“Milton, Oct. 17th, 1643.”
Dr. Aveling, from whose “Memorials of Harvey” this letter is copied, says “the treatment by ‘very little phisick’ and ‘only a regular diet’ seems to have been successful, for Cave, writing soon afterwards to Prince Rupert, says: “Maurice is not able yet to write letters, but hath this day taken physic and so intends to bid his physicians farewell.”
In this year, 1643, Harvey received his last payment as physician to St. Bartholomew’s Hospital. The Journals contain no record of his retirement from office in the hospital, but the ledgers, which have been kept with great accuracy and minuteness ever since the granting of the Charter in 1547, show the entry standing in its usual place, but for the last time. “Item to Doctor Harvey, Physician, xxxiii li. vi s. viii d.” Harvey was resident in Oxford at the time of his retirement, and the absence of any allusion to so important an event in the history of the hospital must be ascribed in part to the confusion of the times. The Journals of the House of Commons, however, contain a significant note: “Feb. 12, an. 1643-1644. A motion this day made for Dr. Micklethwayte to be recommended to the Wardens and Masters of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, to be physician in the place of Dr. Harvey, who hath withdrawn himself from his charge and is retired to the party in arms against the Parliament.” (Sir) John Micklethwaite was as a matter of fact appointed Physician in reversion to St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, May 26, 1648, and he succeeded to the post of full physician May 13, 1653. He was one of the physicians in ordinary to Charles II., and died in 1682.
Harvey’s presence in Oxford, and his method of working by experiment and by logical deduction from observation, must have been singularly agreeable to that band of experimental philosophers who in a few years were destined to found the Royal Society. Harvey’s leaven worked successfully in the brains of such men as Scarborough, Highmore, Willis, and Wren, and in due season the pupils brought forth fruit worthy of their master.
Harvey’s connection with the University of Oxford was destined soon to become both intimate and honourable, though it was unfortunately only of short duration. In 1645 he was elected Warden of Merton College, in succession to Sir Nathaniel Brent. The present Warden of Merton, the Hon. G. C. Brodrick, says that on the 27th of Jan., 1645, letters were received from the King, then lodged at Christ Church, reciting that Sir Nathaniel Brent had absented himself for nearly three years, had adhered to the rebels, and had accepted the office of Judge Marshal in their ranks, to which might have been added that he had actually signed the Covenant, for he gradually became more and more Presbyterian in his views though he was originally a friend of Laud. We learn from the articles afterwards exhibited against [Sir] John Greaves, then a Fellow of the College, Savilian Professor of Astronomy, and the senior Linacre lecturer upon anatomy, that he was the person who drew up the petition against the Warden, and “inveigled some unwary young men to subscribe to it.” The King’s letters accordingly pronounce the deposition of Brent, and direct the seven senior Fellows to present three persons as eligible to be his successor, out of whom the King would choose one. The Royal mandate was obeyed, but there were some irregularities in the consequent election, against which Peter Turner protested and resigned his Fellowship on his protest being overruled by Lord Hertford, who had succeeded the Earl of Pembroke as Chancellor of the University in October, 1645. However, five out of the seven seniors, including the Sub-Warden, placed Harvey first on their lists, and the King lost no time in nominating him. He was solemnly admitted Warden according to ancient custom, on the 9th of April, and two days later, on April 11th, he addressed the Fellows in a short speech which is still preserved. The extract from the College register runs:—“Dominus Custos, Convocatis in Altâ Gaul Sociis, haec verba ad illos fecit. Forsitan decessores Custodiam Collegii ambiisse, ut exinde sese locupletarent, se vere longe alio animo nimirum ut College lucro et emolumento potius foret: simulque socios, ut concordiam amicitiamque inter se colerent sedule solliciteque hortatus est.” [The Warden spoke thus to the Fellows assembled in the Great Hall. He said that it was likely enough that some of his forerunners had sought the Wardenship to enrich themselves, but that for his own part he undertook its duties with far other motives, wishing as he did to increase the wealth and prosperity of the College. At the same time he appealed earnestly and anxiously to the Fellows to cherish amongst themselves an harmonious friendship.] The speech was thought at the time to be somewhat “Pharisaical,” but there seems to be no doubt that Harvey was really expressing his feelings. There had always been a close bond between Merton and the medical profession from the days when John of Gaddesden, one of the earliest Englishmen to write a complete treatise on medicine, was a Fellow, and it was peculiarly fitting that Harvey should have been elected head of the College. He was a rich man, childless, without expensive habits, and so devoted to the pursuit of science that there is but little doubt that if he had retained his position he would have become one of the greatest benefactors of the College. As it was, the College during Harvey’s year of office presented more the appearance of a Court than of a seat of learning. From 1643 to 1646, when the Queen was in Oxford, she lodged in Merton College, occupying the Warden’s House, and living in the room still known as “the Queen’s room,” with the drawing-room adjoining it. Anthony Wood says that during her occupation “there were divers marriages, christenings, and burials carefully registered in a private register by Mr. John Gurgany, one of the chaplains of Merton College; but about the time of the surrender of Oxford the said register, among other books, was stolen by the soldiers out of his window in his chamber joining to the church door.” Many officers too were quartered in Merton, and the College was so full on the 1st of August, 1645, that the annual meeting had to be held in the library, as neither the Hall nor the Warden’s lodgings were available for the purpose.
The year 1645-1646, during which Harvey held the office of Warden of Merton, was long a memorable one in the annals of Oxford. The City was invested by Fairfax for fifteen days from May 22nd, whilst the King was at Droitwich. On June 14th the Royal cause was ruined at Naseby, and on November 27th the College was called upon to lay in a supply of provisions against another siege. On December 28th the King ordered a special form of prayer to be used in the chapel on Wednesdays and Fridays “during these bad times.” On March 24th the College gave a bond for £94 on account of provisions which it had no money to buy. At three in the morning of April 27th the King, disguised as a servant, with his beard and hair closely trimmed, passed over Magdalen bridge in apparent attendance upon Ashburnham and Hudson, and we cannot but believe that Harvey was one of the little band who closed the gates of the city with heavy hearts as his Majesty rode off to begin his wearisome captivity. On May 11, 1646, Oxford was summoned by Fairfax, and on June 24th it was surrendered on very honourable terms, the garrison marching out over Shotover 3,000 strong. The Duke of York fell into the hands of the Parliament; but Rupert, Maurice, and the greater part of the noblemen and gentlemen attendant upon the Court had left Oxford the day before its surrender. Mr. Brodrick says that “Harvey must now have retired from the Wardenship and Brent must have resumed office, though no minute of either event is preserved in the College Register.” We find, however, that in September, 1648, Brent rendered accounts, as Warden, for the four years from 1642 to 1646.
Anthony Wood describes in language which has often been quoted, the utter confusion in which the past three years had left the University—the colleges impoverished, lectures almost abandoned, many of the students dispersed and others quite demoralised—“in a word, scarce the face of an University left, all things being out of order and disturbed.” This account is confirmed by a striking entry in the College Register, under the date October 19, 1646, where it is stated that by the Divine goodness the Civil War had at last been stayed, and the Warden [Brent] with most of the Fellows had returned, but that as there were no Bachelors, hardly any scholars and few Masters, it was decided to elect but one Bursar and one Dean. It is also added that as the Hall still lay “situ et ruinis squalida” the College meeting was held in the Warden’s lodgings.
Of the few students whom we know that the influence of Harvey’s name attracted to Oxford that of Charles Scarborough, the first English editor of Euclid, is the most noted. Ejected from his fellowship at Caius College, Cambridge, on account of his Royalist tendencies, he immediately withdrew to Oxford, entered himself at Merton College, obtained the friendship of Harvey and rendered him considerable assistance in the preparation of his work on the development of animals. He was created a Doctor of Physic on June 23, 1646, by virtue of letters from the Chancellor of the University, and in these letters he is described as a Master of Arts of Cambridge of seven years’ standing and upwards, who was spoiled of his library in the beginning of the Civil War, and afterwards for his conscience deprived of his fellowship. His letters testimonial are under the hand of Dr. William Harvey, who says that he is well learned in Physic, Philosophy, and Mathematics.