136 FOTHERGILL'S MEDICAL FRIENDS CHAP, xi 



him at Warrington, the seat at that time of a well-known 

 academy, where Aikin's father was one of the lecturers. 

 Priestley, Reinhold Forster the naturalist, Gilbert Wake- 

 field the theologian and others contributed to give lustre 

 to this institution, which aimed to give the advantages 

 of a university education to Protestant dissenters. 

 During its existence the press at Warrington issued 

 a succession of important books. The academy was 

 the precursor of Hackney College. Young John Aikin, 

 already ardently pursuing the history of medical science, 

 received much help from Fothergill, who offered him 

 books and gave him useful advice ; and he conceived an 

 admiration for FothergnTs character and attainments 

 which influenced his own career. 1 Aikin was John 

 Howard's literary executor. 



Other medical friends of Fothergill will be found 

 mentioned elsewhere. Here need only be added the 

 names of Dr. Pemberton of Warrington, who died in 

 1780; and James Vaughan of Leicester, M.D., Edin. (1762), 

 the father of Sir Henry Halford. 



1 Mem. John Aikin, M.D. (1823), i. 24, 26, 154, 153 ; Munk, Roll R.C.P. ; 

 Did. Nat. Biog. Aikin practised until 1798 in Broad Street Buildings, on 

 the site of the present North London Railway Terminus. The old house in 

 which Aikin dwelt and died at Stoke Newington still stands now St. Mary's 

 Day Nursery, No. 106 Church Street. Opposite to it, Nos. 113 and 115, is 

 the house of Mrs. Barbauld. 



