Hans Sloane
Encyclopedia
Sir Hans Sloane, 1st Baronet, PRS
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

 (16 April 1660 – 11 January 1753) was an Ulster-Scot
Ulster-Scots
The Ulster Scots are an ethnic group in Ireland, descended from Lowland Scots and English from the border of those two countries, many from the "Border Reivers" culture...

 physician
Physician
A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...

 and collector, notable for bequeathing his collection to the British nation which became the foundation of the British Museum
British Museum
The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

. He also introduced drinking chocolate milk to Europe and gave his name to Sloane Square
Sloane Square
Sloane Square is a small hard-landscaped square on the boundaries of the fashionable London districts of Knightsbridge, Belgravia and Chelsea, located southwest of Charing Cross, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. The square is part of the Hans Town area designed in 1771 by Henry...

 in London, and Sir Hans Slone Square in his birthplace Killyleagh
Killyleagh
Killyleagh is a village in County Down, Northern Ireland. It is on the A22 road from Downpatrick, on the western side of Strangford Lough. It had a population of 2,483 people in the 2001 Census. It is best known for its 12th century Killyleagh Castle...

.

Early life

Hans Sloane was born on 16 April 1660 at Killyleagh in County Down, Ireland, His father was the head of a Scottish
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

 colony sent over by James I. His father died when he was six years old.

As a youth he collected objects of natural history and other curiosities. This led him to the study of medicine, which he went to London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 to pursue, directing his attention to botany, materia medica, and pharmacy. His collecting propensities made him useful to John Ray
John Ray
John Ray was an English naturalist, sometimes referred to as the father of English natural history. Until 1670, he wrote his name as John Wray. From then on, he used 'Ray', after "having ascertained that such had been the practice of his family before him".He published important works on botany,...

 and Robert Boyle
Robert Boyle
Robert Boyle FRS was a 17th century natural philosopher, chemist, physicist, and inventor, also noted for his writings in theology. He has been variously described as English, Irish, or Anglo-Irish, his father having come to Ireland from England during the time of the English plantations of...

. After four years in London he travelled through France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, spending some time at Paris and Montpellier
Montpellier
-Neighbourhoods:Since 2001, Montpellier has been divided into seven official neighbourhoods, themselves divided into sub-neighbourhoods. Each of them possesses a neighbourhood council....

, and taking his M.D. degree at the University of Orange in 1683. He returned to London with a considerable collection of plants and other curiosities, of which the former were sent to Ray and utilized by him for his History of Plants.

Sloane was quickly elected into the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

, and at the same time he attracted the notice of Thomas Sydenham
Thomas Sydenham
Thomas Sydenham was an English physician. He was born at Wynford Eagle in Dorset, where his father was a gentleman of property. His brother was Colonel William Sydenham. Thomas fought for the Parliament throughout the English Civil War, and, at its end, resumed his medical studies at Oxford...

, who gave him valuable introductions to practice. In 1687, he became fellow of the College of Physicians, and went to Jamaica
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...

 the same year as physician in the suite of the Duke of Albemarle
Duke of Albemarle
The Dukedom of Albemarle has been created twice in the Peerage of England, each time ending in extinction. Additionally, the title was created a third time by James II in exile and a fourth time by his son the Old Pretender, in the Jacobite Peerage. The name is the Latinised form of the ancient...

. The duke died soon after landing, and Sloane's visit lasted only fifteen months; during that time he noted about 800 new species of plants, the island being virgin ground to the botanist. Of these he published an elaborate catalogue in Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 in 1696; and at a later date (1707–1725) he made the experiences of his visit the subject of two folio volumes. He became secretary to the Royal Society in 1693, and edited the Philosophical Transactions
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society
The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society is a scientific journal published by the Royal Society of London. It was established in 1665, making it the first journal in the world exclusively devoted to science, and it has remained in continuous publication ever since, making it the world's...

for twenty years.

Sloane married Elisabeth Langley, who was the widow of Fulke Rose of Jamaica
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...

, and daughter of alderman John Langley
John Langley (MP)
John Langley was an English merchant and politician who sat in the House of Commons in 1653.Langley was a merchant of the City of London and a member of the Worshipful Company of Fishmongers. He was one of the Court Assistants from 1643 to 1648 and from 1649 to 1650. He was elected alderman of...

. They had three daughters Mary, Sarah and Elizabeth. They also had one son, Hans. Of the four children only Sarah and Elizabeth survived infancy. Sarah married George Stanley of Paultons and Elizabeth the future Second Baron Cadogan
Charles Cadogan, 2nd Baron Cadogan
General Charles Cadogan, 2nd Baron Cadogan was a British peer, soldier and Whig politician.Charles Cadogan was the younger son of Henry Cadogan and his wife, Bridget, the second daughter of Sir Hardress Waller...

.

Chocolate beverage

Sloane encountered cocoa while he was in Jamaica, where the locals drank it mixed with water, and he is reported to have found it nauseating. However, he devised a means of mixing it with milk to make it more pleasant. When he returned to England, he brought his chocolate recipe back with him. Initially, it was manufactured and sold by apothecaries as a medicine; though, by the nineteenth century, the Cadbury Brothers
George Cadbury
George Cadbury was the third son of John Cadbury, a Quaker who founded Cadbury's cocoa and chocolate company.-Background:...

 sold tins of Sloane's drinking chocolate.

Physician

His practice as a physician among the upper classes was large, fashionable and lucrative. He served three successive sovereigns, Queen Anne
Anne of Great Britain
Anne ascended the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland on 8 March 1702. On 1 May 1707, under the Act of Union, two of her realms, England and Scotland, were united as a single sovereign state, the Kingdom of Great Britain.Anne's Catholic father, James II and VII, was deposed during the...

, George I
George I of Great Britain
George I was King of Great Britain and Ireland from 1 August 1714 until his death, and ruler of the Duchy and Electorate of Brunswick-Lüneburg in the Holy Roman Empire from 1698....

 and George II
George II of Great Britain
George II was King of Great Britain and Ireland, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg and Archtreasurer and Prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire from 11 June 1727 until his death.George was the last British monarch born outside Great Britain. He was born and brought up in Northern Germany...

. In the pamphlets written concerning the sale by Dr William Cockburn (1669–1739) of his secret remedy for dysentery and other fluxes, it was stated for the defence that Sloane himself did not disdain the same kind of professional conduct; and some colour is given to that charge by the fact that his only medical publication, an Account of a Medicine for Soreness, Weakness and other Distempers of the Eyes (London, 1745) was not given to the world until its author was in his eighty-fifth year and had retired from practice.

In 1716, Sloane was created a baronet, the first medical practitioner to receive an hereditary title, and in 1719 he became president of the Royal College of Physicians
Royal College of Physicians
The Royal College of Physicians of London was founded in 1518 as the College of Physicians by royal charter of King Henry VIII in 1518 - the first medical institution in England to receive a royal charter...

, holding the office for sixteen years. In 1722, he was appointed physician-general to the army, and in 1727 first physician to George II. In 1727 also he succeeded Sir Isaac Newton
Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton PRS was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, and theologian, who has been "considered by many to be the greatest and most influential scientist who ever lived."...

 as president of the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

; he retired from it at the age of eighty. He was a founding governor of London's Foundling Hospital
Foundling Hospital
The Foundling Hospital in London, England was founded in 1741 by the philanthropic sea captain Thomas Coram. It was a children's home established for the "education and maintenance of exposed and deserted young children." The word "hospital" was used in a more general sense than it is today, simply...

, the nation's first institution to care for abandoned children
Child abandonment
Child abandonment is the practice of relinquishing interests and claims over one's offspring with the intent of never again resuming or reasserting them. Causes include many social and cultural factors as well as mental illness. An abandoned child is called a foundling .-Causes:Poverty is often a...

.

Investments

Sloane's fame is based on his judicious investments rather than what he contributed to the subject of natural science or even of his own profession. His purchase of the manor of Chelsea, London
Chelsea, London
Chelsea is an area of West London, England, bounded to the south by the River Thames, where its frontage runs from Chelsea Bridge along the Chelsea Embankment, Cheyne Walk, Lots Road and Chelsea Harbour. Its eastern boundary was once defined by the River Westbourne, which is now in a pipe above...

 in 1712, provided the grounds for the Chelsea Physic Garden
Chelsea Physic Garden
The Chelsea Physic Garden was established as the Apothecaries’ Garden in London, England in 1673. It is the second oldest botanical garden in Britain, after the University of Oxford Botanic Garden, which was founded in 1621.Its rock garden is the oldest English garden devoted to alpine plants...

 as well as perpetuating his memory in the names of a "Sloane place", a "Sloane gardens", a "Sloane street", and a "Sloane square
Sloane Square
Sloane Square is a small hard-landscaped square on the boundaries of the fashionable London districts of Knightsbridge, Belgravia and Chelsea, located southwest of Charing Cross, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. The square is part of the Hans Town area designed in 1771 by Henry...

". His great stroke as a collector was to acquire (by bequest, conditional on paying of certain debts) in 1701 the cabinet of William Courten
William Courten
Sir William Courten was a wealthy 17th century merchant, operating from London. He financed the colonisation of Barbados, but lost his investment and interest in the islands to the Earl of Carlisle.-Birth and upbringing:...

, who had made collecting the business of his life.

The British Museum

When Sloane retired in 1741, his library and cabinet of curiosities
Cabinet of curiosities
A cabinet of curiosities was an encyclopedic collection in Renaissance Europe of types of objects whose categorical boundaries were yet to be defined. They were also known by various names such as Cabinet of Wonder, and in German Kunstkammer or Wunderkammer...

, which he took with him from Bloomsbury
Bloomsbury
-Places:* Bloomsbury is an area in central London.* Bloomsbury , related local government unit* Bloomsbury, New Jersey, New Jersey, USA* Bloomsbury , listed on the NRHP in Maryland...

 to his house in Chelsea, had grown to be of unique value. He had acquired the extensive natural history collections of William Courten
William Courten
Sir William Courten was a wealthy 17th century merchant, operating from London. He financed the colonisation of Barbados, but lost his investment and interest in the islands to the Earl of Carlisle.-Birth and upbringing:...

, Cardinal Filippo Antonio Gualterio
Filippo Antonio Gualterio (cardinal)
Filippo Antonio Gualterio was made a papal nuncio to France and cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church from 1706....

, James Petiver
James Petiver
James Petiver was a London apothecary, a Fellow of the Royal Society as well as London's informal Temple Coffee House Botany Club, famous for his study of botany and entomology.-Life:...

, Nehemiah Grew
Nehemiah Grew
Nehemiah Grew was an English plant anatomist and physiologist, very famously known as the "Father of Plant Physiology"...

, Leonard Plukenet
Leonard Plukenet
Leonard Plukenet was an English botanist, Royal Professor of Botany and gardener to Queen Mary. Plukenet published Phytographia in four parts in which he described and illustrated rare exotic plants. It is a copiously illustrated work of more than 2 700 figures and is frequently cited in books...

, the Duchess of Beaufort, the rev. Adam Buddle
Adam Buddle
Adam Buddle was an English cleric and botanist.Born at Deeping St James, a small village near Peterborough, Buddle was educated at St Catharine's College, Cambridge, where he gained a BA in 1681, and an MA four years later. Buddle was eventually ordained into the Church of England, obtaining a...

, Paul Hermann
Paul Hermann
Paul Hermann was a German born physician and botanist who for 15 years was director of the Hortus Botanicus Leiden....

, Franz Kiggelaer
Franz Kiggelaer
Franz Kiggelaer was a Dutch botanist, apothecary and curator of the garden of Simon van Beaumont in Leiden. In 1690 he published a plant catalogue of this garden under the title "Horti Beaumontiani: Exoticarum Plantarum Catalogus ..."....

 and Herman Boerhaave
Herman Boerhaave
Herman Boerhaave was a Dutch botanist, humanist and physician of European fame. He is regarded as the founder of clinical teaching and of the modern academic hospital. His main achievement was to demonstrate the relation of symptoms to lesions...

. On his death on 11 January 1753 he bequeathed his books, manuscripts, prints, drawings, flora, fauna, medals, coins, seals, cameos and other curiosities to the nation, on condition that parliament should pay to his executors £20,000, which was a good deal less than the value of the collection. The bequest was accepted on those terms by an act passed the same year, and the collection, together with George II
George II of Great Britain
George II was King of Great Britain and Ireland, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg and Archtreasurer and Prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire from 11 June 1727 until his death.George was the last British monarch born outside Great Britain. He was born and brought up in Northern Germany...

's royal library, etc., was opened to the public at Bloomsbury as the British Museum
British Museum
The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...

 in 1759. A significant proportion of this collection was later to become the foundation for the Natural History Museum
Natural History Museum
The Natural History Museum is one of three large museums on Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London, England . Its main frontage is on Cromwell Road...

.

Among his other acts of munificence may be mentioned his gift to the Apothecaries' Company of the botanical or physic garden, which they had rented from the Chelsea estate since 1673.

Honours

Sloane Square
Sloane Square
Sloane Square is a small hard-landscaped square on the boundaries of the fashionable London districts of Knightsbridge, Belgravia and Chelsea, located southwest of Charing Cross, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. The square is part of the Hans Town area designed in 1771 by Henry...

, Sloane Street and Sloane Gardens in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea
Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea
The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea is a central London borough of Royal borough status. After the City of Westminster, it is the wealthiest borough in England....

 are named after Sir Hans as is the moth Urania sloanus
Urania sloanus
Sloane's Urania was a moth of the Uraniidae family, last reported in 1894 or 1895., but possibly surviving until at least 1908.It was black with iridescent red, blue and green markings...

. His first name is given to Hans Street, Hans Crescent, Hans Place and Hans Road, all of which are also situated in the Royal Borough. Carl Linnaeus named the plant genus Sloanea
Sloanea
Sloanea is a genus of flowering plants in the family Elaeocarpaceae, comprising about 150 species .Species include:* Sloanea acutiflora, Uittien* Sloanea assamica, Rehder & E. Wilson* Sloanea australis, Benth. & F.Muell...

after Sloane.

Burial

Hans Sloane was buried on 18 January 1753 at Chelsea Old Church with the following memorial:-


"In memory of Sir Hans Sloane, Bart, President of the Royal Society and of the College of Physicians, who died in the year of our Lord 1752, the ninety-second year of his age, without least pain of body, and with a conscious serenity of mind ended a virtuous and beneficient life. This monument was erected by his two daughters, Eliza Cadogan and Sarah Stanley"


His grave is shared with his wife Elisabeth who died in 1724.

External links


Further reading

  • de Beer, G.R., Sir Hans Sloane and the British Museum. London, Oxford University Press. 1953.
  • Jack A. Clarke. Sir Hans Sloane and Abbé Jean Paul Bignon: Notes on Collection Building in the Eighteenth Century. The Library Quarterly, Vol. 50, No. 4 (Oct., 1980), pp. 475-482
  • Lyons, J. 2008. p.53 - 54. The Life and Times of a famous Ulsterman. Copeland Report for 2008. Copeland Bird Observatory

See also

  • British Library Leyden Medical Dissertations Collection
    British Library Leyden Medical Dissertations Collection
    The British Library Leyden Medical Dissertations Collection is a collection of medical dissertations submitted to Dutch universities at Amsterdam, Utrecht, Harlingen, and Leyden. It includes, in particular, a fine set of Leyden medical dissertations and disputations for the period 1593 to 1746...

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