John Fothergill (physician)

John Fothergill (March 8, 1712 – December 26, 1780), English physician, was born of a Quaker family at Carr End in Yorkshire. He took the degree of M.D. at Edinburgh in 1736, and after visiting continental Europe in 1740, settled in London, where he gained an extensive practice. In the epidemics of influenza in 1775 and 1776 he is said to have had sixty patients daily. In his leisure he made a study of conchology and botany; and at Upton, near Stratford, he had an extensive botanical garden where he grew many rare plants obtained from various parts of the world. He was the patron of Sydney Parkinson, the South Sea voyager, and also of William Bartram, the American botanist. A translation of the Bible, known as the Quaker Bible (1764 sq.) by Anthony Purver, a Quaker, was made and printed at his expense. His pamphlet entitled Account of the Sore Throat attended with Ulcers (1748) contains one of the first descriptions of diphtheria in English, and was translated into several languages. He founded Ackworth School, Pontefract, Yorkshire in 1779. He died in London aged 68 on 26 December 1780.