Barton, BENJAMIN SMITH

Barton, BENJAMIN SMITH (1766-1815), American naturalist and medical practitioner, studied the natural sciences and medicine in Philadelphia, Edinburgh, and London (1782-88), and took his degree at Göttingen. He practised medicine in Philadelphia, and held successively the chairs of Botany and Natural History, Materia Medica, and Theory and Practice of Medicine in the university there. He became president of many learned societies, was a correspondent of Humboldt, and amongst other works wrote Elements of Botany (1812-14); Collections for an Essay toward a Materia Medica of the United States (3d ed. 1810); and Flora Virginica (1812).