POTT
could be got they likewise should have their passage freed which conditions Me. Pott having accepted of was refferred to the commitees to be further treated and concluded with."
Dr. Theodore Gulstone, graduate of Oxford, died in 1632, bequeathing $1,000 for founding the Gulstonian chair of anatomy in the London College of Surgeons, a lectureship which is still continued.
Dr. Pott became a member of the Council b}^ royal selection on May 24, 1625, and governor by election of the Council on March 5, 1628. After little more than a year as chief executive he was succeeded by Sir John Harvey. Hardly had the latter assumed the reins of government before Dr. Pott's enemies sought his disgrace, charging him with having pardoned and restored the privi- leges of a wilful murderer, and with holding some cattle not his ov/n. Har- vey confiscated his property and ordered him to remain under arrest at his home until the General Court of July 9, 1630, when he was arraigned before a jur}? of thirteen on the charge of "felony." The doctor declared the evidence against him hypocritical and unrehable but the jury found against him. Gov. Harvey withheld sentence until he could learn the wishes of the King, writing him that the prisoner "was the only physician in the Colony skilled in epidemical diseases," pleaded for his pardon, and the restora- tion of his estate because of his lengthy residence and valuable service. Mrs. Pott took ship for England to importune the Iving in person.
Charles appointed a commission to determine the matter, which reported that the condemning of Dr. Pott "for felony" upon superficial evidence was drastic and very erroneous. The King signed his pardon restoring all rights and privileges on July 25, 1631, most par- ticularly for the reason that he was " the only physician in the Colony."
After his pardon by the King, Dr. Pott retired from public life and devoted his time to his profession. He had acquired
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POTTER
a grant of three acres on Jamestown
Island in 1624, which was increased to
twelve acres in 1628, but the unheal thi-
ness of the Island drove him inland, in
1632 he purchased a plantation and
erected the first home in Middle Planta-
tion, seven miles from James City, which
he called "Harop." The fact that the
"Surgeon of the Colony" had moved to
Middle Plantation was a convincing
argument in favor of its healthfulness.
Surveys were quickly made and new
homes erected so that there grew up
around "Harop" a village which was
later given the name of Williamsburg,
where in 1693 the College of William and
Mary was founded under royal patronage.
Williamsburg, first the habitation of Dr. Pott, became the capital of Virginia in 1698, and here her lawmakers assembled until the exigencies of the Revolution made it advisable to transfer the seat of government to Richmond, in 1779.
It is not known when Dr. Pott died, but his death probably occurred in Vir- ginia, and certainly after March 25, 1651, at which time his son John, styled Jr., signed the test of fealty to the Common- wealth as a citizen of Northampton County. C. C. M.
From the Interstate Med. Jour., St. Louis, June, 1910. (Caleb C. McGruder.)
Potter, Frank Hamilton (1860-1891).
Frank Hamilton Potter was the only son and eldest child of Dr. William Warren Potter, and born in Cowlesville, Wyoming County, New York, January 8, 1860. Descended from a long Une of American physicians, he early directed his attention to medicine and graduated at the Buffalo Medical College in the class of 1882. Prior to his graduation, he served in the Rochester City Hospital for two years. After receiving his degree he settled in Buffalo, and, on the organiza- tion of the Medical Department of Ni- agara University in 1883, was appointed clinical assistant in surgery. He subse- quently held the lectureship of descrip- tive anatomy, in 1884; demonstrator in surgery, and lecturer on botany in 1884-
