The late Dr Henry R Viets (1890–1969) suggested in 1940 that the author of A Journal of a Young Man of Massachusetts was Amos G Babcock. He also showed that Benjamin Waterhouse edited the manuscript. A similar journal, The Prisoner’s Memoirs of Dartmoor Prison by Charles Andrews, is also described and contrasted. The career of Professor Waterhouse is narrated in relation to the medical politics at that time in New England: a possible explanation for Babcock’s anonymous authorship is given.
Viets HR. A Journal, of a Young Man of Massachusetts … Written by Himself. Boston, 1816, and a Note on the Author. Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine 1939–40; 12: 605–622. This does not include the Shakespearean quotation on the title page: ‘Nothing extenuate, or set down aught in malice’.
2.
Ibid: p.606.
3.
National Archives, Kew, England. ADM 103/167, p.86.
4.
Ibid: p.108.
5.
AgnewR. Journal of a young man of Massachusetts. Journal of Medical Biography2010; 18: 181–182.
6.
WolfeRJ. Obituary of Henry Rouse Viets MD (1890--1969). Bulletin of the Medical Librarians Association1969; 57: 437–437.
7.
Viets HR. (op. cit. ref. 1): pp.611--618.
8.
Viets HR. Waterhouse, Benjamin (Mar. 4, 1754 – Oct. 2, 1846). Dictionary of American Biography 1936; 19: 531.
9.
Viets HR. (op. cit. ref. 1): p.610.
10.
Viets HR. (op. cit. ref. 8): p.532.
11.
Viets HR. (op. cit. ref. 1): p.610.
12.
Viets HR. (op. cit. ref. 1): pp.619–622.
13.
WaterhouseB. Cautions to young persons concerning health, Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1805.
14.
Viets HR. (op. cit. ref. 8): p.531.
15.
Viets HR. (op. cit. ref. 1): p.605.
16.
Ibid: p.606.
17.
SchulliamDM. The anonymous publications of Benjamin Waterhouse. Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences1958; xiii: 251–251.
18.
Andrews C. The Personal Memoirs or, DARTMOOR PRISON, containing a complete and impartial HISTORY of the entire captivity of the AMERICANS IN ENGLAND, from the commencement of the late war between the United States and Great Britain, until all prisoners were released by the TREATY OF GHENT. Also, a Particular Detail of all occurrences relative to that HORRID MASSACRE AT DARTMOOR, on the fatal evening of 6th April 1815. The whole carefully compiled from the journal of Charles Andrews, a prisoner in England, from the commencement of the war, until the release of all the Prisoners. Quaeque ipse miserrima vidi, et quorum pars magna fuit; quis talia fando, temperat a lacrymis? Virg.1.11.v.5 [These sufferings I myself have seen, and the great part of which I was a principal party. Who can relate such woes without a tear?] Printed for the author, New York, 1815.
19.
Library of the University of Michigan catalogue No.977.069.
StoneAKWaterhouse, Benjamin (1754--1846). In: KellyHABurrageWL (eds). American Medical Biographies, Baltimore: The Norman Remington Company, 1920, pp. 1200–1200.
30.
AbrahamJJ. Lettsom and America. Lettsom, his life, times, friends and descendants, London: William Heinemann Medical Books Ltd, 1933, pp. 360–360.
DyeIAmerican maritime prisoners of war, 1812--1815. In: RunyanTJ (eds). Ships, seafaring and society: essays in maritime history, Appendix II; A Descriptive List of Prisoners of War Journals, Detroit: Wade State University Press, 1987, pp. 316–316.
