(MEDICINE) Long and unusual letters home from a Philadelphia

Sale 2344 - Lot 175

Price Realized: $ 1,250

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 250 - $ 350

(MEDICINE.) Long and unusual letters home from a Philadelphia physician. 19 letters from Dr. David Merritt of Philadelphia to his parents in Saint John's, New Brunswick; 22 medical reports; and a folder of medical clippings and ephemera; numerous stamped envelopes; and more than 90 letters and other papers from Merritt's extended family in New Brunswick, 1825-1905, particularly his father David Jabez Merritt. Vp, 1862-80

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David Merritt (1830-1888) was a native of New Brunswick, Canada, and emigrated to the United States as a young man, graduating from the Pennsylvania Medical College and serving as a surgeon with the 55th Pennsylvania Infantry during the Civil War before settling into his own practice. These long, detailed, boastful, and rather contentious letters to his father suggest that his father strongly disapproved of his medical career. Dr. Merritt sent his father copies of his monthly income statements, registered of births attended, and other proofs of his great success, many of them in fine calligraphy or illustrated with photographs and engravings. Dr. Merritt was, we feel safe in asserting, an eccentric man, and if you like strange, you'll be happy with this collection.