden (admitted 1694); Padua (admitted 1696). Career: Fellow of St John's (1683-1703); granted permission to travel abroad for three periods of five years each (1685); travelled to Geneva, Rome and Naples, Cornwall and Jersey, sending lists of the plants he saw to John Ray (FRS 1667); Tutor to Sir Arthur Rawdon at Moira, Co Down (1690-1694), Charles Townshend, 2nd Viscount Townshend (FRS 1706), with whom he travelled in Europe (1694), Wriothesley, son of William, Lord Russell, with whom he travelled in France and Italy (1695-1699), Henry, Duke of Beaufort, at Badminton (1700-1702); Commissioner for Sick and Wounded Prisoners (1702); English Consul at Smyrna, where he grew many rare plants in his garden, formed a celebrated herbarium and travelled in Asia Minor (1703-1717); travelled in Europe (1721, 1723, 1727); bequeathed £3000 to found the chair of Botany at Oxford first occupied by his friend John James Dillenius (FRS 1724).