John Berkenhout | |
|---|---|
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| Born | (1726-07-08)8 July 1726 |
| Died | 3 April 1791(1791-04-03) (aged 64) |
John Berkenhout (8 July 1726 – 3 April 1791) was anEnglishphysician,naturalist and miscellaneous writer. He was educated as a physician at Edinburgh and Leyden. While at Edinburgh he published a botanical lexiconClavis Anglicae Linguae Botanicae. He published several works on natural history, includingOutlines of the Natural History of Great Britain and Ireland (1769) andSynopsis of the Natural History of Great Britain and Ireland (1789). He served as a British agent in the colonies during theAmerican Revolution.
Berkenhout was born about 1730 atLeeds, the son of John Berkenhout Snr, aDutch merchant who had settled inYorkshire, and Anne Kitchingman. He was educated atLeeds Grammar School. His father intended him for a commercial career, and sent him toGermany to study languages. After spending some years in Germany he accompanied some English noblemen on a tour through Europe. On returning toBerlin he stayed with his father's relativeBaron von Bielfeld.[1]
Berkenhout became a cadet in aPrussian infantry regiment, where he was promoted to the rank ofensign and then captain. In 1756, at the start of theSeven Years' War, he left the Prussian service, and received a commission in an English regiment.
In 1760 he enteredEdinburgh University as a medical student. From Edinburgh he went to theUniversity of Leyden, where he took his degree of doctor of physic (medicine) on 13 May 1765. On his return to England he settled atIsleworth inMiddlesex, It is stated inDavid Elisha Davy's 'Suffolk Collections' (xc. 403) that he practised for some time as a physician atBury St Edmunds.[1]
In 1778 Berkenhout was sent by the government with theCarlisle Peace Commission to America, quite covertly. TheContinental Congress would not allow the Commission to go beyond New York; but Berkenhout managed to reachPhiladelphia.[1] He knewArthur Lee, and through him contactedRichard Henry Lee. Suspicion arose in September that he was corrupting leading citizens; and he was detained and questioned, and thrown into prison. ThereTimothy Matlack andBenjamin Rush visited him, and verbal fencing ensued.[2][3] In the end Berkenhout was paroled, and rejoined the commissioners at New York on 19 September; but the negotiations of the Carlisle Commission were dead.[4] He came back to England, and was rewarded with a pension for his services.[1]
Berkenhout died on 3 April 1791 atBesselsleigh near Oxford.[1]
While a student at Edinburgh Berkenhout published in 1762 a botanical lexicon,Clavis Anglica Linguæ Botanicæ Linnæi, second edition 1764, and third edition 1766. For his M.D. he wroteDissertatio Medica inauguralis de Podagra, dedicated on publication to Baron de Bielfeld. In 1766 he publishedPharmacopoeia Medici.[1]
In 1769 appeared the first volume of Berkenhout'sOutlines of the Natural History of Great Britain; the second volume followed in 1770, and the third in 1771. It was republished in 1773 (three volumes), and a revised edition in two volumes appeared in 1788 asA Synopsis of the Natural History of Great Britain. In his publication (1771)William Cadogan's "Dissertation on the Gout" wasExamined and Refuted.[1]
In these works Berkenhout named the brown rat as theNorway Rat ("Rattus norvegicus"), notLinnaeus as is often claimed.
Berkenhout's major work wasBiographia Literaria, or a Biographical History of Literature, containing the lives of English, Scotch, and Irish authors, from the dawn of letters in these kingdoms to the present time, chronologically and classically arranged (1777, first volume only). In the preface he acknowledged his debt toGeorge Steevens for the lives of poets.[1] Steevens in fact used the work to put into circulation one of his hoaxes, a forged letter purporting to be fromGeorge Peele.[5]
In 1780 Berkenhout publishedLucubrations on Ways and Means, a proposal on the imposition of taxes. Some of the suggestions in it were adopted byLord North, others subsequently byWilliam Pitt the Younger. HisEssay on the Bite of a Mad Dog appeared in 1783;Symptomatology in 1784. Berkenhout's last work wasLetters on Education to his Son at the University, 1790. In it he commented on the system offagging inpublic schools.[1]
Berkenhout also publishedTreatise on Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Diseases (1777), from the French ofPierre Pomme. In 1779 he edited a revised edition ofJohn Campbell'sLives of the Admirals. He translated from Swedish, asLetters from an Old Man to a Young Prince (1756), CountCarl Gustaf Tessin's letters to the futureGustavus III of Sweden.[1]Richard Linnecar dedicated hisStrictures on Freemasonry to Berkenhout.[6]
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Stephen, Leslie, ed. (1885). "Berkenhout, John".Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 4. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
