Frederick Hervey Foster Quin 1799 - 1878
Frederick Hervey Foster Quin (MD Edin 1820) 1799 -1878 was one of the very first homeopaths in Britain and in 1844 he established the British Homeopathic Society with ten colleagues, which included Paul Francois Curie, grandfather of the scientist Pierre Curie, William Leaf, a rich London Silk Merchant, and Thomas Roupell Everest, the younger brother of Sir George Everest.
These few had all been close confidant’s of Samuel Hahnemann during the last ten or so years of his life.
Frederick Hervey Foster Quin a student of Samuel Hahnemann and George von Neckar, and he was the homeopathic physician of Edward Bulwer Lytton, Keppel Richard Craven, William Drummond, Albany William Fonblanque, John Forster, Edwin Henry Landseer, Leopold I of Belgium, William Charles MacReady, William Makepeace Thackeray
There were also many Campbells who consulted Frederick Hervey Foster Quin.
Frederick Hervey Foster Quin was a friend of the Marquis of Anglesea, the Duke of Beaufort, George Boole, Charles Dickens, Edward VII, William Gell, Charles Powell Leslie, Henry Robinson Montagu, Augustus Henry Moreton, Moritz Wilhelm Mueller, Henry William Paget, Joseph Severn, Thomas Uwins, the Duke of Wellington, and many others.
Frederick Hervey Foster Quin was a colleague of James Smith Ayerst, William Bayes, Hugh Cameron, John Chapman, Edward Charles Chepmell, Paul Francois Curie, A J Davet, William Vallancy Drury, John James Drysdale, Robert Ellis Dudgeon, George Napoleon Epps, Thomas Roupell Everest, Arthur Guinness, Edward Hamilton, Frantz Hartmann, Amos Henriques, Richard Walter Heurtley, George Calvert Holland, Richard Hughes, Henry Kelsall, Joseph Kidd, Thomas Robinson Leadam, William Leaf, Victor Massol, J Bell Metcalfe, Samuel Thomas Partridge, Joseph Hyppolyte Pulte, John Hodgson Ramsbotham, Henry Reynolds, John Rutherford Russell, Marmaduke Blake Sampson, Charles Caulfield Tuckey, Dionysious and Severin Wielobycki, David Wilson, George Wyld, Stephen Yeldham and many others.
Frederick Hervey Foster Quin’s parentage is unknown. Quin was a schoolboy in Putney, attending a school kept by the son of Sarah Trimmer. He graduated as a medical doctor in 1820.
Quin was appointed physician to Napoleon I, who died before Quin could take up that position (as Napoleon died in 1821, this request came to Quin before he discovered homeopathy).
In 1823 Quin had an offer from Lord Byron to accompany him to Greece as his physician, but his health was too delicate to accept.
Joseph Severn was a ‘mutual friend‘ of Frederick Hervey Foster Quin and Thomas Uwins. Joseph Severn painted the famous portrait of Frederick Hervey Foster Quin, Richard Westmacott and William Etty playing cards in Naples in 1823.
Quin became the personal physician to the Elizabeth Duchess of Devonshire, attending her in her final illness in 1824.
In 1824, Quin was brutally assaulted by a coachman and nearly lost his life. He travelled to England later in 1824 where he met Robert Grosvenor, Richard Acton and Thomas Uwins.
Back in Naples in 1825, Quin was a close friend of William Hamilton, William Gell, William Drummond, the Countess of Blessington and Thomas Uwins. At this time, he became aware of homeopath George von Neckar, and he travelled to Leipsig to visit him, where he met Chevalier Lichtenfelz who was also a homeopath. In Berlin, he met several homeopaths, and he resolved to visit Samuel Hahnemann at Coethen.
On the way to Coethen, Quin became very ill and was treated successfully with homeopathy, and he reported to his friend Thomas Uwins that his cure did not involve ‘any blood letting, no purges, no sudorifics and no blisters’, and he recovered after three days having taken ‘only five small powders‘. Quinn was a lifelong asthmatic, which was eased by homeopathic treatment.
In 1826, he met with John Ernst Stapf and Samuel Hahnemann, and in 1827 he became physician to Prince Leopold and returned to England. Some sources report that Quin was Leopold’s physician as early as 1824, when he came across homeopathy when one of the prince’s household was so ill, he gave up on him, only to see him subsquently cured by homeopathy.
In 1831, Quin travelled to Germany to treat a cholera epidemic, and despite catching it himself, he worked through the epidemic until it ceased, to be warmly praised by the local Mayor. Quin successfully cured himself of Cholera on Samuel Hahnemann’s advice…
His reputation greatly enhanced, Quin published a paper on cholera, and his friends pursuade him to return to London, which he does in 1832. settling at 19 King Street St James’s. His practice flourished, which caused uproar in the Royal College of Surgeons. Quin calmly ignored them and continued his work.
As a young man, Quin was a very popular socialite and wit on the fashionable London circuit, a great friend of Charles Dickens (Charles Dickens referred to him as ‘My Dear Homo‘), … amongst many others, and no society party, or social gathering, it was said, was complete without him.
By nature of a very pleasing disposition, he was a man of great personal charm. He was also latterly one of the regular dining partners of Edward, Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII…
The fact that many of the German relatives of the British Royal family were also devoted patrons of homeopathy, including Queen Adelaide, wife of King William IV, also assisted its rapid social acceptance in Britain.
Rich patrons of homeopathy, for example the first Marquis of Anglesea, Henry William Paget, companion at Waterloo of the Duke of Wellington, not only formed its client base, but also funded and numerically dominated the committees which ran the many homeopathic hospitals and dispensaries of the last century.
During this time, Quin met the Duke of Beaufort and the Marquis of Anglesea, and in 1833, he moved to 13 Stratford Place, where he worked industriously, writing, consulting and keeping up a constant correspondance with his friends and his homeopathic colleagues abroad, including Moritz Wilhelm Mueller.
Quin’s reputation continued to grow and he met, treated and taught a great many people, often being consulted by other doctors who were eager to learn about the new art of homeopathy, and many other influential people including Sir Charles Clarke, Sir James Clarke, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Charles Dickens, William Makepeace Thackeray, Edwin Henry Landseer, Richard Robert Madden, Thomas Moore, William Charles MacReady, Charles James Mathews, John Forster, William Charles Ellis, Samuel Lover, Albany William Fonblanque and many others.
Quin now also had homeopathic collegues to assist him, including Belluomini, Harris Dunsford, Paul Francois Curie and Hugh Cameron,
In 1836 Madame Malibran, a patient of Quin’s friend Belluomini, died causing a storm of criticism against homeopathy. This polarised people nicely and as usual, homeopathy emerged from these attacks all the stronger.
Opposition to homeopathy was marked from the moment of Quin’s arrival. The Royal College of Physicians had the ancient power to control all medical practice within seven miles of the City of London, although it had not exercised this right for a century. It called upon Quin, an Edinburgh graduate, to take the college examination. He ignored the summons and eventually the College lost its nerve and desisted. But he was not forgotten….
In response to urging from his European colleagues and as a result of the vitriolic attacks on homeopath, Quin and his friends and colleagues began to plan The British Homeopathic Society, bringing together Quin, Belluomini, Harris Dunsford, John Epps, Paul Francois Curie, Thomas Uwins, Kingdon, Hugh Cameron, Headland, Dendy and Edward Hamilton.
Quin also set in motion a Homeopathic Dispensary with the aim of relieving the suffering of the poor and offering an opportunity to witness homeopathy in action to ‘interested parties’. Homeopaths began to offer their time for free in rotation, attending the poor in their homes and forcing a consultation with allopathic physicians - all supported by voluntary contributions from friends of homeopathy.
Predictably, people rushed to help. Lord Elgin recommended his friend Dr. Scott from Glasgow, ‘an ardent student of homeopathy’ to see Quin. Amos Gerald Hull wrote from New York, sending George Butler to see Quin with some journals, and with a promise from Constantine Hering to send over all the published documents from America, and sending over articles in defense of homeopathy. Amos Gerald Hull also sent over the preamble to the constitution of the New York Homeopathic Society, pointing out new provings of American plants for Quin’s delectation.
When Frederick Hervey Foster Quin was proposed for membership of the Athenaeum Club, an exclusive gentlemens’ club, the then President of the Royal College of Physicians publicly called him a quack. This slur was only retracted on pain of a duel, but the College still mobilised its supporters to ensure that Quin was blackballed.
Here is a small anecdote, related to Frederick Hervey Foster Quin. When Dr. John Ayrton Paris (1785-1856), then President of the Royal College of Physicians, noted seeing Frederick Hervey Foster Quin’s name in the list of candidates to the Athenaeum Club in London, he remarked that they had come to a sorry state if ‘quacks and adventurers’ were to be proposed as members.
Lord Clarence Paget, an officer in the Guards, visited some days later Paris. Lord Paget requested him either to provide a written apology for his language concerning Frederick Hervey Foster Quin or else justify it with pistols.
John Ayrton Paris was forced, not willing to try Lord Clarence Paget’s skills in shooting, to sign a retraction of his views, and an apology.
Frederick Hervey Foster Quin is entitled to the last laugh over the Athenaeum Club as James Epps, homeopathic chemist and the founder of the great cocoa business associated with his name , provided foodstuffs for the Athenaeum Club, who did not distinguish themselves when they prevented homeopath Frederick Hervey Foster Quin from becoming a member, but were quite happy to munch on ‘homeopathic confectionaries’!
The Marquis of Anglesea wrote to congratulate Quin on ‘his defeat’.
Nothing daunted, Quin witnessed an influx of recruits to the cause of homeopathy. In 1839, Francis Black, John James Drysdale, Robert Ellis Dudgeon, C B Kerr, John Chapman, Stephen Yeldham, Vardy, Madden, Edward Charles Chepmell and many others joined the fight. Charles W Luther was already established in Ireland and remained in constant correspondance with Quin.
In 1840, Quin moved to Arlington Street, and in 1843, he establishes the St. James’s Homeopathic Dispensary and can number amongst his patrons the Queen Dowager and the Duke of Beaufort.
In 1843, Quin founded the British Homeopathic Society to replace the Hahnemannian Society which he had tried to bring to life in 1837. Frederick Hervey Foster Quin was the first President of the British Homeopathic Society. Thus followed blast and counterblast between homeopaths and allopaths which ultimately gave birth to homeopathy in Britain. John Franklin Gray wrote from America to offer advice.
From 1845, Quin became the physician of the Duchess of Cambridge.
By 1850 the London Homeopathic Hospital was founded, and Quin was appointed Chair of Therapeutics and Materia Medica in 1859. Frederick Hervey Foster Quin, George Atkins, John Chapman and Robert Ellis Dudgeon, John Rutherford Russell, James W Metcalfe and an anonymous ‘friend’ put together a Directory of British and Foreign Homeopaths and their supporters to counter the suppression of all mention of homeopaths and their supporters by the editors of the London and Provincial Medical Directory in 1853.
Through his many influential contacts in the world of politics, for example Lord Ebury, Quin was able to obtain an amendment to the 1858 Medical Act, withholding a recommendation about the type of medicine approved in Britain.
As a result of this skillful manouevre, homeopathy was indirectly tolerated without challenge and thus never censured by Parliament as an unacceptable or deviant mode of medical practice…
‘Quin was able to obtain an amendment to the Medical Registration Bill; a clause was added enabling the Privy Council to withdraw the right to award degrees from any university that tried to impose the type of medicine practised by its graduates.’
The 1858 Medical Act established for the first time the professional status and legal regulation of formally qualified medical practitioners, as distinct from quacks, and still regulates the practice of medicine in the UK today. The law was specifically designed to outlaw quackery, which was rife at that time, by establishing a Register of approved practitioners. Initially these guidelines were interpreted very strictly, confining those on the Register only to holders of UK medical degrees, licenses and diplomas.
Even the holders of Continental medical degrees and diplomas were excluded from the Medical Register, for fear of encouraging deviant forms of medical practice in Britain, ie. quackery. In more recent times these rules were relaxed, even allowing American medical graduates the right to practice, whose degrees had previously been scorned as worthless pieces of paper.
All foreign graduates must still apply directly to the General Medical Council to be granted permission to practise medicine in Britain.
Homeopathy became increasingly popular among the upper classes and pressure grew for a suitable doctor to be available in London. Frederic Hervey Foster Quin was practicing in Naples when George von Neckar in Rome first introduced him to the method…
Quin, William Leaf, Paul Francois Curie and Thomas Roupell Everest were part of the inner sanctum of Samuel Hahnemann’s proteges. They established practices in the UK and later free dispensaries for the poor and also several hospitals…
Quin had the money, the qualifications and the numerous contacts within the aristocracy to establish homeopathy in Britain with relative ease… The benefit of Quin being aristocratic very quickly became apparent. Quin was allegedly the illegitimate son of the Duchess of Devonshire, Lady Elizabeth Hervey Foster Cavendish:
“He is a mystery man. His names Hervey and Foster suggest a relationship to the Duchess of Devonshire. Indeed, he is often depicted as her illegitimate son. The Duchess of Devonshire was born Lady Elizabeth Hervey and her first marriage was to John Foster. However, there is absolutely no evidence that the Duchess of Devonshire was Quin’s mother although obviously with those names there must have been some sort of relationship, possibly that of godson”.
This loyal devotion to homeopathy has been passed down through all these titled families and continues to this day.
When Quin became ill at the end of his life Edward Prince of Wales was at his bedside when he died.
Quin’s personal papers are in the National Register of Archives.
Quin is buried at Kensal Green Cemetary.
Quin wrote Pharmacopoeia homoeopathica, Du traitement homoeopathique du choléra, avec notes et appendice, Die Cholera mit dem besten Erfolg bekämpft durch die homöopathische Curart … , and Edward Hamilton wrote A memoir of Frederick Hervey Foster Quin in 1879.
Sue :: Jul.11.2008 :: British History :: 1 Comment »
Sue,
Your work is always a real pleasure to read.
Please note that you have referenced an oft-repeated assertion that Dr. Quin was asked to come to France to treat Napoleon I. Whether it is true or not, it is important to note that this request came BEFORE Quin began to study or practice homeopathy (Napoleon died in 1821!).
–Dana