Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement
Wilson, George Fergusson
by Sydney Ernest Fryer
WILSON, GEORGE FERGUSSON (1822%1902), inventor, born at Wandsworth Common on 25 March 1822, was the sixth son in a family of thirteen children of William Wilson, at one time a merchant in Russia and subsequently founder at Battersea of the candle-making firm known as 'E. Price & Son.' His mother was Margaret Nimmo Dickson of Kilbucho and Cultur in Scotland.
After education at Wandsworth [PB: I wonder where? Home? School?], and a short time in a solicitor's office, Wilson in 1840 entered his father's business. Though without training as a chemist, he showed keen interest in the firm's experimental work, and in 1842 patented, in conjunction with W. C. Jones, a process by which cheap malodorous fats could be utilised in the place of tallow for candle-making. The original features of the process were the use of sulphuric acid as a decoloriser and deodoriser of strongly-smelling fats, and their subsequent distillation, when acidified, by the aid of super-heated steam. The invention added materially to the firm's profits, and in 1847, in the midst of a commercial panic, the business was sold for 250,000l.
A new concern, called Price's Patent Candle Company, with a capital of 500,000l., was then formed, George Wilson and an elder brother, James, being appointed managing directors. Both engaged continually in research work which effected repeated changes in the firm's processes of manufacture. George in 1853 introduced moulded coco-stearin lights as 'New Patent Night Lights,' and the two together made improvements on a French patent which led to the wide adoption by English manufacturers of the company's 'oleine' or 'cloth oil.' In 1854 George made a discovery of first-class importance, namely a process of manufacturing pure glycerine, the glycerine being first separated from fats and oils at high temperature and then purified in an atmosphere of steam. Previously even glycerine sold at a high price was so impure as to be comparatively useless for most purposes. He retired from the position of managing director in 1863.
In 1845 Wilson was made a member of the Society of Arts. He contributed frequently to its 'Journal,' read a paper before it in 1852 on 'Stearic Candle Manufacture,' was a member of its council from 1854 to 1859 and again from 1864 to 1867, and its treasurer from 1861 to 1863. In 1854 he read before the Royal Society a paper on 'The Value of Steam in the Decomposition of Neutral Fatty Bodies,' and was elected a fellow in 1855. In that year, too, he was elected a fellow of the Chemical Society, and read at the meeting of the British Association at Glasgow a paper on 'A New Mode of obtaining Pure Glycerine.'
In later life Wilson lived at Wisley, Surrey, where he devoted himself to experimental gardening on a wide scale. The garden formed by him at Wisley now belongs to the Royal Horticultural Society. He was particularly successful as a cultivator of lilies, gaining between 1867 and 1883 twenty-five first-class certificates for species exhibited. Elected a fellow of the Horticultural Society, he served on various of its committees, and was at one time vice-president. At his suggestion the society introduced guinea subscriptions, and in 1876 he published a pamphlet entitled 'The Royal Horticultural Society: as it is and as it might be.' He was Victorian Medallist of Horticulture in 1897. In 1875 he was elected a fellow of the Linnean Society. He died at Weybridge Heath on 28 March 1902.
Wilson married on 13 Aug. 1862 Ellen, eldest daughter of R. W. Barchard, of East Hill, Wandsworth, who survived him with two sons and a daughter. The elder son, Scott Barchard, was author of 'Aves Hawaiienses: the Birds of the Sandwich Islands,' a handsomely illustrated work, which was issued in eight parts (large 4to, 1890%9).
[Proc. Roy. Soc., vol. lxxv.; Who's Who, 1902; Men and Women of the Time, 1899; Soc. of Arts Journal, 1902; The Garden, 1 Jan. 1900 (portrait) and 5 April 1902; Journal of Horticulture, 5 and 10 April 1902; Gardeners' Chronicle, 5 April 1902; Price's Patent Candle Company's Calendar, 1908; Pamphlets by Price's Patent Candle Company, 1853.]
Wilson was by profession an industrial chemist, in the second generation of a family firm. The company had been founded by his father, William Wilson, a failed ironfounder, together with a partner named Benjamin Lancaster; it was originally called Edward Price and Co., the name Price having been chosen because it was a name in Lancaster's family. The firm's initial success lay in the processing of coconut oil as a substitute for tallow in candle-making; in 1830 they acquired James Soames' patent, granted the previous year, for pressing the oil by hydraulic pressure to separate the solid from the liquid parts more efficiently. Lancaster eventually sold his interest to Wilson and his sons, James, George, David, and Robert; the firm was floated as a joint-stock company in 1847, under the new name of Price's Patent Candle Company. By mid-century Price's had a coconut-pressing works in Battersea (demolished in the early 2000s), another factory in Battersea, and further works in Liverpool. At Bromborough Pool, outside Liverpool, the Wilsons built a pioneering industrial village for its employees, and they set up schools at each of their locations for the children they employed.1
1 The Factory Act of 1844 did not abolish child labour, but limited it to ten hours a day; it was not until the Factory and Workshop Act of 1878 that the employment of children under 10 was made illegal.
2014 The Royal Horticultural Society Experimental gardening: Wisley in the nineteenth century 19
During his tenure as a director of Price's, George Fergusson Wilson appears to have been the experimentalist and technical innovator, his brother James the businessman. The firm, having begun by producing an improved tallow from coconut oil, expanded into the refining of fatty acids, following in the footsteps of the great French chemist Michel- Eugene Chevreul, famous in the gardening world for his later theory of complementary colours. Chevreul had identified the fatty acids early in the nineteenth century, publishing a treatise on the subject, Recherches chimiques sur les corps gras d'origine animale, in 1823; in 1825 he and Gay-Lussac patented a method of making candles from stearic acid, and the Wilsons adopted his method, developing a market for "composite" candles during the 1830s.
In the 1840s Price's moved into the manufacture of stearine using a steam distillation process. Chevreul had identified glycerine as one of the fatty acids, and in 1854 Price's developed a method of purifying glycerine; for many years it was the only manufacturer of pure glycerine in Britain.1 During the 1850s Wilson experimented with a replacement for common lime-sulphur as an insecticide, and in 1858 took out a patent on a formula called Gishurst Compound, named after his cottage near Heatherbank.
The Gardeners' Chronicle for 6 November 1858 ran a leader, anonymous as usual but surely by John Lindley, the editor, announcing that "there is
1 A quick glimpse at the subsequent history of Price's Patent Candle Co. It swallowed up other, smaller companies in the late 19th century and Edwardian period, and branched out into the production of Motorine (an oil for motor cars) and other products.
In 1919 it was acquired by its major competitor, Lever Brothers, and in 1922 devolved into a new firm called Candles Ltd, jointly owned by Lever Brothers, Shell, and other companies. The Liverpool works were separated to form part of the Unilever Group, eventually becoming Unichema Chemicals in 1977, and twenty years later being taken over by ICI. Candles Ltd continued to operate on the Battersea site, and gradually its joint owners dropped away, leaving BP, who sold the company in 1991.
Now owned by an Italian company, and once again under its former name of Price's Patent Candle Co., it moved its head office to Bedford, and remains the largest candle manufacturer in Britain.
(See www.prices-candles.co.uk/history/historydetail.asp; www.nationalarchives.
gov.uk/a2a/records.aspx?cat=140-zp&cid=-1#-1; and Unilever Archives Historical Information Sheet: Price's Chemicals Ltd.)
[https://ww
Campanula x pulloides 'G.F.Wilson'
Bellflower
http://www.lubera.co.uk/plants/perennials/harebell/campanula-x-pulloides-g.f.wilson
Product information "Campanula x pulloides 'G.F.Wilson'"
This relatively small bellflower has one of the most intense colours of violet. It spreads relatively quickly via short underground runners and forms dense carpets. It has oval, heart-shaped, pointed, light green foliage. Nodding, slightly spherical, bright violet-blue flowers appear from June until well into August. This plant prefers fully sunny locations with well-drained, not too moist soil. It performs especially well in perennial beds, borders, rock gardens, on stairways as well as in trough and containers. It can also be very attractive in drywalls.
Flower colour: Violet/purple
Flowering period: Early summer
Height: 15 cm
Light requirements: Sun, partial shade
Location: Rocky steppe, stone enclosures, mats
Leaf shape: Round, heart-shaped
Leaf colour: Green
Spacing: 20 - 30 cm
Hardiness zone: 6
Use: Rock gardens, container plantings, grave plantings, ground cover
Speciality: Food for bees, forms runners
Family: Campanulaceae
Compatibility: Plant in groups
THE AMERICAN PRIMROSE SOCIETY
Blue primroses
$ "I Knew Mr. G. F. Wilson of Wisley, England" [Mrs. Leonora Townend] (With a note by Florence Levy) 3:4:61
https://americanprimrosesociety.org/quarterly/quarterly-indexes-contents/quarterly-indexes-hybrids-and-named-varieties/
MRS WILSON FREQUENTLY VISITS WISLEY WITH HER HUSBAND
https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/search/archives/70e8aa1e-7ffd-3e80-b388-e0e43b05dd86?component=6ef4b052-d09b-3731-b8f2-b22d3706feec
1 x Campanula x pulloides G.F. Wilson - 9cm pot
A compact perennial to 10cm tall, forming a clump of rounded pale green leaves. Erect, open bell-shaped, violet-blue flowers 2.5cm wide are borne on slender stems
https://www.secretgardeningclub.co.uk/collections/plant-pass-voucher/products/1-x-campanula-x-pulloides-g-f-wilson-9cm-pot
Also
https://www.esveld.nl/htmldiaen/c/capgfw.htm
pubescens - downy - hairy - ripening [as in puberty]
https://people.elmbridgehundred.org.uk/biographies/george-wilson/
I think they've rolled together father and son...look at the dates!
George Fergusson Wilson (1822-1902), Industrial Chemist. The founder of Price's Candles. He started a brokering business trading with Russia, which was extremely profitable. One of Russia's principal exports was tallow, and so in 1830 he bought the patent granted to James Soames in 1829 for the processing of coconut oil into a solid fat substitute for tallow in candle manufacture, and oil-burning lamps. Not wishing to use his own name, he called the venture E. Price & Co. (supposedly after his business partner's aunt who was not connected with the business in any way!)
They built a factory at Battersea, and by 1840 their 'composite' candles, made from tallow and coconut fats on plaited wicks were hugely successful.
In his later life he lived at 'Gishurst Cottage', Weybridge, and then 'Heatherbank' on Weybridge Heath.
RHS WISLEY
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1000126
Details
Experimental wild gardens laid out by G F Wilson from 1878 to 1902 and acquired by the Royal Horticultural Society in 1903, and further enlarged and developed since then.
HISTORIC INTEREST
In 1878, Glebe Farm was bought by George Fergusson Wilson (1822-1902), a London businesssman well known as a grower of fruit and orchids, who lived nearby at Heatherbank in Weybridge. Wilson established an experimental garden on part of the land, influenced by the writings of William Robinson (1838-1935) (CL 1897). He received practical assistance from Gertrude Jekyll (1843-1932) who wrote that 'He was kind enough to let me come and do actual spade work with him' (Jekyll 1937), and who commented, 'I have had the happiness of visiting Mr G F Wilson's garden at Wisley, a garden which I take to be about the most instructive it is possible to see' (Jekyll 1899). Some 5.5ha of the estate, which Wilson renamed Oakwood, was gardened, the remainder being let to a local farmer. Wilson died in 1902, and in 1903, Sir Thomas Hanbury KCVO, a wealthy Quaker and founder of the garden at La Mortola on the Italian Riviera, purchased the 24ha estate at Oakwood and donated it to the Royal Horticultural Society for use as an experimental garden and for the encouragement and improvement of scientific horticulture in all its branches.
The lease of the Society's former garden at Chiswick, and many of its plants, were sold in March 1904 and the move to Wisley took place in April of that year.
The estate at that time consisted of c 7.5ha of garden ground and water, c 7.5ha of grassland, and c 9ha of arable. Since then the Society has progressively enlarged the estate to its present (1999) extent and continues to develop the gardens for the benefit of its members and visitors.
This material is held at
Royal Horticultural Society Lindley Library
Reference
GB 803 RHS/WY/Owd
Dates of Creation
1878-1903
Name of Creator
Wilson; George Fergusson
Language of Material
English
Physical Description
4 A boxes and 2 OS items
Scope and Content
This part of the RHS Wisley archive comprises garden journals maintained by Wilson's head gardener, Alfred Tatnall, 1888-1902, seed bed records in Wilson's own hand, 1878-1902, a volume recording signatures of several thousand visitors to the garden, 1884-1902, and deeds and papers relating to the estate, 1878-1903. Visitors to Oakwood included Gertrude Jekyll, William Robinson, Alfred Wallace, Edwin Lutyens, E.A. Bowles, Constance Lytton and many others.
Administrative / Biographical History
George Fergusson Wilson (1822-1902) was born in Wandsworth, one of 13 children born to William Wilson and his wife Margaret. In 1840 he joined the family firm, E. Price & Co, later Price's Patent Candle Company, developing the technical side of the business. In 1858 he patented Gishurst Compound, an important insecticide in use for a century. He held office at the Society of Arts, was a fellow of the Royal Society and of the Chemical Society. He retired from Prices in 1863 but he maintained his involvement in the company for the rest of his life. He was a member of the RHS Fruit & Vegetable, Floral, and Scientific Committees, Treasurer of the Society from 1866-1868, and a member of Council.
Wilson married Ellen Barchard in 1862 and they had three children: Scott Barchard, born in 1864, Herman George, born in 1866, and Alice Charlotte, born in 1869.
Wilson had a garden at Heatherbank, Weybridge, and in 1878 he purchased Glebe Farm and 60 acres of farmland at nearby Wisley, where he created an experimental garden he called Oakwood, trying plants in the various soils and conditions there. He published the results of his experiments in articles in the horticultural press, along with updates on the development of his Wisley garden. He began with the development of the area known as the Wild Garden, in the shade of an old oak wood, and the slope beside it, introducing lilies in the wood and colourful blooms on the hillside.
He went on to develop a field garden, where deep drainage ditches were filled with iris, and lupins grew on the mounds of earth dug from the ditches. He established a pinetum in the north of the garden, where lilies also grew, two vegetable gardens and an avenue of flowering trees along the approach road to the garden. He was renowned for his cultivation of lilies and breeding of primroses, one of which he named 'Oakwood Blue'. Wilson had a number of gardeners at Wisley, headed by Alfred Tatnall. Many prominent horticulturists and dignitaries visited the garden, and private events were held there such as an annual garden party.
Wilson was one of the original 60 recipients of the Victoria Medal of Honour. He died at Heatherbank on 28 Mar 1902. His wife survived him. The following year his garden at Wisley was bought by Sir Thomas Hanbury and presented to the RHS as an experimental garden.
etc etc
George Fergusson Wilson (1822-1902) [industrial chemist, botanist and horticulturist (his garden at Wisley is now the RHS's), born Wandsworth Common, son of founder of candle-makers E.Price & Son. He was later MD of a new firm (based on his own prodigious chemical discoveries), Price's Patent Candle Company.
Wilson married on 13 August 1862 Ellen, eldest daughter of R. W. Barchard, of East Hill, Wandsworth, who survived him with two sons and a daughter. The elder son was Scott Barchard Wilson (1865-1923), ornithologist and explorer. Was RWB the "Mr Barchard" who led the campaign against Earl Spencer's attempts to enclose WC c.1827?
WILSON, GEORGE FERGUSSON (1822-1902), inventor, born at Wandsworth Common on 25 March 1822, was the sixth son in a family of thirteen children of William Wilson, at one time a merchant in Russia and subsequently founder at Battersea of the candle-making firm known as 'E. Price & Son.' His mother was Margaret Nimmo Dickson of Kilbucho and Cultur in Scotland.
After education at Wandsworth, and a short time in a solicitor's office, Wilson in 1840 entered his father's business. Though without training as a chemist, he showed keen interest in the firm's experimental work, and in 1842 patented, in conjunction with W.C. Jones, a process by which cheap malodorous fats could be utilised in the place of tallow for candle-making. The original features of the process were the use of sulphuric acid as a decoloriser and deodoriser of strongly-smelling fats, and their subsequent distillation, when acidified, by the aid of super-heated steam. The invention added materially to the firm's profits, and in 1847, in the midst of a commercial panic, the business was sold for £250,000.
A new concern, called Price's Patent Candle Company, with a capital of £500,000, was then formed, George Wilson and an elder brother, James, being appointed managing directors. Both engaged continually in research work which effected repeated changes in the firm's processes of manufacture. George in 1853 introduced moulded coco-stearin lights as 'New Patent Night Lights,' and the two together made improvements on a French patent which led to the wide adoption by English manufacturers of the company's 'oleine' or 'cloth oil.' In 1854 George made a discovery of first-class importance, namely a process of manufacturing pure glycerine, the glycerine being first separated from fats and oils at high temperature and then purified in an atmosphere of steam. Previously even glycerine sold at a high price was so impure as to be comparatively useless for most purposes. He retired from the position of managing director in 1863.
In 1845 Wilson was made a member of the Society of Arts. He contributed frequently to its 'Journal,' read a paper before it in 1852 on 'Stearic Candle Manufacture,' was a member of its council from 1854 to 1859 and again from 1864 to 1867, and its treasurer from 1861 to 1863. In 1854 he read before the Royal Society a paper on 'The Value of Steam in the Decomposition of Neutral Fatty Bodies,' and was elected a fellow in 1855. In that year, too, he was elected a fellow of the Chemical Society, and read at the meeting of the British Association at Glasgow a paper on 'A New Mode of obtaining Pure Glycerine.'
In later life Wilson lived at Wisley, Surrey, where he devoted himself to experimental gardening on a wide scale. The garden formed by him at Wisley now belongs to the Royal Horticultural Society. He was particularly successful as a cultivator of lilies, gaining between 1867 and 1883 twenty-five first-class certificates for species exhibited. Elected a fellow of the Horticultural Society, he served on various of its committees, and was at one time vice-president. At his suggestion the society introduced guinea subscriptions, and in 1876 he published a pamphlet entitled 'The Royal Horticultural Society: as it is and as it might be.' He was Victorian Medallist of Horticulture in 1897. In 1875 he was elected a fellow of the Linnean Society. He died at Weybridge Heath on 28 March 1902.
Wilson married on 13 Aug. 1862 Ellen, eldest daughter of R. W. Barchard, of East Hill, Wandsworth, who survived him with two sons and a daughter. The elder son, Scott Barchard, was author of 'Aves Hawaiienses: the Birds of the Sandwich Islands,' a handsomely illustrated work, which was issued in eight parts (large 4to, 1890-1899).
[Proc. Roy. Soc., vol. lxxv.; Who's Who, 1902; Men and Women of the Time, 1899; Soc. of Arts Journal, 1902; The Garden, 1 Jan. 1900 (portrait) and 5 April 1902; Journal of Horticulture, 5 and 10 April 1902; Gardeners' Chronicle, 5 April 1902; Price's Patent Candle Company's Calendar, 1908; Pamphlets by Price's Patent Candle Company, 1853.]
[Source: Fryer, Sydney Ernest (1912). "Wilson, George Fergusson", Dictionary of National Biography (2nd supplement), London: Smith, Elder & Co. pp. 189-190.]
Superb paper, with numerous photographs etc
[Source: Brent Elliott, Link, Occasional Papers of the RHS Lindley Library, vol.? Jan 2014: ]