| AdminHistory | Emilia Frances Noel ( - 1950) was the youngest child and third daughter of the Honourable Henry Lewis Noel, whose father was the first earl of Gainsborough. His cousin was the third earl of Gainsborough, an amateur botanist who had collaborated with A.R. Horwood in writing the 'Flora of Rutland and Northamptonshire'. The Noel's family homes were in Rutland and Lincolnshire.
Emilia Noel attended Somerville College, Oxford, before going on to study at Swanley Horticultural College where she received prizes for the best diary of garden work and the best notebook of advanced botany. She was elected a Fellow of the Linnean Society in 1905 and was among the twenty or so senior female members. She travelled extensively and visited places including Egypt (in 1892) India, Kashmir, Europe, America, North Africa, Ceylon [Sri Lanka], South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Java, Lombok and in around 1938 she visited the Canaries and West Africa. She kept detailed diaries of the plants that she encountered on these trips. She registered for the Women's War Service in World War I and travelled extensively in England between World War I and World War II. In [1905?] she published a book on the plants of Kashmir and some notes on the country. Noel died on 19 March 1950. |