James Parkinson and His Disease

Abstract

James Parkinson was born in 1755 in Shoreditch, close to the City of London and like his father practised medicine there as an Apothecary and Surgeon. His earlier years in practice were disturbed by a rebellious spirit, roused by the poverty and injustices he saw around him. Inevitably he was drawn into politics and joined the provocative London Corresponding Society. He wrote a number of highly critical pamphlets under the pseudonym of “Old Hubert”. His criticisms of government and administration were at times so bitter and fearless that eventually they led to his being subpoened and examined by the Privy Council. During the course of these examinations he had to answer to the Lord Chancellor, the Prime Minister, Mr. William Pitt and others in high office. Fortunately his explanations impressed his interrogators by their honesty and sincerity and he escaped imprisonment. By the time he was 40, with the increasing demands of a busy practice and a young family, he seemed to turn all his efforts to his own work and writings. His interests were broad. His first book was on “The Organic Remains of a Former World”. Later he wrote on medical education, the preservation of health, and a brilliant criticism “Observations on Doctor Hugh Smith’s Philosophy of Physics”. Nevertheless it was not for another 22 years that he wrote his classic essay on “The Shaking Palsy” which was published in 1817 (Critchley 1955).