1. Baron Thomas Dimsdale was an English medical doctor, banker and politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1780 to 1790.
13 Facts About Thomas Dimsdale
1. 2.
Thomas Dimsdale was created Baron Dimsdale of the Russian Empire by Catherine the Great after inoculating her against smallpox.
3.
Thomas Dimsdale's cousin, housekeeper and third wife Elizabeth Dimsdale was a diarist and recipe collector.
4.
Thomas Dimsdale was born in Theydon Garnon, Essex, the son of John Dimsdale, a surgeon, and his wife Susan.
5.
Thomas Dimsdale was trained in medicine by his father before training further at St Thomas' Hospital, London, after which he began to practise medicine in Hertford in 1734.
6.
Thomas Dimsdale published The present method of inoculating for the small-pox in 1767 which went into five editions by 1769.
7.
In 1768, Thomas Dimsdale, accompanied by his second son Nathaniel Thomas Dimsdale travelled to St Petersburg and inoculated the Empress, her son, and over 140 members of the Court.
8.
Thomas Dimsdale was elected as MP for Hertford in two successive parliaments in 1780 and 1784.
9.
Thomas Dimsdale had married three times: firstly Mary, the daughter of Nathaniel Brassey of Roxford, Hertfordshire; secondly Anne, the daughter of John Iles, with whom he had seven sons and two daughters; and thirdly Elizabeth Dimsdale, the daughter of his cousin Joseph Dimsdale of Bishop's Stortford.
10.
Thomas Dimsdale had lived within the family for most of her life and she was a diarist and writer of letters.
11.
Thomas Dimsdale was succeeded in the Russian Barony by his eldest son John, from whom it descended within the family.
12.
Thomas Dimsdale lived in Bengeo a part of Hertford, the county town of Hertfordshire, where Dimsdale Street, which partly bounded his land, still bears his name.
13.
Thomas Dimsdale died in 1800 and was buried in the Quakers' burial-ground at Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire.