Engraving of Richard Mead, 1754. Boston Medical Library in the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine.
The Center for the History of Medicine staff members report that as they review and examine the rare books in the Center’s holdings for inclusion in the Medical Heritage Library digitization project, surprising things continue to come to light:
Our copy of the 1708 second edition of A mechanical account of poisons in several essays, Richard Mead’s tract on vipers, tarantulas, and mad dogs, will soon be appearing in the MHL, but in looking through one of the copies of the fourth edition of 1745 we found the volume to be a presentation copy from its author. The endpaper bears an inscription from William Shrimpton in 1748, stating “My Uncle Mead desir’d me to present this book to the College Library in New England,” with the addendum, “Forwarded by yr. humble serv’t, John Hunt, by desire of my uncle, Mr. William Shrimpton of London.” Richard Mead (1673-1754) was physician to King George II of England, and the volume was probably commended to the care of Boston merchant, John Hunt (1715-1763), a graduate of Harvard College in 1734, whose mother was a Shrimpton.
Of possibly even greater interest, though, is the inscription on the volume’s Harvard bookplate, stating “This book belonged to the Library before the fire of Jan. 24, 1764.” On that night, during a storm of snow and high wind, Harvard Hall, containing the College’s books and scientific apparatus, caught fire. Over 5,000 volumes were destroyed, with only 404 surviving, the books being either on loan or recent donations not yet unpacked. Many of those new acquisitions, which helped to rebuild the library, were gifts of Thomas Hollis (1720-1774), who also endowed Harvard’s oldest book acquisition fund. His name and generosity are perpetuated through Harvard’s library catalog, HOLLIS (which also is an acronym for the Harvard OnLine Library Information System.)
To see an early edition of Richard Mead’s text along with other titles digitized for the Medical Heritage Library, see http://www.archive.org/details/medicalheritagelibrary.