Did James the First of England die from the effects of poison, or from natural causes? / by Norman Chevers.

  • Norman Chevers
Date:
1862
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Did James the First of England die from the effects of poison, or from natural causes? / by Norman Chevers. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    him most good? The Duke gave him a particular answer thereto, and that one, who was the Earl of Warwick’s physician, had ministered a plaister and a posset-drink to him, and the chief thing that did him good was a vomit; which he wished the King had taken in the beginning of his sickness. The King was very desirous to have that plaister and posset- drink sent for; but the Duke delayed it: whereupon the King impatiently asked, whether it was sent for or not? And finding by the Duke’s speech- es, he had not sent for it, his late Majesty sent J. Baker, the Duke’s servant, and with his own mouth, commanded him to go for it; whereup- on the Duke besought his Majesty not to make use of it, but by the advice of his own physicians, nor until it should be tried by James Palmer, of his bed-chamber, who was then sick of an ague, and upon two children in the town; which the King said he would do. In this resolution the Duke left his Majesty and went to London,” [We have, already, cited Eglisham’s allusion to this absence] “ and, in the meantime, the plaister and posset- drink was brought and applied by his late Majesty’s own command. At the Duke’s return, his Majesty was in taking the posset-drink, and the King then commanded the Duke to give it him; which he did in the pre- sence-of some of the King’s physicians, they then no ways seeming to dis- like it, the same drink being first tasted by some of them, and divers others in the King’s bed-chamber; and he thinks this was the second time the King took it. Afterwards, when the King grew somewhat worse than before, the Duke heard a rumour as if his physic had done the King hurt, and that the Duke had ministered that physic to him without ad- vice. The Duke acquainted the King therewith; to whom the King, with much discontent, answered thus,—‘They are worse than devils that say it.’ So far from the truth it was; which now notwithstanding as it seemeth, is taken up by some, and with much confidence affirmed. And here the Duke humbly prayeth all your lordships, not only to consider the truth of this answer, but also to commiserate the sad thought which this article had revived in him.”’* On the following (lay, the Commons called upon the Lords for a copy of the Duke’s answer, that they might consider and reply to it. The Lords promised to furnish this. The Duke then stood up and declared his intention of submitting proofs which, he declared, would wholly clear him of the seventh charge (of delivering certain ships into the hands of the Drench.) On the 10th, the copy of the Duke’s answer was brought to the Commons. Mr. Baron Trevor and Sir C. Caesar, who were charged with this duty, signified that the Duke had * According to Bishop Goodman, who speaks from memory, admitting that he had not a perfect remembrance of the transactions in Parliament, Bristol, on one occasion, “ Reckoning some misdemeanours of Buckingham, and how ill tlie King did relish them, concluded that he did wish that these things had not been some cause to hasten the King’s death ; which words were then understood as if the King had not died naturally. But, the next day, Bristol did expound himself, that his meaning only was in respect of the sorrow and grief which the King might, thereby, conceive. And hereupon, Buckingham took occasion in the Parliament House, to speak of the plaister, and said that a woman had a child sick of a quartan acme in the same town, and that she did use the very same plaister to her child, and the child recovered,” li