Henry William Ravenel

Henry William Ravenel’s (1814-1877) extensive collection has now come to USC, and scientific researchers from throughout the world will be able to study elements of it here.

A new exhibition at Thomas Cooper Library, opening March 17, will showcase some of the most interesting and significant aspects of the collection, along with botanical illustrations from Rare Books & Special Collections.

Ravenel was an avid collector of vascular plant specimens in a region of the country noted in the 19th century for being rife with plant life. The young botanist shared liberally with his botanists friends in other parts of the country. In turn, they reciprocated by adding to the learned 19th century French Huguenot’s own collection.

About half of the collection consists of Southeastern material. The rest came from elsewhere in the United States and Europe. Ravenel’s colleagues included some of the top American botanists of the time.

After Ravenel’s death, his widow allowed the collection to be turned over to Converse College via a relative who was on the institution’s board of trustees at the time. Now Converse has determined the best stewardship of the collection is for it to be reposited at a research institution.

John Nelson, the USC botanist who writes the Mystery Plant column for The Columbia Star , and directs the initiatives of the USC Herbarium, said it will be years before cataloguing the entire collection can be complete. There are more than 6,000 specimens that may require repair, remounting, or annotation.

Meanwhile, Nelson said it has been very exciting to see the labels Ravenel wrote, in his own hand, and to consider South Carolina as a botanical treasure trove in the times the St native was collecting here. Some of Ravenel’s personally collected materials are representative of plants found in Berkeley and Aiken counties

“He was especially interested in fungi,” Nelson said, “and that was long before many other botanists were collecting it.

Nelson added to seeing the preservation techniques, and mounting styles and materials used in the 19th century is noteworthy in itself. “A few sheets were labeled as type material. There may be “forgotten” type specimens that will be of major importance to the project, and interest to researchers.”