John Gill ("J.G.") Lemmon (January 2, 1831 or 1832, Lima, Michigan – November 24, 1908

Oakland, California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the ...

) was an American

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

and

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government polici ...

veteran and former prisoner of Andersonville. He was married to fellow botanist, Sara Plummer Lemmon, and the two jointly cataloged numerous western and desert plants.

Biography

Lemmon was born in Lima, Michigan, on January 2,"Biographical Information", John and Sara (Plummer) Lemmon Papers
University and Jepson Herbaria Archives, University of California, Berkeley (last visited Aug. 24, 2012). in 1831 or 1832,James Miller Guinn, ''History of the State of California and Biographical Record of Oakland and Environs'' (1907), Historic Record Company, pp.834-835. Available a

(last visited Aug. 24, 2012). to William Lemmon and Amila Hudson Lemmon, a descendant of

Henry Hudson Henry Hudson ( 1565 – disappeared 23 June 1611) was an English sea explorer and navigator during the early 17th century, best known for his explorations of present-day Canada and parts of the northeastern United States. In 1607 and 16 ...

the explorer. He was a schoolteacher for eight years, before attending the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

. He enlisted in the Union Army in June, 1862, and was involved in numerous engagements in the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by Names of the American Civil War, other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union (American Civil War), Union ("the North") and t ...

. In August, 1864, Lemmon was captured by the Confederates, and subsequently held as a prisoner of war in the Florence prison and the notorious Andersonville prison. After being freed on March 1, 1865, he moved to

Sierraville, California Sierraville (''Sierra'', Spanish for "mountain range" and ''Ville'', French for "town") is a census-designated place in Sierra County, California, United States. It is at the southern end of the huge Sierra Valley which is used primarily as pas ...

, to stay with family while he recuperated. He returned to teaching, and acquired an interest in botany. Lemmon began corresponding with Henry Bolander at the

California Academy of Sciences The California Academy of Sciences is a research institute and natural history museum in San Francisco, California, that is among the largest museums of natural history in the world, housing over 46 million specimens. The Academy began in 1853 ...

and

Asa Gray Asa Gray (November 18, 1810 – January 30, 1888) is considered the most important American botanist of the 19th century. His ''Darwiniana'' was considered an important explanation of how religion and science were not necessarily mutually excl ...

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

, as he identified more hitherto uncataloged plants. It was only botanical work that gave him solace from the horrors of Andersonville prison. Gray named the new genus ''Plummera'', now called '' Hymenoxys'', in his wife's honor. Eventually, he became known as "the botanist of the West". While visiting Santa Barbara on a collecting and lecture expedition, Lemmon met Sara Plummer, a transplanted East Coast artist and intellectual who had also developed an interest in botany. The two corresponded for several years, marrying in 1880. They took a "botanical wedding trip" to Arizona in 1881, cataloging many desert and mountain plants, and climbed to the peak of the mountain they christened Mount Lemmon, after Sara, the first European-descended woman to make that ascent. On their return, they continued their botanical activities, ultimately establishing the Lemmon Herbarium, now part of

UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant uni ...

University and Jepson Herbaria The University and Jepson Herbaria are two herbaria that share a joint facility at the University of California, Berkeley holding over 2,200,000 botanical specimens, the largest such collection on the US West Coast. These botanical natural hist ...

. J.G. and Sara lived and established their

herbarium A herbarium (plural: herbaria) is a collection of preserved plant specimens and associated data used for scientific study. The specimens may be whole plants or plant parts; these will usually be in dried form mounted on a sheet of paper (calle ...

at No. 5985 Telegraph Avenue. From 1888 to 1892, J.G. also served as the state botanist for the California State Board of Forestry. J.G. died November 24, 1908, in

, preceding Sara in death by 15 years. He and Sara are buried at Mountain View Cemetery, in Oakland, Plot Section 46.J.G. Plummer
Find-a-Grave (last visited Aug. 24, 2012).

Selected papers

* John Gill Lemmon, ''Recollections of Rebel Prisons'' * --. ''Ferns of the Pacific Including Arizona'' (1882) * --. ''Handbook of West American Cone-Bearers'' (1900) * --. ''Conebearers'' * --. ''Oaks of the Pacific Slope'' (1902) * --. ''Discovery of the Potato in Arizona'' (1883) * --. ''Pacific Coast Flowers and Ferns'' (1880) * -- and

Sara Allen Plummer Lemmon Sara Allen Plummer (September 3, 1836 – January 15, 1923) was an American botanist. Mount Lemmon in Arizona is named for her, as she was the first white woman to ascend it. She was responsible for the designation of the golden poppy (''Eschsc ...

, ''How to Tell the Trees and Forest Endowment of Pacific Slope'' (1902)

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lemmon, J.G. 1830s births 1908 deaths People of Michigan in the American Civil War University of Michigan alumni American botanists Union Army soldiers American Civil War prisoners of war Writers from California Writers from Michigan