Biography

John Stackhouse was a British phycologist and botanical artist. Of independent means, he was able to devote himself to these interests while living on his Cornwall estates in southwestern England.

Stackhouse was born in Trehane, Cornwall, where his father was rector at St. Erme. He matriculated from Exeter College, Oxford, in 1758 and in 1761 was elected to a fellowship of the college. Leaving Oxford in 1763, he returned to his family property in Cornwall, then lived and travelled in Europe for three years, where he studied the marine biology (especially the seaweeds) of the Mediterranean.

In England once more, Stackhouse married Susanna Acton in 1773 and built a house on the coast between Perranuthnoe and Cuddon Point, where he could continue to study seaweeds. In 1775 he built a new house, Acton Castle, at Perranuthnoe, where the couple lived until 1802. They then lived in Bath, where Stackhouse died in 1819.

Stackhouse was an early Fellow of the Linnean Society, being elected in 1795. His most significant publication was Nereis Brittanica, or, A Botanical Description of the British Marine Plants in Latin and English, Accompanied with Drawings from Nature (1795). The genus Stackhousia Sm. honours him.

Sources:
P.S. Dixon, 1962, "Notes on important algal herbaria, III", British Phycological Bulletin, 2(3): 162-163
F.A. Turk, 1959, Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, New Series, 3(3): 242-245.