Robert Fortune (16 September 1812 – 13 April 1880) was a Scottish botanist, plant hunter and traveller, best known for introducing around 250 new ornamental plants, mainly from

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

, but also

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, into the gardens of Britain, Australia, and North America. He also played a role in the development of the tea industry in India in the 19th century. He also imported Japanese chestnuts into the United States, which led to the introduction of chestnut blight to the country 24 years after his death.

Life

Fortune was born in 1812 in the small settlement or "fermtoun" of Kelloe in the parish of Edrom, Berwickshire. After completing his apprenticeship, he was then employed at Moredun House, just to the south of

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

, before then moving on to the

Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE) is a scientific centre for the study of plants, their diversity and conservation, as well as a popular tourist attraction. Founded in 1670 as a physic garden to grow medicinal plants, today it occupies ...

. In 1840, he and his family moved to London to take up a position at the Horticultural Society of London's garden at Chiswick. Following the Treaty of Nanking in 1842, in early 1843, he was commissioned by the Horticultural Society to undertake a three-year plant collection expedition to southern China. His travels resulted in the introduction to Europe, Australia, and North America of many flowers and plants. His most famous accomplishment was the successful introduction, although it was not the first by any means, of Chinese tea plants ('' Camellia sinensis''), along with skilled tea makers, from China to India in 1848 on behalf of the

British East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to Indian Ocean trade, trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (South A ...

. Robert Fortune worked in China for several years in the period from 1843 to 1861. Wuyi Shan Fengjing Mingsheng Qu 2012

Similar to other European travellers of the period, such as Walter Medhurst, Fortune disguised himself as a Chinese merchant during several, but not all, of his journeys beyond the newly established treaty port areas. Not only was Fortune's purchase of tea plants reportedly forbidden by the Chinese government of the time, but his travels were also beyond the allowable day's journey from the European treaty ports. Fortune travelled to some areas of China that had seldom been visited by Europeans, including remote areas of

Fujian Fujian is a provinces of China, province in East China, southeastern China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its capital is Fuzhou and its largest prefe ...

Guangdong ) means "wide" or "vast", and has been associated with the region since the creation of Guang Prefecture in AD 226. The name "''Guang''" ultimately came from Guangxin ( zh, labels=no, first=t, t= , s=广信), an outpost established in Han dynasty ...

, and

Jiangsu Jiangsu is a coastal Provinces of the People's Republic of China, province in East China. It is one of the leading provinces in finance, education, technology, and tourism, with its capital in Nanjing. Jiangsu is the List of Chinese administra ...

provinces. Fortune employed many means to obtain plants and seedlings from local tea growers, although this was some 150 years before international biodiversity laws recognised state ownership of such natural resources. He is also known for his use of Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward's portable Wardian cases to sustain the plants. It is also widely reported that he took skilled workers on contract to India who would facilitate the production of tea in the plantations of the

East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to Indian Ocean trade, trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (South A ...

. With the exception of a few plants that survived in established Indian gardens, most of the Chinese tea plants Fortune introduced in the northwestern provinces of India perished. The other reason for the failure in India was that the British preference and fashion was for a strong dark tea brew, which was best made from the local Assam subspecies (''Camellia sinensis'' var. ''assamica'') and not the selection that Fortune had made in China. The technology and knowledge that was brought over from China was, however, instrumental in the later flourishing of the Indian tea industry in Assam and

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

. In subsequent journeys, he visited Formosa (

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

) and Japan, and described the culture of the silkworm and the manufacture of rice. He introduced many trees, shrubs, and flowers to the West, including the cumquat, a climbing double yellow

rose A rose is either a woody perennial plant, perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred Rose species, species and Garden roses, tens of thousands of cultivar ...

('Fortune's Double Yellow' (syn. Gold of Ophir) which proved a failure in England's climate), and many varieties of tree peonies,

azalea Azaleas ( ) are flowering shrubs in the genus ''Rhododendron'', particularly the former sections ''Rhododendron sect. Tsutsusi, Tsutsusi'' (evergreen) and ''Pentanthera'' (deciduous). Azaleas bloom in the spring (April and May in the temperate ...

s and

chrysanthemum Chrysanthemums ( ), sometimes called mums or chrysanths, are flowering plants in the Asteraceae family. They are native to East Asia and northeastern Europe. Most species originate from East Asia, and the center of diversity is in China. Co ...

s. A climbing white rose that he brought back from China in 1850, believed to be a natural cross between '' Rosa laevigata'' and '' R. banksiae'', was dubbed ''R. fortuniana'' (syn. ''R. fortuneana'') in his honour. This rose, too, proved a failure in England, preferring warmer climates. Today, both of these roses are still widely grown by antique rose fanciers in mild winter regions. ''Rosa fortuniana'' also serves as a valuable

rootstock A rootstock is part of a plant, often an underground part, from which new above-ground growth can be produced. It could also be described as a stem with a well developed root system, to which a bud from another plant is grafted. It can refer to ...

in Australia and the southern regions of the United States. He related his travels in a series of books. He died in London in 1880, and is buried in

Brompton Cemetery Brompton Cemetery (originally the West of London and Westminster Cemetery) is since 1852 the first (and only) London cemetery to be Crown Estate, Crown property, managed by The Royal Parks, in West Brompton in the Royal Borough of Kensington a ...

Legacy

Fortune is credited with the introduction of a large number of plants, shrubs, and trees to Europe from China. In 1913, botanists Rehder and E.H.Wilson named a plant genus from China, with one species, '' Fortunearia sinensis'', in his honour.

Plants named after Robert Fortune

*'' Arundinaria fortunei'' *'' Berberis fortunei'' *'' Cephalotaxus fortunei'' *'' Cyrtomium fortunei'' *'' Euonymus fortunei'' *'' Hosta fortunei'' *'' Keteleeria fortunei'' *'' Osmanthus × fortunei'' (''O. fragrans'' × ''O. heterophyllus'') *'' Paulownia fortunei'' *'' Pleioblastus fortunei'' *'' Rhododendron fortunei'' *'' Rosa fortuniana'' *'' Saxifraga fortunei'' *'' Trachycarpus fortunei'' (has synonym ''Chamaerops fortunei'')

Publications

''Three Years' Wandering in the Northern Provinces of China, A Visit to the Tea, Silk, and Cotton Countries, with an account of the Agriculture and Horticulture of the Chinese, New Plants, etc.''
(1847, John Murray
Excerpt
China Heritage Quarterly No. 29 (March 2012) ISSN 1833-8461 .
''A Journey To The Tea Countries Of China; Including Sung-Lo And The Bohea Hills; With A Short Notice Of The East India Company's Tea Plantations In The Himalaya Mountains.''
(1852, John Murray
Excerpt
China Heritage Quarterly. *
Two visits to the tea countries of China and the British tea plantations in the Himalaya
with a narrative of adventures, and a full description of the culture of the tea plant, the agriculture, horticulture, and botany of China'' (1853, John Murray; LCCNbr>04-32957
National Library: CAT10983833)
''A Residence Among the Chinese; Inland, On the Coast and at Sea; being a Narrative of Scenes and Adventures During a Third Visit to China from 1853 to 1856, including Notices of Many Natural Productions and Works of Art, the Culture of Silk, &c.''
(1857, John Murray)
''Yedo and Peking; A Narrative of a Journey to the Capitals of Japan and China, with Notices of the Natural Productions, Agriculture, Horticulture and Trade of those Countries and Other Things Met with By the Way''
(1863, John Murray)

References and further reading

* Mather, Jeffrey. (2010).
Botanising in a Sinocentric world: Robert Fortune's travels in China
. ''Studies in Travel Writing'', 14(3), 257–270. https://doi.org/10.1080/13645145.2010.500099 *

Sarah Rose Sarah Rose (born 1974) is an author and journalist known for ''D-Day Girls'' and ''For All the Tea in China''. Early life and education Rose was born in Chicago and attended the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, Harvard College, and t ...

''For All the Tea in China: How England Stole the World's Favorite Drink and Changed History''
Viking: 2010. * Watt, Alistair, ''Robert Fortune, A Plant Hunter in the Orient''. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew: 2017.

In Fiction

Robert Fortune features as a character in Sara Sheridan's novel ''The'' ''Secret Mandarin (2009)''

Notes

External links

* The China Vintage Hou
Robert Fortune's Wanderings in China
(Part 1) YouTube video. * The China Vintage Hou
Robert Fortune's Wanderings in China
(Part 2) YouTube video.
Plant Explorers: Robert Fortune (1812-80)

Dreijährige Wanderungen in den Nord-Provinzen von China
(German)

* Mark O'Neill
Robert Fortune, the Scottish Botanist Who Stole the Tea of China
The Foreign Correspondents' Club, Hong Kong. YouTube *
Digitised papers of Robert Fortune, held at the Royal Horticultural Society's Lindley Library. RHS Digital Collections
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fortune, Robert Botanists with author abbreviations 1812 births 1880 deaths 19th-century Scottish botanists Botanists active in China Botanists active in India Botanists active in Japan Scottish plant collectors People from Berwickshire Burials at Brompton Cemetery People from Duns, Scottish Borders Scottish travel writers