, an English surgeon of the highest eminence, was born in Thread
, an English surgeon of the highest
eminence, was born in Thread needle-street, London, in
December 1713. His father dying before he was quite
four years old, he was left, in some degree, to the protection and patronage of Wilcox, bishop of Rochester, who
was a distant relation of his mother. The profession of
surgery was his own decided choice, though the connection
above mentioned might naturally have led him to the
church; and, in 1729, he was bound apprentice to Mr.
Nourse, one of the surgeons of St. Bartholomew’s hospital,
under whom he was profoundly instructed, in what, at that
time, was taught only by a few, the science of anatomy.
His situation brought with it an abundance of practical
knowledge, to which his own industry led him to add all
that can be gained from a sagacious and careful perusal of
the early writers on surgery. Thus qualified, he was admirably calculated to reform the superfluous and awkward
modes of practice which had hitherto disgraced the art.
In 1736, having finished his apprenticeship, he took a
house in Fencburch-street, and quickly was distinguished
as a young man of the most brilliant and promising talents.
In 1745, he was elected an assistant surgeon; and, in
1749, one of the principal surgeons of St. Bartholomew’s
hospital. It was one of the honours of Mr. Pott’s life, that
he divested surgery of its principal horrors, by substituting
a mild and rational mode of practice (notwithstanding the opposition of the older surgeons), instead of the actual
cautery, and other barbarous expedients which had hitherto
been employed and he lived to enjoy the satisfaction of
seeing his improved plan universally adopted. Though he
possessed the most distinguished talents for communicating
his thoughts in writing, it seems to have been by accident
that he was led to become an author. Immersed in practice, it does not appear that hitherto he had written any
thing, except a paper “on tumours attended with a softening of the bones,
” in the forty-first volume of the Philosophical Transactions; but, in 1756, a compound fracture
of the leg, occasioned by a fall of his horse in the streets,
gave him leisure to plan, and in part to write, his Treatise
on Ruptures. The flattering reception of his publications
attached him afterwards to this mode of employing his talents, so that he was seldom long without being engaged
in some work. His leg was with difficulty preserved, and
he returned to the labours of his profession. In 1764, he
had the honour of being elected a fellow of the Royal
Society; and in the ensuing year he began to give lectures
at his house, which was then in Watling-street; but finding it necessary, from the increase of his business, to
choose a more central situation, he removed, in 1769, to
Lincoln’s-rnn-fields, and in 1777 to Hanover-square. His
reputation had now risen nearly to the greatest height, bj
means of his various publications, and the great success of
his practice. He was universally consulted, and employed
by persons of the first rank and situation; and received
honorary tributes to his merit from the royal college of
surgeons at Edinburgh and in Ireland. In 1787, he resigned the office of surgeon to St. Bartholomew’s hospital,
“after having served it,
” as he expressed himself, “man
and boy, for half a century
” and in December 1788, in
consequence of a cold caught by going out of town to a
patient in very severe weather, he died, at the age of
seventy-five. He was buried near his mother, in the church
of St. Mary Aldermary, Bow-lane, where a tablet was affixed
to his memory, inscribed by his son, the rev. J. H. Pott, the
present archdeacon of London, and vicar of St. Martin’s-in-the-fields.