George IV’s death in June 1830 released Knighton from royal duties that had sapped his health and spirits. By July he was planning his retirement, and in September he sold his London home, 9 Hanover Square. The purchaser was Charles Locock, an obstetrician in his early thirties to whom Knighton had once referred patients.
More than twenty years earlier, as a provincial doctor making a second attempt to
establish himself in London, Knighton had bought the property from Robert Hallifax, one of the physicians-in-ordinary to George, then Prince of Wales. In contrast Locock, who enjoyed the patronage of royal surgeon Benjamin Brodie and respected obstetrician Robert Gooch, both of whom Knighton knew well, brought a thriving practice to 9 Hanover Square. Nevertheless Knighton and Locock had much in common. Both had attracted mentors who guided their early careers. As their practices grew, both noted a rapid, exponential increase in lucrative connections. And both were befriended by slightly older women who became their confidantes (more about that in a later post).
Robert Hallifax died in 1810, and two years later Knighton was appointed physician-in-ordinary in his place. In 1831 Locock became physician accoucheur to William IV’s consort, Queen Adelaide, whom Knighton attended in 1820 when she was Duchess of Clarence. In 1840 Locock became physician accoucheur to Queen Victoria.
More than twenty years earlier, as a provincial doctor making a second attempt to
establish himself in London, Knighton had bought the property from Robert Hallifax, one of the physicians-in-ordinary to George, then Prince of Wales. In contrast Locock, who enjoyed the patronage of royal surgeon Benjamin Brodie and respected obstetrician Robert Gooch, both of whom Knighton knew well, brought a thriving practice to 9 Hanover Square. Nevertheless Knighton and Locock had much in common. Both had attracted mentors who guided their early careers. As their practices grew, both noted a rapid, exponential increase in lucrative connections. And both were befriended by slightly older women who became their confidantes (more about that in a later post).
Robert Hallifax died in 1810, and two years later Knighton was appointed physician-in-ordinary in his place. In 1831 Locock became physician accoucheur to William IV’s consort, Queen Adelaide, whom Knighton attended in 1820 when she was Duchess of Clarence. In 1840 Locock became physician accoucheur to Queen Victoria.
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I shepherded the bio through publication, shuffling commas and tweaking headings, ignorant of letters at Westminster City Archives in which Locock discusses Knighton’s practice. How important is stuff like that in a biography of a physician? How many eons did I waste looking for it in the wrong places? What of the trillion hours I wiled away in Westminster City Archives dotting and crossing insignificant 'i's and 't's? Why did it not occur to me to check out the Locock papers at the Wellcome Library? Now I find there's even a biography of the wretched man.
***
Hanover Square is south of Oxford Street. You can just about make out No 9, second down from the north-east corner. http://www.motco.com/Map/81005/Sale/imagetwo-a.asp?Picno=81005860&title=+return+to+your+previous+screen+close+this+window+%2D+click+on+the+X+in+the+top+right+corner%2E
Sources:
- G T Bettanny, revised by Anne Digby, ‘Locock, Sir Charles, first baronet (1799-1875), obstetric physician’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/16915 [accessed 9 June 2013, free to members of UK libraries]
- Russell C Maulitz, ‘Metropolitan medicine and the man-midwife: the early life and letters of Charles Locock’, Medical History, Vol 26, Issue 1, Jan 1982, pp25-46 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1139111/?page=1 [accessed 9 June 2013]
- Morning Chronicle, London, 11 December 1820 and many subsequent dates
- London Metropolitan Archives: Middlesex Deeds Registry MDR 1834/8/247 and MDR 1834/8/248
- Westminster City Archives, London: Poor, Watch and Paving Rates Collector’s Book, MF451
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