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SIR ROBERT WALPOLE, 1ST EARL OF ORFORD (1676-1745)
Document signed, an order for payment to Charles Maitland, surgeon, in pursuance of a royal warrant signed [by King George I] on 14 August, n.p. [London], 23 August 1724, signed by Walpole, George Baillie and George Dodington in the right hand margin, and by Lord Halifax and Lord Powlet at the foot, receipted by Maitland on the verso, one page, folio (cancellans in ink on recto, slightly browned, a few ink smudges, small splits in horizontal folds, edges strengthened and small old repairs on verso).
THE INOCULATION FOR SMALLPOX OF THE FUTURE HEIR TO THE THRONE
An order for the payment to Charles Maitland of 'One thousand pounds without account' in addition to two hundred pounds already paid 'which his Ma[jes]ty [King George I] is graciously pleased to Grant and allow unto him not only in regard to his skill and ability and the Joy and satisfaction his Ma[jes]ty had in his successfully practising thereof upon his Dearly Beloved Grand Child Prince Frederick whom he inoculated for the small pox' but also to pay his expenses in returning from Hanover for the purpose.
The Aberdeen-educated surgeon Charles Maitland was the surgeon to the English embassy in Constantinople during the residence from 1716 to 1718 of Sir Edward Wortley Montagu, whose wife Lady Mary is often credited with the introduction of the practice of inoculation against smallpox into England. Maitland and Lady Mary (who had survived the disease herself in London in 1715) had learned of the technique used by the Turks from Dr Emmanuel Timoni, a surgeon from Padua who had given an account of the practice in the Transactions of the Royal Society in 1714. While there, with the help of Dr Maitland she arranged for the inoculation of her five-year-old son and, during an epidemic of smallpox in London in 1721, she persuaded a somewhat reluctant Maitland to vaccinate her daughter. Lady Mary promoted the practice among her friends and interested Princess Caroline, wife of the heir to the throne, who, after the procedure had been tested without ill effects on six condemned prisoners in Newgate prison, arranged for Maitland to inoculate two of her daughters in 1722. The Royal Family were sufficiently convinced of the satisfactoriness of the treatment for Maitland to be sent to Hanover in 1724 to vaccinate the second-in-line to the throne.
The technique used in Constantinople, known as variolation, consisted of transferring a smallpox scale in powdered form to the nostril of the patient, so giving him a mild case of the disease which conferred future immunity. The smallpox vaccine was refined and developed in its more effective form by Edward Jenner at the end of the 18th-century (cf. lot 15).
Frederick Louis, Prince of Wales (1707-1751) was the eldest son of Prince George of Hanover, who succeeded to the throne as King George II in 1727, by his marriage to Princess Caroline of Ansbach. Frederick, whose home became a centre of opposition to his father, predeceased him and his own son succeeded as King George III in 1760. Frederick remained in Hanover, his birthplace, until 1728.
Document signed, an order for payment to Charles Maitland, surgeon, in pursuance of a royal warrant signed [by King George I] on 14 August, n.p. [London], 23 August 1724, signed by Walpole, George Baillie and George Dodington in the right hand margin, and by Lord Halifax and Lord Powlet at the foot, receipted by Maitland on the verso, one page, folio (cancellans in ink on recto, slightly browned, a few ink smudges, small splits in horizontal folds, edges strengthened and small old repairs on verso).
THE INOCULATION FOR SMALLPOX OF THE FUTURE HEIR TO THE THRONE
An order for the payment to Charles Maitland of 'One thousand pounds without account' in addition to two hundred pounds already paid 'which his Ma[jes]ty [King George I] is graciously pleased to Grant and allow unto him not only in regard to his skill and ability and the Joy and satisfaction his Ma[jes]ty had in his successfully practising thereof upon his Dearly Beloved Grand Child Prince Frederick whom he inoculated for the small pox' but also to pay his expenses in returning from Hanover for the purpose.
The Aberdeen-educated surgeon Charles Maitland was the surgeon to the English embassy in Constantinople during the residence from 1716 to 1718 of Sir Edward Wortley Montagu, whose wife Lady Mary is often credited with the introduction of the practice of inoculation against smallpox into England. Maitland and Lady Mary (who had survived the disease herself in London in 1715) had learned of the technique used by the Turks from Dr Emmanuel Timoni, a surgeon from Padua who had given an account of the practice in the Transactions of the Royal Society in 1714. While there, with the help of Dr Maitland she arranged for the inoculation of her five-year-old son and, during an epidemic of smallpox in London in 1721, she persuaded a somewhat reluctant Maitland to vaccinate her daughter. Lady Mary promoted the practice among her friends and interested Princess Caroline, wife of the heir to the throne, who, after the procedure had been tested without ill effects on six condemned prisoners in Newgate prison, arranged for Maitland to inoculate two of her daughters in 1722. The Royal Family were sufficiently convinced of the satisfactoriness of the treatment for Maitland to be sent to Hanover in 1724 to vaccinate the second-in-line to the throne.
The technique used in Constantinople, known as variolation, consisted of transferring a smallpox scale in powdered form to the nostril of the patient, so giving him a mild case of the disease which conferred future immunity. The smallpox vaccine was refined and developed in its more effective form by Edward Jenner at the end of the 18th-century (cf. lot 15).
Frederick Louis, Prince of Wales (1707-1751) was the eldest son of Prince George of Hanover, who succeeded to the throne as King George II in 1727, by his marriage to Princess Caroline of Ansbach. Frederick, whose home became a centre of opposition to his father, predeceased him and his own son succeeded as King George III in 1760. Frederick remained in Hanover, his birthplace, until 1728.
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