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Social History of Medicine 2001 14(3):417-437; doi:10.1093/shm/14.3.417
© 2001 by Society for the Social History of Medicine
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Opportunity on the Edge of Orthodoxy: Medically Qualified Hydropathists in the Era of Reform, 1840–60

JAMES BRADLEY and MARGUERITE DUPREE*

* Research Fellow and Senior Lecturer (Core Staff), respectively, Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, University of Glasgow 5 University Gardens, Glasgow G12 8QQ, UK

SUMMARY Following the lead of the Lancet's attacks in the 1840s, historians have considered hydropathy and hydropathists in Britain as part of fringe or heterodox medicine. Yet the distance between varieties of orthodox theory and practice and hydropathy was small, and many of the most prominent hydropathists held orthodox views and qualifications. Examining the educational backgrounds and careers of 40 early British hydropathists, the authors suggest that hydropathy and hydropathic establishments, like specialist hospitals, asylums, and spa practice, provided an alternative niche to general practice in the crowded British medical market and a way to ‘fame and fortune’ for medical men outside the metropolitan élite.

Keywords: hydropathy; orthodox medicine; fringe medicine; medical careers; Britain; qualifications; medical theory; therapeutics


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