Did you ever hear of Joel Roberts Poinsett? Probably not. Yet this distinguished American—born in Charleston, South Carolina, March 2, 1779 and died Dec. 12, 1851—loved and served his country well.
He was an expert in agriculture, architecture, horticulture, medicine, military science, linguistics, and law. He was a writer, a road and bridge builder, a botanist, a legislator, a diplomat, a cabinet member, an advisor to foreign heads of state, a founder of the Smithsonian Institution, probably the “greatest American traveler of his time,” and Deputy Grand Master of Masons in South Carolina. Five Presidents of the United States, James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, and Martin Van Buren evidenced their estimate of his character and ability by appointing him to positions of public trust.
Poinsett was educated at Woolwich Military Academy in England and at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. In 1809 he was United States Commissioner to South America. In Chile he skillfully brought about release of American seamen who had been seized by Spanish authorities in Peru because of an unfounded rumor of war between the United States and Spain.
Returning home he served in the South Carolina legislature, followed by two terms in congress. From 1825 to 1829 he was U.S. Minister to Mexico. Returning home again he allied with the union party in strenuously opposing nullification.
Companion Joel R. Poinsett served as Deputy General Grand High Priest for the General Grand Chapter of Royal Arch Masons from 1829 to 1838. He was a Past Master of both Recovery Lodge No. 31, Greenville, S.C. and of Solomon’s Lodge No.1, in Charleston, S.C.
President Martin Van Buren appointed him Secretary of War and he served in that office from 1837 to 1841. In 1840 he forced through a very beneficial measure for reorganizing militia units. His later years were spent in retirement in South Carolina where he founded the Charleston Academy of Fine Arts and published his “Notes on Mexico.”
He was an ambitious man who served his country with zeal and had a burning desire to have his name recorded in the History of the United States. He did. Ironically, however, it was not his public service but a by-product of his diplomatic work in Mexico which made his name immortal.
In Mexico he found a shrub of the Euphorbiacae family, which bore small yellow terminal flowers surrounded by brilliant vermillion bracts. Poinsett was enchanted by its marvelous beauty; he sent plants home to South Carolina and brought more with him on his return. They were distributed by his friend Robert Buist in Philadelphia and became popular the nation over.
Their botanical name as cultivated in hothouses became Poinsettia pilcherrima—Poinsett’s flower. It is the bright red Christmas flower that has given joy to millions.
Whenever I gaze at a Poinsettia it brings back childhood memories of the large stand that my mother had in the 1950’s growing outside our dining room window in north Riverside. The flowers were much smaller than today’s versions but the plants were taller.
Joel Roberts Poinsett—Secretary of War, Minister to Mexico, Congressman and Commissioner to South America—is forgotten.
But the name he hoped to make famous through his years of public service lives on through the fragile, tropical flower he brought home from Mexico—the poinsettia, or Poinsett’s flower.
Blessings upon each and every one of you this season. In the Sacred Name of I.N.R.I. I pray.
Glenn E. Chandler, Snr.
M.I. Grand Master