Rosa ‘Scarlet Moss’

Horticultural & Botanical History

The date of introduction of ‘Scarlet Moss’ is given as 1808 by Hurst, quoting Shailer.  But there are a number of candidates for ‘Scarlet Moss’.  This may be the ‘Dark Moss Rose’, or ‘Mousseuse Coccinée’ of Catherine Gore, or one of the other dark moss roses she describes, such as ‘Mousseuse de la Flèche’, synonym ‘Anemone Moss Rose’.  Dickerson is emphatic that the ‘Scarlet Moss’ is ‘De La Flèche’, bred by Lemeunier in 1824.  This is clearly Gore’s ‘Mousseuse de la Flèche’ as he gives the synonyms ‘Fleur d’Anémone’ and ‘Sanguinea’.  William Paul also describes ‘De La Flèche’, synonym ‘Scarlet’ in the first edition of The Rose Garden.  [Paul (1848)].  Gore describes the flowers of the ‘Dark Moss Rose’ as middle-sized, full, regular, of a bright deep pink, almost red, and those of ‘Mousseuse de la Flèche’ as small, semi-double, saucer-shaped, of a dark pink and very mossy.  Paul describes the flowers of ‘De La Flèche’ as double, medium-sized, cupped and well mossed.

History at Camden Park

Included in a handwritten list of roses dated 1861, probably intended for a new edition of the catalogue that was never printed.  [MP A2943].

Notes