Browne, Patrick (c.1720–1790), botanist and physician, was born at Woodstock, Crossboyne, Co. Mayo, fourth son of Edward Browne, landowner; his mother's name is not known. In 1737 he went to live in Antigua with a relative, but ill health prompted his return to Europe, where he studied medicine in Paris for five years and pursued his personal interests in botany and mathematics. He moved to Leiden and continued his medical studies for a further two years, graduating MD 21 February 1743. While there he became acquainted with Gronovius and began a twenty-year correspondence with Linnaeus. He practised medicine at St Thomas's hospital in London for two years before returning to the West Indies (1746–55), spending time in Antigua and the other sugar islands before settling in Kingston, Jamaica. He worked as a doctor but continued to follow his interest in natural history by observing and collecting specimens of the island's plants and animals. On his return to Europe he published a new map of Jamaica (London, 1755), for which he profited by 400 guineas (£420). The following year he published The civil and natural history of Jamaica (1756; 2nd ed. 1769), which contained his observations of the economics, geology, and natural history of the island and included detailed engravings of the flora and fauna. In it he commented on having collected more plants than fellow Irishman Hans Sloane (qv), who had published an earlier natural history of Jamaica (1707–25). The Danish zoologist Peter Ascanius, writing to Linnaeus, said he thought Browne a superior botanist to Sloane.
Browne continued to travel between Europe and the West Indies, making six trips in all during his lifetime. He subsequently wrote ‘A catalogue of the plants of the British sugar colonies’, classified and described according to the Linnaean system, which he later sent to Sir Joseph Banks, the naturalist and president of the Royal Society, with a letter dated ‘Castlebar, 22 November 1787’. Banks's promise of a publication never materialised. Browne's collection of Jamaican plants was purchased in 1758 by Solander for Linnaeus for £8 8s. (£8.40). When in Ireland he continued his observations of natural history and published catalogues of the birds and fishes of Ireland in Exshaw's Gentleman's and London Magazine (June, August 1774).
In a later voyage to the West Indies he mainly stayed in Monserrat and Antigua, continuing to practise medicine for a further four years. However, he used his extensive leisure time to collect a large herbarium and many seeds. In 1781 he returned to Ireland for the last time and settled on the family estate near Ballinrobe, Co. Mayo. Before his death he compiled a catalogue of the plants of Mayo and Galway with descriptions of several hundred plants in Fasiculus plantarum Hiberniae (1788), written in Latin, with English and Irish names. On the advice of Sir Joseph Banks, he sent a copy of the flora to the provost of TCD, and a surviving one is held by the Linnean Society, London. In this he made reference to the desirability of forming a botanical garden in Ireland, an idea that may have influenced Walter Wade (qv) to petition to form a botanical garden in Dublin. He had also begun a Flora Indiae Occidentalis. He presented his herbarium of West Indian and Irish plants to Edward Hill (qv), professor of botany in TCD. However, no trace of this collection remains. A small herbarium of plants from Mayo and Galway was also given to the Linnean Society.
A tall, handsome man, Browne was known for his gentle manners, generosity, and cheerful temperament. He married a woman native to Antigua but had no children. He died 29 August 1790 at Rushbrook, Co. Mayo, and was interred in the family grave at Crosboyne, where the inscription on his monument was penned by himself. Baron Nikolaus von Jacquin, director of the Schonbrunn Imperial Gardens in Vienna, dedicated the genus Brownaea to him.