NEWS RELEASES
Breast Cancer - A Georgian Family Perspective
10th October 2007
Buried amongst a sheaf of letters and papers written by the eighteenth-century lawyer Thomas Medwin, uncle of the celebrated poet Shelley, lies a revealing and very contemporary tale of breast cancer.
To many, breast cancer is seen as a modern disease, if for no other reason than modern media campaigns have made people aware of it, but as these everyday letters reveal it was certainly known of in the past. What makes Medwin’s account even more ‘toe curling’ is the knowledge of how removal of the breast was carried out, without anaesthetic or any other modern treatment, in the eighteenth century.
Below are various extracts from the letters and attached are scans of the documents. The tale starts on 27 August 1786 when a letter arrived from Luke Medwin, Tom’s father saying, “We are all well except your mother who is now home for advice etc for her Breast which has been sometime bad – we fear a cancer hope it will not be so- …”
Some 5 months later the sorry tale continues in a letter dated 20 January 1787. Again from Luke to his son Tom:
I am now set down to say what I am sure must affect you as it does me so much that I hardly know what I say or do. The next day after you left us I went with your mother to Reading where we had the advice of a Dr Taylor who without hesitation declared your Mothers disorder to be a cancer … I was determined to come to Town (London) for further advice where I now am at Mr Flemmings with your mother - & yesterday as I was advised procured a consultation of Dr Potts & 6 others of the faculty at St Bartholomew Hospital who were clearly of Opinion with Mr Taylor of Reading that it was cancer & told me that if she would come into the Hospital they would or he (Mr Potts) would take off or out the part – so infected. I need not say how much your mother is affected with myself on this dreadful Occasion. Your mother is not yet fully determined at present but hope I shall prevail to have it done as they all say she cannot live long if tis not done & also say that tis not gone so far but that the[y] hope & believe it may be done with safety - & if I can prevail do not at present know whether it will be done in or out the Hospital.
A further letter of 23 February noted that Mrs. Medwin “is this Morning very low indeed my Father is just going to know whether Mr Potts can come tomorrow or not.”
The following day Medwin wrote “Your Dear mother underwent the amputation by Mr Potts this day at 12 with such ….. as I could not have imagined, [she] never so much as said ‘Oh’”
Three days later Tom’s brother wrote a long letter in which he says, “I am happy to inform you that our own dear Mother is as well as the time will possibly admit of no very bad symptoms have occurred since the operation, the fever she has had has been but trifling, to that which often succeeds such an operation hope we shall be able to see her in a day or two and give you a still more favourable account”.
On 28 February 1787 Tom’s brother wrote again:
Dear Brother,
A very sudden Alteration and an unexpected one has happened to our dear Mother so as to take her from us last night at ten o’clock she is to be buried at Stoke according to her particular desire.
These letters are just part of an extensive family archive dealing with the everyday goings on of an ambitious Georgian lawyer in the growing market town of Horsham.
For further information please contact Jeremy Knight, Curator
Digital images of the letters are available upon request.
Horsham Museum
9 Causeway, Horsham,
West Sussex RH12 1HE
Tel: (01403) 254959
Fax: (01403) 282594
Email: museum@horsham.gov.uk
Web: www.horshammuseum.org