George Swinton (botanist)

George Swinton FRSE (1780–1854) was a Scottish civil servant who served as Chief Secretary to the British government during their colonial rule of India.

In 1826 he took on the additional role of caring for the Botanical Gardens and began collecting plants for Nathaniel Wallich.

In 1833 he donated seven skulls of "thugs and stranglers of central India" to the Phrenological Society of Edinburgh.

[7][8] His son, James Samuel Swinton, served with the Bengal Infantry and died during the Siege of Lucknow in 1858.

[9] His son, William Bentinck Swinton, was a Major in the Madras Cavalry and died at Secunderabad in 1876.