Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Fellowes, James (1771-1857)
FELLOWES, Sir JAMES, M.D. (1771–1857), physician, born in Edinburgh in 1771, was the third son of Dr. William Fellowes, physician extraordinary to the Prince of Wales and brother of Sir Thomas Fellowes [q. v.] He was educated at Rugby, and at Peterhouse, Cambridge. On obtaining a Tancred scholarship he migrated to Gonville and Caius College, where he became a Perse fellow, and graduated M.B. in 1797 and M.D. 1803. He was elected a fellow of the College of Physicians 30 Sept. 1805. He served in the medical service of the army before taking his degree, and afterwards became physician to the forces, and went with Admiral Christian's fleet to San Domingo. In 1804 he was sent to investigate and treat the pestilential fever which raged there. He returned to England in April 1806, and in 1810 was knighted by George III. Soon after he served at Cadiz as chief of the medical department of the army, and in 1815 retired from his majesty's service. In the same year he published ‘Reports of the Pestilential Disorder of Andalusia, which appeared at Cadiz in the years 1800, 1804, 1810, and 1813.’ The reports, though somewhat wanting in completeness, give an interesting account of these violent epidemics as observed at Cadiz, and also of the pestilential fever at Malaga in 1803–4, which was witnessed and described by Waterton the naturalist, with further account of the disease as seen at Gibraltar, and of the Walcheren fever [see Davis, Joseph Barnard]. The Spanish pestilence seems to have been a malignant form of typhus, with interspersed cases of relapsing fever, a combination also observed in London and in Ireland. The fever was highly contagious and the book shows that the author was not deterred from thoroughly investigating the subject by any fears for his own safety, and that he had sound views on the ventilation of barracks and sickrooms. The pathological part of the reports is defective. Fellowes long lived on his pension, and died at Havant 30 Dec. 1857.
[Munk's Coll. of Phys. iii. 24; Luard's Graduati Cantabrigienses; Works.]
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.121
N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
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| 300 | ii | 22 | Fellowes, Sir James: for 1809 read 1810 |