Henry Nicholson Ellacombe

Born in Bitton, Gloucestershire, in 1822, he was educated at Bath Grammar School and Oriel College, Oxford, graduated in 1844, and was ordained a few years later. After a short curacy in Derbyshire, he returned home and in 1850 succeeded his father as vicar of Bitton, a post he held for the rest of his life.

Alongside his church work, he became a respected plantsman and gardener. He cultivated a notable garden at Bitton, exchanged plants and seeds with Kew and other botanical gardens in Europe, and earned wide respect in horticultural circles; in 1897 he was among the first recipients of the Victoria Medal of Honour.

His books helped make him memorable beyond his parish. The best known is The Plant-Lore & Garden-Craft of Shakespeare (1878), and his other works include Shakespeare as an Angler (1883), In a Gloucestershire Garden (1895), and In My Vicarage Garden, and Elsewhere (1902). He died in 1916.