A duel betwixt two old physicians
In March 1693 the College of Physicians had to act as mediator between two of its most senior Fellows, who had recently fallen out;
There having happened an unhappy difference betwixt Dr Dun, our present President and Dr Howard, one of our present Censors, upon the College interposing they have both unanimously and without reserve submitted to the decision and determination of the College, and the censure of the College being read to them they accordingly allowed of and complied with it, and are now in presence of the College, returned to their former friendship.[1]
But what exactly had happened to cause this rift between Dr Dun and Dr Howard?
A letter from Nathaniel Foy, Bishop of Waterford, to Archbishop King dated 24 February 1693 contains an account of the whole event;
I received an account of a re-encounter betwixt Dr Dun and Dr Howard. The former drawing upon the Dr., and making fiercely at him in York Street (where they had been immediately before at a consultation), received a small wound in his sword hand, whilst Dr. Howard retreated to the wall, and called out for a constable; upon which the inhabitants of the street came in and parted them. The ground of the quarrel (as it is reported) was that Dr. Dun judged himself injured by Dr. Howard, whilst he endeavoured to supplant him, as he though, in his Excellency's favour, when he made application to be physician to my Lord's family.[2] How the matter of fact stands betwixt them I cannot tell, and so shall not take upon me to judge; but if Dr. Dun has ever been injured by Dr. Howard, I think he could not take a worse way to repair himself, than by an assault upon the Dr.'s life; which may convince the world, perhaps, of an evil, vindictive temper, but never of the justice of his cause. Sure I am he has not acted suitably to his professions, either [as a] Christian or a physician, who bother ought to be peaceable men.[3]
This public spat between two eminent Dublin medical men not only brought the censure of the Bishop of Waterford and the College down on the head of Dun and Howard, but also led to them being ridiculed in verse. An epigram and a long verse on the York Street duel were circulated in Dublin at the time. The longer poem The duel betwixt two old physicians had been, possibly incorrectly, attributed to Jonathan Swift.
As for motive most men doubt,
Why these two doctors did fall out.
Some say it was ambition:
And that one did undermine
The other's credit, with design
To be the State's Physician.[4]
The duel and the notoriety it created don't seem to have materially altered the fortunes of either men, Dun completed his term as President of the College of Physicians, and would go on to be re-elected on a further three occasions and receive a knighthood. Dr Howard would also hold the position of President three times in the next 15 years and his descendants would become the Earls of Wicklow.
However, in times of competition for medical appointments perhaps today's physicians should be careful of meeting their competitors, rapier in hand, on the streets of Dublin?
[1] College Journal – Vol I, 1693-1717, RCPI/2/1/1/1
[2] Presumably His Excellency is Henry Sidney, 1st Earl of Romney, who was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1693.
[3] Letter from Nathaniel Foy, Bishop of Waterford, to Archbishop King, dated 24 February 1693, held in Trinity College Dublin and quoted in J D H Widdess' History of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (Edinburgh, 1963)
[4] Quoted in Widdess' History of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (Edinburgh, 1963)