92 HISTORY OF THE INDIAN MEDICAL SERVICE
value of six thousand pagodas; which though there is no reason to believe, yet the Dewan's officers will take occasion to make a demand as customary, and give us trouble by complaining to the Nabob. And Dr Brown being apparently guilty of a breach of the peace, it is resolved that he be committed to the custody of the Marshall, that others may be deterred from the like, and that the inhabitants may understand that such practises are not allowed." *
Dr. Browne was detained in custody for a week, after which he was discharged, in consideration of the fact that his patients required his services, he giving security to the satisfaction of the court.
The Cons. of 3rd Jan., 1697/98, note his discharge, from 30th Nov., 1697, the Court of Directors having disallowed the appointment of Second Surgeon at Fort St. George, which he had held for ten years. On 13th Jan., he was offered the post of surgeon at Chutanuti (Calcutta), but declined it; William Warren got the appointment from 30th June, 1698. On 11th Aug., the Assay Master at Madras, Nathaniel Stone, applied for leave to go home, and promised to instruct Samuel Browne in his duties before he left, so as to leave him qualified for that employment." On 22nd Sept., 1698, Browne died at Madras.
The Dictionary of National Biography includes Browne's name, but only states that from time to time he sent to England collections of dried plants, which now form part of the herbarium of the British Museum, and that particulars of his life are wanting. In 1688 Browne married Ann Baker. Two years after his death, in 1700, she married John Foquet, Scavenger of Madras. In spite of his unpleasant title, the scavenger was a civilian, in charge of house taxation and conservancy, and Foquet stepped from that post, in 1700, to that of Chief of Masulipatam. Browne's daughter, Elizabeth, in 1711, brought an action for breach of promise against Henry Cornwall, Captain of the frigate Sherborne, the ship on which William Hamilton was then serving as surgeon. Seven years later, in 1718, she married the Rev. Charles Long, Chaplain of Madras.
The career of Richard Benoni Ebenezer Blackwall is one of some interest. His name first appears in the Madras Press Lists on 8th March, 1688/89, in a letter from Fort St. George to John
- From J. Talboys Wheeler's Madras in the Olden Time, Vol. I, pp. 300, 301. The Cons. from 1st Jan. to 30th Sept., 1696, are missing from the Fort St. George Factory Records in the India Office, nor can the deficiency here be supplied from the Mackenzie MSS. Apparently they are, or were, preserved at Madras.
