Andrew Dickson Murray (19 February 1812, Edinburgh – 10 January 1878, Kensington) was a Scottish lawyer, botanist, zoologist and entomologist. Murray studied insects which caused crop damage, specialising in the Coleoptera. In botany, he specialised in the Coniferae, in particular the Pacific Rim conifer species.
He served as president of the Royal Physical Society of Edinburgh during 1858–59.
Life
He was born at 17 Forth Street in Edinburgh, on 19 February 1812, and was son of William Murray WS of Conland (now part of Glenrothes) and Duncrivie (near Kinross), and his wife Mary Thompson (d.1871).
Murray was apprenticed in law under his father, and became a Writer to the Signet in 1837, joined the firm of Murray & Rhind, and for some time practised in Edinburgh.
His earliest scientific papers were entomological, and did not appear until he was forty.
On the death of the Rev. John Fleming, professor of natural science in New College, Edinburgh, in 1857, Murray took up his work for one session, and in the same year he became a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
On the foundation of the Oregon Exploration Society, he became its secretary, and this apparently first aroused his interest in Western North America and in the Coniferae.
In 1858–59, Murray acted as president of the Botanical Society of Edinburgh, and in 1860, abandoning the legal profession, he came to London and became assistant secretary to the Royal Horticultural Society (1860–5).
In 1861, he was elected fellow of the Linnean Society.
