Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Crosfield, George
CROSFIELD, GEORGE (1785–1847), botanist, son of George and Ann Crosfield, was born in 1785 at Warrington, His parents removing from Warrington left him at the age of fourteen engaged in business there, a circumstance which gave a remarkable self-reliance to his character. He acted as secretary to the Warrington Botanical Society, and in 1810 published ‘A Calendar of Flora, composed during the year 1809 at Warrington, Lat. 53° 30′,’ in 34 pages, 8vo, with an Index generum, the nomenclature adopted being that of Sir J. E. Smith. At the age of thirty he became an elder in the Society of Friends, and in 1818 he published the ‘Letters of W. Thompson of Penketh,’ 12mo, to which a biographical notice is prefixed. This work went into several editions, and was followed by an edition of John Wilbur's ‘Letters to a Friend on the Primitive Doctrines of Christianity,’ 8vo, the preface to which is dated Liverpool, 1832; and by ‘Memoirs of S. Fothergill,’ Philadelphia, 1837, 8vo; reprinted at Liverpool in 1843, and at London in 1857. He died on 15 Dec. 1847.
[Annual Monitor, 1849.]