Author: Ferriar, John
Biography:
FERRIAR, John (1761-1815: ODNB)
He was born at Oxnam near Jedburgh, Scotland, the son of the Rev. Alexander Ferriar and his wife Mary Burn. After the death of his father in 1764 his mother returned to her native town of Alnwick, where she married Thomas Idlerton. Ferriar attended Edinburgh University and graduated MD in 1781. He married Barbara Gair at Alnwick on 9 Oct. 1782 and began his medical practice in Stockton-on-Tees, but they moved to Manchester in 1785 and stayed for the rest of their lives. Barbara Ferriar died in 1800; five of their children survived both parents. Ferriar became a leader in both medical and literary circles. He instituted reforms at the Manchester Infirmary, helped to found Manchester's first board of health, and encouraged the establishment of fever wards. From the time of his arrival in Manchester he contributed papers to the meetings of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society, some of which grew into separate publications such as the Illustrations of Sterne. His 1809 poem The Bibliomania, teasingly addressed to the collector Richard Heber (q.v.), preceded T. F. Dibdin's prose Bibliomania, published in the same year and presented as a "Supplement" to Ferriar. Other publications include collections of case histories, an abridgment of Southern's tragedy Oroonoko (1788), and An Essay towards a Theory of Apparitions (1813). He died in Manchester on 4 Feb. 1815 and was buried there in St. Mary's Church. (ODNB 26 Jul. 2021; findmypast.com 26 Jul. 2021; Lancaster Gazette 11 Feb. 1815) HJ