Guildhall Library, Society of Apothecaries List of Candidates, mss 21,747/2; Examination Pass Books, mss 8241/23 (folio 177) and 8242/26 (no. 48).
2.
Public Record Office (PRO), Register of Appointments, Totnes Union (ref. MH9/17, page 571). He was appointed in March 1874, and resigned, giving no reason, in April of the following year.
3.
PRO, 1881 census of 35 Fore Street, Totnes (ref. RG11/2176/81).
4.
PRO, 1891 census of Melrose Villa East, 73 London Road, Reading (ref. RG12/994/14).
5.
He had listed these on his Society of Apothecaries application form for the primary examination. Hackney Archives, letter from Hackney archivist, 1965.
6.
Henry Jelley hinted that he went to Glasgow from America, but there is no record of his arrival in Scotland by sea in 1904. PRO, Incoming Passengers to Glasgow, 1904 (refs BT26/222 and 223).
7.
Society of Apothecaries, Book of Licentiates (1900–10), folio 222.
8.
His results (written and oral examinations, respectively), were as follows: Chemistry (74%, 40%); practical chemistry (oral only, 50%); materia medica (85%, 85%); anatomy (75%, 70%); physiology (69%, 60%); surgery, clinical cases (oral only, 50%); surgery, anatomy etc. (64%, 52%); instruments etc. (written only, 70%); surgery (65%, 60%); surgical pathology (60%, 80%); clinical medicine (67%, 66%); therapeutics etc. (61%, 90%); pathology (62%, 63%); forensic medicine etc. (62%, 55%); midwifery (40%, 40%). I am grateful to Mrs D Cook ma darm, archivist to the Society of Apothecaries, for this information.
9.
Op. cit. ref. 7.
10.
Hackney Gazette, 1 January 1912.
11.
Daily Mail, 29 March 1912; Hackney Gazette, 19 April 1912. On this occasion the magistrate dismissed the case, but he was to be found guilty of similar misdemeanours, as well as of maltreating his horses, on numerous occasions between 1912 and 1914.
12.
Hackney Gazette, 26 February 1912.
13.
The Times, 13 January 1912.
14.
“The Threepenny Doctor summoned for abuse, an amusing case”. Hackney Gazette, 30 October 1912.
15.
The Times, 27 November 1912.
16.
Hackney Gazette, 27 November 1912.
17.
Hackney Gazette, 27 December 1912.
18.
The Times, 24 December 1912.
19.
Hackney Gazette, 28 February 1913.
20.
The ceremony was performed by the Reverend Francis Corbett at St Barnabas's Church in Hackney. The witnesses were the bride's parents, James and Florence Louisa Glenham (Family Records Centre, ref, 1911, Hackney registration district, page 357).
21.
Evening Times, 31 August 1911; Hackney Gazette, 1 September 1911.
22.
The Threepenny Doctor, Doctor Jelley of Hackney. London: Centreprise Trust, 1983. The reluctance of the local nubile population may have had more than a little to do with Harold's peculiarities. After the war he was fined £5 for “an act of indecency with intent to insult a female”. His father paid the fine for him. Hackney & Kingsland Gazette, 21 March 1923.
23.
Most of those he attacked with the horsewhip were children who had been taunting him. Hackney Gazette, 15 January 1912.
24.
Hackney Gazette, 22 April 1912.
25.
The jury foreman of the inquest into the death of four-year-old Bertha Littleton, one of the doctor's patients, whom he had refused to visit, stated, “We cannot commend the doctor's humanity”. Daily Mirror, 28 December 1912.
26.
Hackney Gazette, 1 January 1912.
27.
MillerL. Introduction. In: The Threepenny Doctor. Jelley of Hackney. London: Centreprise Trust, 1983.
28.
He was certainly no establishment figure; he filled out his return for the Medical Register only once in the three years (1911–13) in which his name appears. I am grateful to Ms Mandy Mordue, BMA archivist, for this information.
29.
Hackney Gazette, 22 January 1913. On 15 January, an anonymous correspondent, the wife of a doctor, had written at length to complain of the burden that the Insurance Act would place on her husband. Rosalind Landon, the wife of a panel doctor, rejoindered, stating how proud she was that her husband was associated with the Act.
30.
Hackney Gazette, 3 January 1913.
31.
The Times, 8 February 1913.
32.
The Times, 8 February 1913.
33.
Hackney Gazette, 10 February 1913.
34.
It would seem that he found difficulty staving off competition after leaving the panel, as evidenced by his financial problems in 1915 (see below).
35.
It was not the first time he had been questioned on his methods after the death of a baby from chest disease. The Times, 27 April 1914.
36.
Daily Express, 24 December 1914.
37.
The quality of his treatment was questioned at the inquest into the death of seven-year-old Millicent Mills and an infant called Greenwood in December 1911 (The Times, 1 January 1912), and into the death from accidental suffocation of 30-year-old Adam Dye in 1913 (The Times, 6 February 1913).
38.
The Times, 11 June 1915.
39.
PRO, petitions for bankruptcy (ref. B12/15/18 verso). At the time of his bankruptcy, his liabilities were over £136, and his assets totalled only £6. He offered to pay the debt at £10 per month, but agreed that, although his practice was large, each patient brought in only three or four pence. The libel action had plunged him into difficulties; he had earned £1000 a year until 1913, but, since then, his practice had fallen off. The Times, 14 July and 11 August 1915.
40.
ShorterE. A History of Women's Bodies. London: Allen Lane, 1983: 177–224.
41.
Irvine Loudon disagrees with Shorter's thesis in: Deaths in childbed from the eighteenth century to 1935. Med Hist1986;30: 1–41.
42.
BMJ, February 1916: 206.
43.
MacLarenA. Illegal operations: Women, doctors and abortion. Journal of Social History, summer 1993: 797–816, p. 799.
44.
PRO, Calendar of Prisoners, 27 June and 18 July 1916 (ref. Crim 9/62). The warrant was issued on 17 June, following the request of the coroner, W Westcott, who had undertaken the inquest into Caroline Marsh's death.
45.
PRO, Calendar of Indictments (ref. Crim5/10).
46.
PRO, Central Criminal Court, First Court Minute Book, 19 May 1914 to 2 September 1917 (ref. Crim6/24).
47.
The official record of the trial is closed until 2117. This account has been taken from the Hackney & Kingsland Gazette, 24 July 1916, and Daily Mail, 17 June and 22 July 1916.
48.
This was no doubt caused by Henry Jelley's pathological hatred of all officials, and his refusal to allow utility company employees to enter the premises.
49.
Society of Apothecaries, Court Minute Book, 1913–26, f. 160.
50.
Hackney Gazette, 28 July 1916.
51.
PRO, Court of Criminal Appeal register (ref. J81/5) and Record of Male Prisoners, Licences Issued (ref. PCOM6/23). There is no record of the petition, or of Florrie Jelley's letter to the Home Secretary. PRO, Correspondence Registers of the Home Office (refs. HO146/18 & HO57/22).
52.
Hackney Gazette, 10 September 1913.
53.
Hackney & Kingsland Gazette, 7 October 1921.
54.
Hackney & Kingsland Gazette, 12 October 1921.
55.
Hackney & Kingsland Gazette, 16 November 1921.
56.
Hackney & Kingsland Gazette, 1 December 1922.
57.
Hackney & Kingsland Gazette, 22 January 1923.
58.
Hackney & Kingsland Gazette, 1 November 1922.
59.
Hackney Gazette and North London Advertiser, 13 July 1965. Letter from Charles Stock, former patient. There were similar recollections in the same newspaper on 20 July 1965.
60.
The Threepenny Doctor. Dr Jelley of Hackney. London: Centreprise Trust, 1983.
61.
DavinA. Hospital days. In: The Threepenny Doctor. Dr Jelley of Hackney. London: Centreprise Trust, 1983.
