William Oliver (physician, 1695–1764)

Oliver practised for a time at Plymouth, on returning from Leyden, where he introduced inoculation for smallpox. but about 1725 he settled at Bath and remained there for the rest of his life, obtaining in a very short time the leading practice of the city. This was mainly due to his friendship with Ralph Allen (a fellow Cornishman, who introduced him to Pope, Warburton, and the rest of the guests at Prior Park), and with Dr. William Borlase, his 'friend and relation,’ who, after being his patient in 1730, sent to him the gentry of the west country. and Charles Lucas, M.D., in consequence of their reflections on the use and abuse of the waters, and their censures on the conduct of the physicians at the hospital. Much correspondence ensued, and it was published as proving the existence of a 'physical confederacy in Bath.' His medical skill is mentioned by Mrs. Anne Pitt. and by Mrs. Delany He and Peirce attended Ralph Allen in his last illness, and each received a complimentary legacy of £100. ==The Bath Oliver and Bath Bun==

Oliver is said to have invented the Bath bun, however it proved too fattening for his rheumatic patients, and so he invented the ‘Bath Oliver’ biscuit, and shortly before his death confided the recipe to his coachman Atkins, giving him at the same time £100 in money and ten sacks of the finest wheat-flour. The fortunate recipient opened a shop in Green Street, and soon acquired a large fortune. The 'Bath Oliver' is still a well-known brand. ==Personal life==

In 1746, Oliver purchased a small farmhouse two miles from Box, near Bath, as a vacation residence, and called it Trevarnoe, after the scene of his childhood and the abode of his fathers. For many years before his death he was subject to the gout. He died at Bath on 17 March 1764, and was buried in All Saints' Church of Weston, near that city, where an inscription 'on a white tablet, supported by palm-branches,’ was erected to his memory. There is also a plain mural tablet to his memory in Bath Abbey. The statement in the Life and Times of Selina, countess of Huntingdon (i. 450–1), that he remained 'a most inveterate infidel till a short time before his death' is probably an exaggeration. He was generally admitted to have been an eminently sensible man, and one also of a most compassionate and benevolent nature. His library was sold in 1764. His son, the third William Oliver, matriculated from Christ Church, Oxford, on 20 January 1748–9, aged 18, and his name appears on the books at Leyden on 21 September 1753. The eldest daughter married a son of the Rev. John Acland, rector of Broadclyst, Devonshire; the second daughter, Charlotte, married, 14 April 1752, Sir John Pringle, bart., F.R.S. Some of his descendants are said to have been living at Bath in 1852. ==Writings==

Oliver published, in 1753, Myra: a pastoral dialogue sacred to the memory of a lady who died 29 Dec. 1753, aged 25. His Practical Essay on the Use and Abuse of warm Bathing in Gouty Cases came out in 1751, passed into a second edition in 1751, and into a third in 1764. Philip Thicknesse inserted some remarks on this essay in his ''Valetudinarian's Bath Guide, (1780, pp. 30–36). Oliver was also the anonymous author of A Faint Sketch of the Life, Character, and Manners of the late Mr. Nash'', which was printed at Bath for John Keene, and sold at 3d. It was praised by Oliver Goldsmith as 'written with much good sense and still more good nature,’ and it was embodied in Goldsmith's Life of Beau Nash. It also appeared in the Public Ledger of 12 March 1761, and in the Rev. Richard Warner's History of Bath, (pp. 370–1). To the Philosophical Transactions for 1723 and 1755 respectively he contributed brief papers on medical topics, the former being addressed to Dr. Richard Mead. His lines to Sir John Cope 'upon his catching Sir Anthony's fire by drinking Bath waters,’ are in Mrs. Stopford Sackville's manuscripts. Oliver applied to Dr. Borlase for minerals for Pope's grotto, and his name frequently occurs in the letters of Pope and Borlase at Castle Horneck, near Penzance. A letter to Oliver from Pope, dated 8 October 1740, and the property of Henry George Bohn, was inserted with the first draft of the reply in Carruthers's Life of Pope. Several other letters were formerly in the possession of Upcott. One, dated 28 August 1743, is printed in Roscoe's Works of Pope, (i. 541–2), and it was reprinted with two others which were taken from the European Magazine. In the summer of 1743 Oliver wrote to Pope to free himself from all knowledge of John Tillard's attack on William Warburton, which was dedicated to him without his knowledge (Works, ed. Courthope, ix. 233). Two letters from Warburton to Oliver are in Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, (v. 581–582), and several communications from him to Doddridge from 1743 to 1749 are contained in the latter's Correspondence, (v. 223–225, 302–4, v. 66–7, 126–9). Three letters from Stephen Duck to him are printed in the European Magazine, (1795, pt. i. p. 80 and pt. ii. p. 79). He bestowed many favours on Duck, and was, no doubt, the polite son of Æsculapius depicted in that author's Journey to Marlborough, Bath, &c. (Works, 1753, p. 75). A letter from Oliver to Dr. Ward on two Roman altars discovered at Bath is in the British Museum, (Addit. MS. 6181, f. 63), and three more letters referring to some dirty and miserly old acquaintance of Jacob Tonson at Bath in 1735, are in Addit. MS. 28275, fols. 356–61. Some manuscript letters to James Jurin belong to the Royal Society. Benjamin Heath dedicated to him in 1740 The Essay towards a demonstrative Proof of the Divine Existence; plate 18 in the Antiquities of Cornwall was engraved at his expense and inscribed to him by Dr. Borlase; and the later impressions of Mary Chandler's 'Description of Bath' contained (pp. 21–3) some verses to him acknowledging that he had corrected her poem, and that == See also ==