Frederick Edward Hulme

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Frederick Edward Hulme (March 1841 – 10 April 1909) was an English drawing teacher, amateur botanist and natural historian. He is best known for his nine-volume work Familiar Wild Flowers and for teaching drawing at Marlborough College and King’s College London.

Life
- Hulme was born in Hanley, Staffordshire, in March 1841 to Frederick William Hulme and Caroline (née Jackson). In 1844 his family moved to London, where his father worked as a landscape painter.
- He studied at the South Kensington School of Art, now part of the Royal College of Art.
- He was elected a Fellow of the Linnean Society in 1869, recognizing his interest in botany.

Career
- Hulme became the drawing master at Marlborough College in 1870 and worked there until 1883.
- While at Marlborough, he began his most famous project, Familiar Wild Flowers. The work describes each flower and its medicinal uses and habitat, and each volume includes Hulme’s detailed botanical illustrations reproduced as color plates. He completed nine volumes, published over many years, with the final volume published after his death.
- He was Professor of Freehand and Geometrical Drawing at King’s College London from 1886. Drawing was not always part of the standard curriculum at the college, but Hulme offered an optional course in drawing.
- Hulme was also an amateur botanist, antiquarian and natural historian. In addition to his botanical works, he published books on heraldry and on cryptography (the history, principles and practice of cipher-writing).

Death
- Hulme died at his home in Kew on 10 April 1909. His ninth volume of Familiar Wild Flowers was in production at the time, and the earlier volumes were published after his death.

Works
- Plant Form (1868)
- Bards & Blossoms; or The Poetry, History, and Associations of Flowers (1877)
- Familiar Wild Flowers (1878–1905; nine volumes, completed after his death)
- Suggestions in Floral Design (1880)
- Natural History, Lore and Legend (1895)
- Wild Fruits of the Countryside (1902)
- Proverb Lore: Many Sayings, Wise or Otherwise, on Many Subjects (1902)
- Butterflies and Moths of the Countryside (1903)
- Wild Flowers in Their Seasons (1907)
- Familiar Swiss Flowers (1908)
- The History, Principles and Practice of Heraldry (1892)
- Cryptography, the History, Principles and Practice of Cipher-Writing (1898)

Prose
- Myth-land (1886)
- The Town, College, and Neighbourhood of Marlborough (1881)
- The Flags of The World: Their History, Blazonry, and Associations (1887)

Illustration
- Sylvan Spring (illustration only)
- Familiar Garden Flowers (illustration only)

Frederick Edward Hulme left a lasting mark as a teacher and as a prolific writer and illustrator on flowers, heraldry and cryptography.