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Amy N. Cameron has been identified as the regular photographer of MacWatt’s collection of Primulas and other items in his horticultural collection, and responsible for the illustrations in his publications.
Amelia Nisbet Cameron was born at Trinity Lodge in Duns, Berwickshire on 21 October 1871 to the late Rev Daniel Cameron (1840 -1871) and Elizabeth Waller Dowling Brown (1842-1879). Daniel, Minister of Ayton Parish Church had died on 3 June. Elizabeth remarried on 28 June 1875, to William George Dunlop (Scotsman 29 June 1875, p8) but died 4 years later.
In 1891, Amelia, now aged 19, is listed in the census with her elder sister Elizabeth Waller Cameron (1869 -1955), aged 21, as living with their great-aunt Margaret Stuart Brown, aged 68, sister of their maternal grandfather Forbes Scott Brown (1816-1874). Along with 7 Brown relatives and 8 live-in servants, their residence was Nisbet House, the castle/mansion at Edrom. Both young women were described as 'living on independent means'. As they had lost both their parents when small, Margaret Brown may have had a leading part in their up-bringing.
By the time of the 1901 census, Amelia, with her great-aunt and 3 servants, is recorded as living again in the place of her birth, - Trinity Lodge, a respectable but less magnificent residence, long in the hands of the Brown family. It seems that Trinity Lodge remained Amelia's home for the rest of her life. In his 1923 monograph on 'The Primulas of Europe', Dr John MacWatt refers to her as Miss Amy N. Cameron of Trinity, Duns. At 'Morelands' in Station Road, Duns, his married home with extensive gardens, MacWatt would have been a near neighbour.
In 1923 Dr John MacWatt publishes ‘The Primulas of Europe’ with 41 black and white and 8 coloured illustrations. In the introduction (vi) he states: ‘My thanks are also due to Miss Amy Cameron, Trinity, Duns, for the generous way in which she has expended time and labour in the photographs which add so greatly to the value of the book’. Some of these, published earlier, were among figs 25-40 illustrating his 1913 paper to the Third Primula Conference and/or were among the MacWatt prints dated 1913 in the RBGE collection, confirming that Amy was already his regular plant photographer by this date.
When interviewed in April 2023, Mrs Elizabeth Farquharson, MacWatt’s youngest child, then aged 107, had clear memories of Amy. She described her as shorter and stouter than her elder sister. Although she was artistic and sometimes tinted her prints, it was for her accuracy that MacWatt particularly appreciated her work. Amy apparently had no interest in selling her prints and rarely even signed them.
In New Flora and Silva, Vol 2, No 2 (January 1930), 111-112, Amy Cameron provided a note, illustrated with a photograph (Fig xxxv) on ‘Digitalis dubia’ in the New and Interesting Plants section. She describes and comments on the performance of this perennial foxglove from the Balearic Islands, which she has grown from seed. ‘The Foxglove in the accompanying picture is growing at the top of a miniature cliff, with Erica vagans St. Kerverne growing near it’. This implies that a year before her death she was still active as a photographer, and was herself a knowledgeable horticulturist.
Amy Nisbet Cameron died on 19 April 1931. A report of her funeral appeared in Berwickshire News and Advertiser 28 April 1931, p6; the pall bearers listed included her sister, Dr MacWatt, and Mr George Hume, gardener, Trinity.
Biography by Dr. Helen Bennett

W.H. Campbell was a student of Robert Graham and one of the founding members of the Botanical Society of Edinburgh in 1836, becoming its first Secretary.

Bertha Chandler (Mrs. C. Norman Kemp) was the first woman to obtain the degree of D.Sc. of Edinburgh University July 1915.