The importance of medical volumes to the lay library is indicated by the inclusion of two in the supplies provided by a London agent for a Virginia plantation in 1620-21. William S. Powell, in a recent study of books in Virginia before 1624, found that the agent chose The French Chirurgerye, published in English in 1597, and the Enchiridion Medicinae, first published in 1573.
In spite of medical books, the apprenticeships, training in Europe or England, and the demand for medical services despite a high fee, it is possible to overestimate the competence of the seventeenth-century Virginia doctor even by the standards of his own century. An observation made by William Byrd II early in the next century tends to reduce the stature of the medical man.
"Here be some men," Byrd wrote, "indeed that are call'd doctors; but they are generally discarded surgeons of ships, that know nothing above very common remedys. They are not acquainted enough with plants or other parts of natural history, to do any service to the world...." Byrd may have been prejudiced by his father who, although believing himself facing death, still did not call a physician.
CHAPTER FIVE
Conclusion
Portrait of a Seventeenth-Century Virginia Physician
Historical evidence does not support Byrd's description of the typical physician as a discarded ship's surgeon. In contrast, the physician, whatever his competence may have been, emerges from the sources as a respected member of the colony who, besides his medical practice, engaged in farming sizable holdings of land and took part in the civic life of the colony. His private life was not unlike that of the other planters who enjoyed some wealth and professional standing. The reputable surgeon, who could also supplement his income from farming, probably enjoyed an existence not unlike that of the physicians, considering that the distinction between them in the New World was slight.
Dr. Blanton, in his volume on medicine in Virginia, created a lively portrait of what he imagines from his researches to be the seventeenth-century Virginia doctor. The doctor is seen:
dressed in knee breeches and jerkin, perhaps adorned with periwig and cap; not given to church-going, but fond of ale, horse-racing and cuss words; husband of a multiparous wife; owner of a log cabin home or at best a frame cottage which he guarded with gun, pistol and scimitar; his road a bridle path and his means of conveyance a horse or boat ... reading ... by candle light, without spectacles; writing with a goose quill pen; sitting on a rough stool or bench; eating at a crude table from pewter dishes, without fork or table knife; having no knowledge of bath tubs; keeping his clothes in trunk or chest; sleeping, night-capped, on a flock bed in a bedroom shared by others; dividing his time, which he measured with hour-glass and sundial, among medicine, politics and farming; often in court, often a justice, member of Council or Burgesses, and subject, like his neighbors, to military service.