Henri Ernest Baillon (; 30 November 1827 in Calais â 19 July 1895 in Paris) was a French botanist and physician.
Baillon spent his academic career teaching natural history and publishing numerous works on botany. He was appointed to the Légion d'honneur in 1867, joined the Royal Society in 1894 and put together the Dictionnaire de botanique with Auguste Faguet's wood engravings.
He obtained his doctorate in Medicine in Paris in 1855 and passed the agrégation in medicine in 1857. He also obtained a doctorate in natural sciences in 1858. He succeeded Moquin-Tandon as chair of medical natural history at the Paris School of Medicine in 1863. He later became professor of hygiene and natural history at the ÃÂcole Centrale Paris.
He was made a Knight of the Legion of Honour on August 14, 1867, and promoted to Officer on July 13, 1888.
Jacques Désiré Leandri (1903-1982)âÂÂwho did not know him personally, having been born after Baillon's deathâÂÂsaid of him: âÂÂHe had a difficult and ironic character that made him enemies, and while his supporters at the Museum and the Institute were passionate and convinced, his enemies were no less soâÂÂ; and François Gagnepain (1866-1952) said: âÂÂVery witty but a little sharpâÂÂ. In fact, Baillon did not mince his words in his criticism. For example, we read: âÂÂIt seems that, with his usual inaccuracy in observing plant organization, he (Duchartre) mistook a large placenta laden with anatropous ovules for a single ovuleâÂÂ; and, less than 20 lines later: âÂÂI need not say that the one whose descriptions contain the most errors is, as always, Mr. Decaisne,â followed by supporting evidence. This colors Decaisne's attitude (see the section below on âÂÂLearned societiesâÂÂ), but Baillon is essentially right: 150 years later, we are still surprised by the âÂÂrelative theoretical mediocrity of Joseph Decaisne.â Baillon did not reserve his sarcasm for his colleagues: the Revue encyclopédique of 1895 states that he had a reputation as a terrible examiner and was particularly feared by medical students. This did not prevent him from taking a group of students to Jean-Jacques Rousseau grave in Ermenonville for the centenary of the death of the âÂÂfather of the Revolutionâ and giving a speech celebrating herbalism and botany, the science of observation taking precedence over the knowledge of words.
Henri Baillon is credited with writing a Dictionary of Botany and a voluminous History of Plants.
He died suddenly, struck down by congestion in his bath. His grave is in Montparnasse Cemetery (Paris), 8th division.