Last Updated : 31 Ag 2009

William Roscoe was born in 1753 at the top of Liverpool's Mount Pleasant. He died in 1831 and is buried in Roscoe Gardens in Mount Pleasant.

Roscoe has been considered Liverpool's greatest citizen and few men of his time accomplished so much. He became a lawyer and a banker and was also a poet and an international authority on Italian Art, as well as being a botanist.

In 1802 he was responsible for Liverpool Botanic Gardens, the same plan later being used for Philadelpia's botanic garden. He was sympathetic to America's independence and a friend of President Jefferson. In 1831 Roscoe, Ohio was named in commemoration of him.