George Wall, merchant and coffee planter in Ceylon (Sri Lanka), was born near Manchester, England, and began his career in the engineering firm of Sir Joseph Whitworth. Suffering ill health, in 1846 he moved to Ceylon to take advantage of the climate, and was made acting manager of the Ceylon Plantation Company in Kandy. He remained with the company until 1854, when he established his own business, George Wall & Co, Coffee Merchants and Estate Agents.

Wall opened an office in Colombo and the business soon grew into an important concern, with Wall rising to prominence, accordingly. He became the first Englishman to chair the Planters' Association of Ceylon (in 1856-1857) and from 1858 sat on the Legislative Council of Ceylon, supporting the case against the Ceylon Paddy Tax.

Wall spent 1859-1863 back in Manchester, where he served as a partner with his former employer, Sir Joseph Whitworth & Co., then enjoying success in small arms manufacturing. Once more in Ceylon, he was elected chair of the Chamber of Commerce in 1866. Bad luck was to follow, however, when Wall's business eventually collapsed in 1879 following a disastrous outbreak of coffee blight.

Alongside his business activities, George Wall was a keen botanist and amateur astronomer. He was especially interested in ferns and built up a significant herbarium of plants from Ceylon. In his later years he was editor of the Ceylon Independent newspaper. After falling ill in 1894 he returned to England for treatment at St. Thomas' Hospital, where he died in December that year. He was married twice and had 13 children in all. One of his sons, Arnold Wall (1869-1966), went on to become a professor of botany in New Zealand and another, Frank Wall, also became a naturalist. Wall Street in Kotahena, Sri Lanka, is named in honour of George Wall.
Sources:
Anon., 1895, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 55: 202
Anon., 1895, Journal of Botany, 33: 63
H. Trimen, 1900, Handbook of the Flora of Ceylon, 5: 379-380
F.Wall, 1922, Snakes of Ceylon: v-x.