David Hamilton (diarist)

Sir David Hamilton, FRS, MD (1663 – August 1721) was a Scottish physician to Queen Anne, during which appointment he kept a diary.^[1]

Life

Born in Scotland, he entered the University of Leiden as a medical student on 30 October 1683. He graduated MD of the university of Reims in 1686. He was admitted a licentiate of the London College of Physicians in 1688, and fellow in 1703.^[2]

Elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1708, Hamilton became a leading practitioner in midwifery, and was successively physician to Queen Anne,^[3] who knighted him, and to Caroline, Princess of Wales. He is said to have acquired a fortune of £80,000, which he lost in the South Sea Bubble. He died on 28 August 1721.^[2]

Works

Hamilton wrote:^[2]

• An inaugural Dissertation for M.D. "De Passione Hysterica", Paris, 1686.
• The Private Christian's Witness for Christianity, in opposition to the National and Erroneous Apprehensions of the Arminian, Socinian, and Deist of the Age, London, 1697.
• The Inward Testimony of the Spirit of Christ to his outward Revelation, London, 1701. This and the previous work were anonymously published.
• Tractatus Duplex: prior de Praxeos Regulis, alter de Febre Miliari, London, 1710; Ulm, 1711; English translation, London, 1737.

Notes

1. Baigent, Elizabeth. "Hamilton, Sir David (1663–1721)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/12058. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
2.  Stephen, Leslie; Lee, Sidney, eds. (1890). "Hamilton, David (1663-1721)". Dictionary of National Biography. 24. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
3. John Pointer (1714). A chronological history of England: or, An impartial abstract of the most remarkable transactions ... to ... 1713. to the end of queen Anne's reign. p. 626.

Further reading

• Philip Roberts (ed.), The Diary of Sir David Hamilton, 1709–1714 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975).

Attribution

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Stephen, Leslie; Lee, Sidney, eds. (1890). "Hamilton, David (1663-1721)". Dictionary of National Biography. 24. London: Smith, Elder & Co.