Just Retribution
The story of the attack on the Boylstons’ home is based on family legend; I have tried to disentangle obvious exaggerations from probabilities and plausibilities, and fit the latter into a sensible pattern based on known facts. Boylston family legend has it that “one evening while [Zabdiel’s] wife and children were sitting in the parlor, a lighted hand grenade was thrown into the room, but the fuse striking against some furniture fell off before an explosion could take place, and thus providentially their lives were saved.” Because the grenade is said to have lost its fuse—as Mather’s certainly did—and because Mather made a fuss that left a long, still readable trail while the Boylstons did not, it has sometimes been assumed that the attack on the Boylston home is Ward Nicholas Boylston’s confusion of his family’s story with the Mathers’ story.
Against that, Ward Nicholas knew his great-uncle Zabdiel and his mother’s cousins (Zabdiel’s children), who were present, as well as his own grandfather (Zabdiel’s brother Thomas), who was in a position to know the truth. While Ward Nicholas often exaggerates, I think complete confusion or creation of this attack de novo is unlikely. Thomas Hutchinson (who was ten in 1721, and later became governor of the province) later wrote that Boylston’s “family was hardly safe in his house, and he often met with affronts and insults in the streets.” Boston had a bad reputation as a town prone to mob violence; it was so bad in 1721 that the General Court had passed a riot act earlier that year. As the dying reached its height—and people began running to be inoculated—street violence certainly picked up. Furthermore, much more of the violence and hatred seems to have been aimed at Boylston than Mather. I think a rain of stones against the Boylston house, possibly topped off by some kind of poorly made grenade or bomb—the same as might have been used against Mather—is not only plausible, but probable.
If the attack on the Boylstons’ home took place the same night as that on the Mathers’—which seems likely, given the nature of crowds—Boylston responded by inoculating once more the following morning. Quietly putting his head down and going right ahead with his practice, while refusing to pursue vengeance (legal or otherwise), seems as much a part of Boylston’s personality as shouting and demanding justice from the authorities seem a part of Mather’s. I do not know that Pierce replaced the broken windows, but it seems plausible for exactly the reason stated.
Ward Nicholas also says that Zabdiel visited patients “only at midnight, and in disguise.” Boylston’s own notes record visiting Mrs. N——s at midnight, when called on an emergency; no doubt there were others. On such occasions, he may well have wrapped himself in a cloak against weather and recognition—but a false nose and glasses seem as unlikely as the notion of taking no precautions in the face of threatening mobs.
As for hiding, Ward Nicholas records that “the only place of refuge” left to Zabdiel “at one time was a private place in the house where he remained secreted fourteen days, unknown to any of his family but his wife.” Given Zabdiel’s inoculation records, this is not possible. It is possible, however, that he did not go out much in the two weeks following Mrs. Dixwell’s death. I have made him hide the one and only time it would have seemed necessary: when a potential lynch mob was actually storming the house. The place is my own invention.
Finally, Ward Nicholas noted that “parties entered his house by day and by night searching for him.” Again, this seems an exaggeration—though without a police force, it would be hard to stop mobs from doing so. I have created a search I think more likely: a more calm search on the part of authorities—looking for Boylston ostensibly in order to protect him, and also for the out-of-town inoculees that these authorities had recently declared illegal.
Mather recorded in his diary the 3:00 A.M. attack on his house—along with a description of the “grenado” and the threatening strip of paper wrapped around it. The governor and council convinced the House to offer a £50 reward for information about the culprit (in Britain, this would have meant roughly £5,000 in today’s money, though colonial currency was notoriously unstable). Though the reward was handsome, no one came forward.
The Royal Society’s minutes reveal that Alexander Stuart read the first of Douglass’s letters to him from Boston on November 16, the same day that Sloane reported Maitland’s conclusions from Hertford. French and English drafts of this report are extant in Sloane’s papers in the British Library; Miller has argued from internal evidence that the French drafts were meant for the Prince and Princess of Wales (who preferred to do their official reading in that language, though they had learned at least some English by this point).
I do not know for sure why Dummer held back from publishing Mather’s report, especially since someone—possibly Dummer himself—seems to have leaked news of its positive nature to Sloane; the possibility that they were urging the use of Mather’s name seems a plausible reason.
Dr. Douglass’s retreat from the public eye and his defensive admission that his own plan of treatment had not gone as well as he hoped are drawn from his own (later) words.
Hutchinson’s illness, will making, and death, the consequent panic and proroguing of the General Court, Robie’s inoculating, and Boylston’s sudden popularity are all documented. I have woven these events together; the connections are more plausible than a sudden cluster of coincidences. I have specifically made Hutchinson’s case confluent and have surmised that Robie was his doctor: I do not think it was coincidence that Robie began inoculating the very day that Hutchinson died—and one week after Boylston began inoculating Robie’s students and fellow Harvard faculty members en masse. One month earlier, Boylston noted that several people who had refused inoculation then died of the natural smallpox, spending their final breath urging their friends to “hasten into” the operation; I have made Hutchinson one of these people.
Sewall recorded that Hutchinson’s funeral was a “great” one. I do not know whether Boylston went or not, nor do I know that he joined the Salutation Inn crowd later. His sentiments there, however, are his own.
In Royal Fashion
Maitland’s Account, Dummer’s belated (and anonymous) release of Mather’s Account, and the further trials on six genteel subjects all hit London’s notice at virtually the same time.
I do not know when precisely the princess became specifically interested in Boylston. She kept close abreast of inoculation publications, however, and Neal was summoned to speak with her soon after his publication. (I have surmised that she also spoke to Dummer.) Neal’s suggestion that Boylston be asked for his account is the first I have been able to locate. In the end, it was the princess and Sloane who convinced Boylston to put pen to paper; I have let Neal plant this suggestion in her brain. In the matter of inoculation, I have also deduced some measure of competition arising between the colonies and the capital, along with respect and curiosity—as history showed them to have in so many other matters.
Sloane’s conversations with the Princess of Wales and the king are based on his own reports. He does not give locations or specific times, but he does include the most important parts of the dialogue. The princess asked his advice about inoculating the princesses, he refused, and she followed up by asking if he would dissuade her. The king (who was famous for tiring out others on long walks in the park, regardless of the weather) asked whether inoculation would work and, when told accidents might happen, retorted that any physic might at times go wrong. I do not know whether Sunderland (or anyone else) was present, but as Sunderland was certainly close in the king’s counsels and suddenly decided to inoculate his son just before the princesses’ operation, it’s a plausible supposition.
Beyond Amyand, Maitland, Sloane, and Steigerthal, I do not know who was present at the inoculation of the princesses at St. James’s. I’ve drawn this scene from Amyand’s and Maitland’s reports to the Royal Society of what they did, and from contemporary and modern assessments of the royal family’s character and habits. Princess Amelia was called Emily by the family; she took after the k
ing in loving dogs, horses, hunting, and brisk walks outdoors; the prettiest of the three sisters, she was an extrovert and a flirt. Princess Caroline was a shy mother-hen who doted on her oldest sister and her mother. Pierre and Anne-Caroline are my imagination, though they fit in with the princesses’ personalities. Princess Anne had become Handel’s pupil at age eight, and often played for the family.
The accounts of the Sunderland, Amyand, Bathurst, Berkeley, Townshend, Tichborne, and De La Warr children follow factual reports by their physicians and surgeons. Arbuthnot—one of the attending doctors—provided the best account of the death of Bathurst’s servant (though anonymously, in Mr. Maitland’s Account . . . Vindicated); Dr. Wagstaffe supplied other details. The newspapers reported that the princess spent the evening of April 25 with her daughters, while the king and the prince went to Handel’s opera.
Lady Mary’s literary masquerade as a Turkey merchant, taking on the physicians, is genuine. It is not clear when she wrote it, though Grundy argues it was well before the edited version appeared in print. Lady Mary’s run-in with Sloane is my supposition. She attended, however, many of the inoculations performed under the supervision of Sloane, Steigerthal, Arbuthnot, and Mead, and by Maitland and Amyand (though she did not give many particular names). Given the level of her ire, it seems improbable that she did not have regular disagreements with these men in person—she certainly knew Sloane, Arbuthnot, Mead, and Maitland well enough to speak her mind frankly before them. That one or several of them faced her with her literary “crime” also seems probable: by the following spring, someone had convinced her that the two deaths she here calls murders were not, in fact, due to inoculation.
Wagstaffe, Edmund Massey, and Isaac Massey were the leading opponents of inoculation in London.
Jurin made his report to the Royal Society at the time stated, later publishing it in the Society’s Philosophical Transactions, as well as separately in a pamphlet.
As for the princesses’ inoculation, I do not know who beyond the medical men attended the inoculation of Prince William at Leicester House—but that, even more than the princesses’ operation, was an occasion of state importance: the little prince was third in line for the throne.
Lady Mary gave very few specific names of those who begged her presence and got it—though she said repeatedly that she was run off her feet in complying. The duchess of Ancaster, however, is a very good bet: Jane Brownlow Bertie was a childhood friend who had specific smallpox memories with Lady Mary. I have, however, given her the title of duchess about one month earlier than she acceded to it (by the death of her father-in-law); when her daughter was inoculated on May 11, 1723 (the same day as the prince), she was the marchioness of Lindsey. I have written the scene to bring to life the unbalancing difference between the hooting and jeering of crowds, and the anxious supplications of parents Lady Mary recorded in her diary. Her final words I have borrowed from the closing sentence of her inoculation piece in her Embassy Letters.
Meetings and Partings
Whether or not Lady Mary and Zabdiel Boylston met remains one of the great enigmas of this tale. In solving the mystery, I have been more speculative in this chapter than in the others. I have built the story, however, on tantalizing fragments of evidence.
In brief, Boylston embarked for London in December 1724 on Captain Barlow’s ship. During his year-and-a-half stay, he did not perform any inoculations, but he was in high demand to attend them. At the time, so was Lady Mary. Many of the same people who welcomed him warmly into the Royal Society were her close friends. So, although I have uncovered no evidence of their meeting, it is hard to imagine that they did not.
Here are the historical details:
Boylston’s brief remembering of the end of the epidemic, through the summer of 1723, is accurate in the events, though I have supplied emotions and reactions that make sense. In May he inoculated six people who were soon packed off to Spectacle Island; Robie noted that they had been “forced” there by the “Boston mob.” Boylston was hauled before a town meeting. Though Boylston did write the medical excuse that got James Franklin released to the press yard, I do not know if it was Josiah Franklin who asked him to do so. Samuel Adams of Revolutionary fame was born as noted. The grim numbers are drawn from Boylston and Douglass, both quoting official town statistics.
Boylston family legend has it that Sir Hans Sloane invited Boylston to London. While I have found no hard evidence of such an invitation, it seems plausible enough. Sloane certainly chaired the first meeting of the Royal Society that Boylston attended—soon after his arrival in London. Boylston himself intimates that both Sloane and the Princess of Wales encouraged him to write up his account of inoculation early in the spring, again, quite soon after his arrival.
Additionally, Boylston’s submission of a paper to the Royal Society before he took ship suggests that someone was pushing him to bolster his résumé, so to speak—or, as I have surmised, that someone at the Royal Society elicited a paper from him, assuming he would realize that what the Fellows really wanted to know about was inoculation. Both the bolstering (if it was that) and the writing are out of character for Boylston. In contrast to Mather, he took little pleasure in writing papers and letters to the Royal Society once he was a member—and did so only rarely. In no other instance did he write to publish without some kind of duress: self-defense, royal command, or (as is obvious in his few later communications with the Royal Society) a burdensome sense of duty too long neglected.
The instigator might well have been Cotton Mather, who wrote Boylston letters of introduction to Sloane and Jurin, suggesting a royal presentation. Sloane, however, was an even more inveterate collector of knowledge than Mather. He wrote voluminously to many people, and he was also the orchestrator of the English trials of inoculation—certainly at the princess’s behest, but also, apparently, to satisfy his own professional curiosity. He may well have taken it upon himself to make such an invitation, or to solicit it through contacts like Mather—especially if it already had royal force behind it.
For the few words Boylston reads from Sloane’s “letter,” I have used standard phrases of politeness that Boylston later employed in the dedication of his book.
Boylston’s report home to Colman confirms that he was in part an emissary to the governor for the moderates of Boston. This may have been another inducement for him to go—though his aloofness from Boston politics make it unlikely that this diplomatic mission was his primary reason for heading to London.
I do not know whether Sloane or anyone else found Boylston’s submission of a paper on ambergris funny. The merchant Thomas Hollis certainly thought Boylston “ingenuous” by London’s worldly standards. Back in Boston, though, the “ambergrease”/bear’s grease confusion was real: though it may have been a deliberate prank rather than a muddle-headed mistake, as the man then in charge of the Courant was none other than Benjamin Franklin.
It is not clear whether or not Boylston’s family went with him, but the few extant clues suggest that they did not. His son Zabby certainly remained at Harvard, where he got into enough trouble drinking and carousing to be reprimanded by the president. None of the few notices of Boylston in London mention anything about his wife or children being there as well—though Hollis twice found fit to mention Boylston’s horses. Furthermore, his advertisements appear to offer to rent part of his garden and the right to sell its produce out of his shop—but not to rent the house, stables, or shop itself. Finally, his first extant letter back to London—to Sir Hans—notes his joyous return to family, friends, and country.
A number of his horses, however, did go and caused something of a stir, at least among the Americans in London. I have assumed that Jack went with him, as servant and groom, and possibly Jackey as well. Curiously, I have found no scrap of evidence indicating whether or not he returned to America with the horses. That he took them at all is intriguing—it cannot have made for a small shipping charge or an easy crossing. Even more intriguing is Hol
lis’s note that he was refusing to part with them even for very handsome sums, coupled with his own later offer (through Jurin) to send the royal children saddle pads, in what sound like surprisingly familiar terms. This suggests the possibility that he intended his horses as princely gifts, and quite possibly presented them—though again, I have turned up no evidence.
Family legend also has Boylston inoculating the first two royal princesses (Emily and Caroline); his great-nephew Ward Nicholas Boylston insisted upon this point, though it is patently impossible (Amyand did it, and Boylston was in Boston at the time, in any case). Dr. Boylston was, however, in London at the time that Princess Mary was inoculated. He may well have been invited to be present, given the royal family’s penchant for having all possible experts dancing attendance: he was, after all, far and away the world’s most experienced inoculator outside Turkey and western Africa. Sergeant Amyand did the cutting, once again, but Boylston’s possible presence as witness seems a likely—and understandable—source for his great-nephew’s later insistence that Boylston inoculated a princess or two.
I have drawn his encounters with Prince William and Prince George from their known personalities and interests, matched with Zabdiel’s own pride in his horses. That he spoke to William is suggested—though not proven—by a letter he later sent to Dr. Jurin, offering to send “Prince William and the young princesses” saddle pads—a specific kind of American training saddle. In context (it occurs as an afterthought, in a postscript) it reads as if he has met the children—particularly William—and discussed horses with them. This certainly fits in with family legend that he met the royal family—and was given a reward for his work. (The stated sum, £1,000, is likely an exaggeration, however, as that was the lavish sum given by the king to Maitland for traveling to Hanover and inoculating Prince Frederick.)