Main content

Thomas Ruston papers

Notifications

Held at: Historical Medical Library of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia [Contact Us]19 S. 22nd Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103

This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Historical Medical Library of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.

Overview and metadata sections

Thomas Ruston, Pennsylvania physician and businessman, was born at Fagg's Manor, Chester County, Pennsylvania, in 1742. He was the son of Job and Mary Ruston. Ruston married Mary Fisher (d. 1797) in 1771; they had three children, Thomas, Mary, and Charlotte. Ruston died in 1811, in Philadelphia.

Ruston attended the College of New Jersey [Princeton University] and received a B.A. in 1762. He served a medical apprenticeship in Philadelphia, then traveled to Edinburgh. He received an M.D. from the University of Edinburgh in 1765. In the 1770s, Ruston was practicing medicine in Exeter and writing on financial matters.

With his family, Ruston returned to Philadelphia in 1785 and was involved in many business transactions. He was imprisoned for debt along with Robert Morris circa 1786. Although a friend of Benjamin Rush, Ruston broke with Rush over the yellow fever treatment controversy.

Ruston became a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1787. He published several monographs, including An essay on inoculation for the smallpox (1767) and A collection of facts on yellow fever (1804).

This small collection of manuscripts, 1764-1802, documents the education, medical career, and personal life of Thomas Ruston. Items in the collection relating to Ruston's medical education at the University of Edinburgh include notes on two lectures on the pulse delivered by William Cullen with drafts of three letters by Ruston describing his affairs, 1764-1765; petitions signed by the students of the university, protesting the lack of regulations in granting degrees, 1764; and an autograph letter of John Hope, professor of materia medica and botany, to Ruston, 1765.

The collection also includes professional correspondence concerning Ruston's appointment at the Devon and Exeter Hospital and printed letters from the Medical Society of Edinburgh's Committee on Publication and the Society Instituted in London for the Improvement of MedicaljKnowledge, 1779-1784. There are also a few bills and receipts, 1790-1802; three recipes, 1766 and 1784; a poem composed by Sir William Browne to celebrate the marriage of Ruston with Mary Fisher, 1771; and Ruston's commonplace book, 1799-1801, containing financial information, poems, observations on the weather, and a few diary notes.

The Thomas Ruston Papers were donated to the Library of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia by John F. Lewis of Lewis, Adler, and Laws, 208 South Fourth Street, Philadelphia, on 29 July 1922.

The collection was processed and catalogued in 1990.

Publisher
Historical Medical Library of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia

Collection Inventory

1. Clinical lectures of Dr. William Cullen: notes on lectures concerning the pulse delivered at the University of Edinburgh; correspondence, circa 1764.
Box 1
2. Petitions concerning the degrees of the University of Edinburgh, 17 April 1764; 5 May 1764.
Box 1
3. Hope, John Autograph letter signed, Edinburgh, to Thomas Ruston, Edinburgh, 17 November 1765.
Box 1
4. Examination questions, circa 1765.
Box 1

1. Medical Society of Edinburgh-Committee on Publication Letter, Edinburgh, to Thomas Ruston, London, 1 March 1779.
Box 1
2. Devon and Exeter Hospital Letter, Exeter?, to Thomas Ruston, London?, 11 May 1779.
Box 1
3. Society Instituted in London for the Improvement of Medical Knowledge Letter, London, to Thomas Ruston, Exeter, 1782 July 16.
Box 1
4. Society Instituted in London for the Improvement of Medical Knowledge Letter, London, to Thomas Ruston, Exeter, 25 November 1782.
Box 1
5. Devon and Exeter Hospital Letter, Exeter? to Thomas Ruston, Exeter?, 1784 July 1.
Box 1

1. Bill to the estate of Robert Aitken, circa 9 January 1796.
Box 1
2. Bill to George Stock, circa 17 June 1802.
Box 1
1. Carey, Stewart, and Co, Receipt for subscription to the American museum, 27 January 1790.
Box 1
2. Library Company of Philadelphia Receipt for subscription, 5 May 1794.
Box 1
3. University of Pennsylvania--Trustees Receipt for tuition of Thomas Ruston, Jr., 1 January 1797.
Box 1
Series 4 RECIPES, 1766; 1784.
Box 1

1. Epigram written at Tunbridge Wells, by Sir William Browne, President of the College of Physicians in London, on the marriage of Dr. Ruston with Miss Fisher, 1771.
Box 1
2. Commonplace book and newspaper clippings, 1799-1801.
Box 1
3. A poem to Llywelyn the son of lorwerth (alias Llywelyn ye Great) compos'd by Einion ye Son of Gwgan, A.O. 1240, undated.
Box 1
4. Maxims by John Peter Craft, showing that the will constitutes the power in man to do anything, undated.
Box 1

Print, Suggest