[Archive of twelve letters written to his future wife Mary R. Nicholson.]

£3,000 · Offered by Maggs Bros Ltd

John Rodgers (1793-1851) studied at the New York College of Physicians and Surgeons, graduating in 1816. He travelled to England where he spent two years at Guy’s and St Thomas’s Hospital. In 1820, with , he co-founded America’s first specialty hospital, the New York Eye Infirmary. His reputation soon spread and in 1823, Governor Paulus Roelof Cantz’laar invited him to work in Curaçao. “In what might be described as opthamology’s first international goodwill mission, he performed scores of severe operations on poor and rich patients alike in two converted rooms of a fort located near Willemstad, the capital city” (Levin). While much of the correspondence constitutes professions of adoration, Rodgers includes descriptions of his time on the island. On April, 30 he writes: “I have felt flattered to by being asked to perform operations which the surgeons of the island would not be trusted with and have been pleased with the success in those as well there the surgeons were afraid to make any attempt … I saw many indigent persons afflict with various diseases who were not able to procure proper medical advice … The Governor having taken great interest in a gentleman on whom I operated having wished me success in all my operations, I told him that if apartments were provided for I was willing to devote an hour every day to their service. He has given me the use of a house in the Fort …” In a long letter written from the Fryke Plantation, he comments on the drought endured on the is

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