The Linnean Society of London, Drawings of plants and insects collected by William Carey

William Carey (1761-1834) was a Baptist missionary in India. A pastor before going to the mission field, he spent 41 years in India, and translated the Scriptures.
Carey was born in Paulerspury, Northamptonshire in 1761 to a parish clerk in the Church of England. He apprenticed to shoemaker Clarke Nichols in 1775. He first attended a meeting of Dissenters in 1779 and moved to Moulton, Northamptonshire in 1785 to be the pastor of the Baptist chapel, then moving to Leicester in 1789 where he pastored the Harvey Lane Baptist Church. In 1793 he was appointed along with John Thomas as a missionary to Bengal (India) and that same year he sailed from Dover with his family for India on the Danish ship, Kron Princessa Maria, arriving in Calcutta. He moved to Serampore in 1799/1800 and was appointed the Professor of Sanskrit at Fort William College in 1801. He founded the Botanic Garden, Serampore. He was married three times: Dorothy Plackett (1781), Charlotte Rumohr (1808) and Grace Hughes (1823). He was elected a Fellow of the Linnean Society in 1823. He died in Serampore on 9 June 1834.
The Linnean Society of London holds a collection of watercolour drawings of flowering plants and insects collected by William Carey. The drawings are thought to have been produced by Indian artists.