Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History
Benson Lossing, Ed.

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Darlington, William, -1863

Scientist; born of Quaker parents in Birmingham, Pa., April 28, 1782; studied medicine, languages, and botany, and went to Calcutta as surgeon of a ship. Returning in 1807, he practised medicine at West Chester with success; was a Madisonian in politics, and when the war broke out in 1812 he assisted in raising a corps for the service in his neighborhood. He was chosen major of a volunteer regiment, but did not see any active service. He was a member of Congress from 1815 to 1817 and from 1819 to 1823. In his town he founded an academy, an athenaeum, and a society of natural history. Dr. Darlington was an eminent botanist, and a new and remarkable variety of the pitcher plant, found in California in 1853, was named, in his honor, Darlingtonica California. He wrote and published works on botany, medicine, biography, and his.. tory. Dr. Darlington was a member of about forty learned societies in America and Europe. He died in West Chester, Pa., April 23, 1863.