Senator John Henderson of Mississippi, was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, United States, on September 17, 1853.
His older brother, John Leland Henderson, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1851.
His father, who was a supporter of Lincoln, was murdered shortly after the Civil War, at which time, his mother took Louis and his brother John north.
Nonetheless, he continued in academia for several years afterward and some of his work survived through exchanges he had made with other herbariums.
Henderson was considered one of the most knowledgeable botanists of the northwest United States at the time of his death.