Benjamin Waterhouse Papers

Benjamin Waterhouse (MD 1780, Leiden University) is known as the first person to successfully vaccinate for smallpox in the United States. He was the first professor of medicine at Harvard and the first to give a course of lectures on natural history at the College of Rhode Island (later known as Brown University) in Providence. He was the founder of a botanical garden at Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the curator of the collection of minerals at Harvard.

The rich collections of Waterhouse papers at the Countway Library contain correspondence files that include autographed letters to Waterhouse—principally related to vaccinating against smallpox—from Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, John Quincy Adams, Edward Jenner, Dr. Sylvanus Fansher, Justice Peter Oliver, and others. Letters from Thomas Jefferson illustrate the President’s support for vaccination against smallpox and discuss vaccine “matter” sent by Waterhouse. Jefferson also discusses his ideas on agriculture, especially the benefits of a variety of rice he introduced into America. Lecture files include those from Harvard Medical School and elsewhere on natural history, mineralogy, botany, and other medical topics. Files of writings include those on smallpox, botanical classification, and epidemics. Materials also include family papers and papers belonging to a son, John Fothergill Waterhouse (1838, Harvard; 1842, Harvard Divinity School), and to his wives, Elizabeth Oliver and Louisa Lee Waterhouse. Family papers include the inoculation and vaccination records of the Waterhouse children, as well as petitions and reports regarding inoculation for smallpox in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

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Materials Digitized for the Contagion Collection

Letters from Thomas Jefferson, 1801–1808. H MS c16.2.

Copy of a letter from Edward Jenner, July 18, 1801. H MS c16.2.

Dissertation upon the effects of blood-letting, by John Fothergill Waterhouse, 1814. H MS c16.3.

Letters from Sylvanus Fansher to John Fothergill Waterhouse, Dec. 14, [1815?]. H MS c16.3.

Petition for general inoculation to the Cambridge, Mass. Selectmen, Aug. 30, 1792. H MS c16.3.

Petition of sundry inhabitants respecting the small pox to the Cambridge, Mass. Selectmen, Sept. 9, 1788. H MS c16.3.

Petition respecting the small pox to the Cambridge, Mass. Selectmen, Mar. 2, 1789. H MS c16.3.

Letter from John Fothergill Waterhouse to Lemuel Hayward, Aug. 22, 1812. H MS c16.3.

“On the Criteria by Which to Determine When the Use of Mercurials in Cases of Syphilis Should Be Discontinued,” by John Fothergill Waterhouse, [1813]. H MS c16.3.

Newspaper clipping about a dissertation competition, [1813]. H MS c16.3.

Lecture ticket addressed to James P. Chaplin, 1804. H MS c16.4.

Introductory medical lecture, Oct. 4, 1797. H MS c16.4.

Introductory medical lecture, Oct. 1805. H MS c16.4.

“The Effects of Cold and of Catarrh,” [Lecture], 1806. H MS c16.4.

“Small Pox,” [Lecture], Sept. 1809. H MS c16.4 [Lecture], 1806. H MS c16.4.

Document (manuscript) about children and smallpox vaccination. H MS c16.4.

Record of smallpox vaccinations for the Waterhouse children, [18––]. H MS c16.4.

“Small Pox: To the Editor of the Columbian Centinel.”

Letters to Lyman Spalding.

Waterhouse Kine Pock Inoculation ticket.

Additional Contagion Resources

General Materials: Vaccination

Full Collection Citation

Main collection: Papers of Benjamin Waterhouse, 1786–1836 (inclusive). Boston Medical Library in the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard University, Boston, Mass.

Electronic Finding Aid

No extended electronic finding aid is available.

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