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Sectional Vol. 52 page 7 Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine 231 Section of the History of Medicine President-Sir WELDON DALRYMPLE-CHAMPNEYS, Bt., C.B., M.A., D.M., F.R.C.P. Meeting December 3, 1958 John Sheldon, F.R.S., and the Exeter Medical School By NORMAN CAPENER, F.R.C.S. Exeter EXETER is an ancient City and was a provincial with requisition and billeting. The archives of metropolis. It is, therefore, natural that we Exeter provide an interesting illustration of this. should find mirrored there many of the features In 1688 William of Orange landed at Torbay of medical evolution which are familiar in the and with thirteen thousand men marched on great national metropolis itself. It is my purpose Exeter which he entered "amidst the shouts of to give an account of a place rather than of a its citizens". There exist lists of some of the man although the particular man, John Sheldon, casualties and the cost of treatment by the F.R.S. (1752-1808), is one of the more surgeons, apothecaries and by Widow Westcott picturesque features in this interesting back- (evidently the nurse in charge) at the Blue ground. It is exactly one hundred and fifty Maidens Hospital. Then there is an appeal in years since he died. 1706 to Queen Anne requesting payment of the From medieval times until the eighteenth account which William evidently had forgotten. century hospitals differed greatly in their "Whereas your Majesty's Predecessor, King functions. Some were little more than orphan- William of ever blessed memory (when Prince of ages, or were hostels for the aged poor and in Orange) did a little after his landing at Torbay the course of time became schools and alms- desire the Chamber of Exeter to take care of houses. Some were used for the isolation of part of his Army (Which there lay sick and destitute individuals suffering from such diseases disabled in and near this City) and to furnish as leprosy which made them a danger to the them with necessaries. At the same time community. When Exeter's Norman Cathedral proniising to reimburse the Chamber with such was completed in the twelfth century each of sums as (by them) should be, on this Account, these types of hospital was already established expended." The expenditure is stated to be there and has continued in some form or another £354 4s. 2jd. The Blue Maidens Hospital which until the present time. Notable amongst these had been converted into a Military Hospital was was the Hospital of St. Mary Magdalene, which one of the mediaeval schools and is now the is recognizable as a leper hospital in a Charter Maynard School, an excellent grammar school of Bishop Bartholomew in A.D. 1163, confirmed for girls. later by a Papal Bull of Celestine III in 1192. In medieval times there existed an Exeter This hospital was established just outside the Guild of Surgeons which is noted in the records city wall on a road, still called Magdalen Street, of the Guildhall but no records of the Guild which was a medieval by-pass for traffic to the itself remain. frontiers of civilization which were but a few Although it is usual to look for the origins of miles farther on. There is thus a resemblance our modern hospitals in the eighteenth century in time and possibly in early function to St. we note that the public conscience was being Bartholomew's and St. Thomas's-both outside aroused in the century before. At an early date the city walls and on the main line of com- the City fathers were making efforts to do munications: but there the resemblance ceases something, and in 1656 there was a bequest by for the Hospital of St. Mary Magdalene in due the Mayor, Thomas Ford, which was "towards course became a refuge for the aged sick and erecting a hospital for poor, sick and wounded itself fell into decay; the foundation, however, persons according to the order of St. Thomas's in the nineteenth ceiztury was moved to a new Hospital in Southwark". The first Exeter site and is now represented by some old Hospital so called was built by the commonalty almshouses which retain their ancient name. in 1665 and a new hospital was planned through Hospitals were also needed during and after an Act of Parliament passed in 1694. This wars. Such is the origin of Chelsea Hospital. second Exeter Hospital, completed in 1718, They were often arranged by improvisation; remained until 1942 when the old buildings were APRIL 232 Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine 8 destroyed by enemy action. Later nineteenth and the conscience of the Church was aroused. century and more modern buildings now form During this social awakening other Hospitals the nucleus of a good modem general hospital. were founded. In London Bart's, Thomas's, This old Exeter City Hospital within a few Bethlem and Chelsea already existed, but in years came into conflict with a new and more succession Westminster-1719, Guy's-1725, St. broadly based institution established by charitable George's-1733 and the London Hospital-1740, enterprise. Perhaps we see in this the roots of were established. At Edinburgh, Bristol and the deep prejudice of Englishmen against Winchester, hospitals were founded in 1736 and submitting their bodies to the care of municipal- at Bath the Mineral Water Hospital in 1740. ities, but perhaps even more against being The Devon and Exeter came in 1741. All these compelled by taxation to do something more hospitals existed long before those at Liverpool, rightly to be regarded as a matter for conscience Manchester or Newcastle and before Adden- and as an object for the display of pity and brooke's, the Radcliffe, Middlesex or St. Mary's. benevolence. The first physicians of the Devon and Exeter Hospital were men of great learning enriched by study abroad and especially with the great Dutch teacher Boerhaave. They included Michael Lee Dicker, a Quaker with well-marked administrative ability, and Thomas Glass, a greatly loved and respected physician who collected a great library of the medical classics which he left to the Cathedral Library. Around him there appears to have been established a Medical Society but apart from the fact that there was such a society no record of its activities remains. He was succeeded in 1783 by another physician of great literary ability, Dr. Bartholo- mew Parr, F.R.S. (1750-1810) the author of a great "London Medical Dictionary". The earlier surgeons appear to have been worthy men but we know little about their work. John Patch, senior, had been on the staff of the Old Pretender in Paris and was a considerable anatomist; he was the head of a medical dynasty in Exeter and London. His son John was appointed to the Hospital at the same time as his father: as a surgeon he made a great name for himself; his John one FIG. 1.-John Patch,. Jr. (1723-1787). Engraving portrait by Opie makes after portrait by John Opie, R.A. understand that "he had a prodigious memory, great penetration and sound judgement and his [Figs. 1, 2 and 3 are reproduced by permission of the Governors of the Royal Devon and Exeter conversation charmed by its warmth and Hospital.] benevolence". Through their portraits now in the Hospital The Devon and Exeter Hospital was founded board room we are brought into touch with in 1741 by Dean Alured Clarke who, in 1736 interesting figures in the world of art and letters. while at Winchester, had founded one of the first Michael Lee Dicker and John Tuckfield, an early County Hospitals. It was a time of great social benefactor, were painted by Thomas Hudson degradation, which was well portrayed by Gay who was the master of Joshua Reynolds, the in his "Beggars' Opera". The Gentleman's Plympton boy who became the first President Magazine contains many interesting details; for of the Royal Academy. example in 1736 it recorded an incident but a Thomas Glass and John Patch, junior, were short distance from this Society's House in a painted by John Opie, the poor Cornish prodigy list of births: "A woman in Vere Street-of her who had been befriended by John Wolcot (the 35th child by one husband." And in almost satirist "Peter Pindar"). Brian Hill (1954) gave every month of that year we see that the burials an entertaining account of these two men. were at least double the christenings, and Wolcot who came from South Devon was half the burials were of infants under 5 years. alternately a parson and a doctor but later There was great anxiety about the iniquitous gin devoted himself to teaching, and then managing, trade. The Wesleys had started their crusade the youthful artist. Having exhausted the 9 Section of the History of Medicine 233 portraiture of the county families of Cornwall, his appointment as "surgeon to the General Wolcot brought Opie to Exeter for two years Medical Asylum, St. Marylebone". In it he also before going on to' London and introducing him announced special financial assistance to former to Sir Joshua. Here Opie needed no further help pupils of Magnus Falconer, another Hunterian after Sir Joshua's introduction to the Court. disciple who, after establishing his own school It is sad to find that after a journey to Paris for of anatomy, had, like Hewson, died prematurely. study his later portraits were lacking the In 1779 Sheldon founded a medical society of distinction of his earlier work which Reynolds which he was the first president: there were described as "like Caravaggio only finer".