Dr. John Fothergill appears uniformly to have evinced an interest in Pennsylvania, at first in relation to medical affairs, and subsequently in a more extended way by his anxiety to avert the calamity of war between the colonies and the mother country.[1] He was of the same religious persuasion as William Penn, and hence his concern for the welfare and prosperity of the Province. Dr. Wistar tells us “that the people of Pennsylvania seem always to have been regarded with affection by this gentleman, but at the present period he was more interested in them than usual. The Pennsylvania Hospital had lately been erected; he took it for granted that students would resort to it, and supposed that they would experience great difficulty in acquiring a knowledge of anatomy. To remedy this defect in the medical education of Pennsylvania, he employed Rimsdyck, one of the first artists of Great Britain, to execute the crayon paintings, now at our Hospital, which exhibit the whole structure of the body, at two-thirds the natural size, and the gravid uterus, with many of the varied circumstances of natural or preternatural parturition, of full size. Jentry, an anatomist of London, is said to have made the dissections from which these paintings were made, and Dr. William Hunter sometimes examined the work. They are supposed to have cost two hundred guineas, which, in addition to one hundred and fifty guineas which he contributed to the institution, constitute a most substantial proof of his regard as well as of his liberality.”
The account of the arrival and reception by the Hospital of the donation of Dr. Fothergill is given in the Minutes of the Board of Managers, to wit—“At a Meeting of the Managers and Treasurer, in the Warden’s Room at the Court House, Philada., the 8th, 11 month (Nov.), 1762.
“The Board being called at the request of Dr. William Shippen, Jr., lately arrived from London, he attended and informed the Board that per the Caroline, Capt. Friend, are
- ↑ Life of Dr. Fothergill by John Coakley Lettsom, M. D., see the “Works of Dr. Fothergill,” London, vol. 3d, 1784, Oct., also in Quarto ed. The account of Dr. Fothergill’s association with Dr. Franklin is most interesting, in an effort to prevent the American war. His political papers on this subject are worthy of perusal.
