To Benjamin Franklin from John Shippen, 3 June 1769
From John Shippen8
ALS: American Philosophical Society
Skeleton-hall,9 St. Thos. Street, Southwarke June 3d. 1769.
Most respected Sir
If after the Perusal of the inclosed Letters from my Father you will Venture to Assist Me, by accepting a Bill on the Man so Near and dear to Me,1 Or in any other way you shall think more proper to Enable Me to Return to America with every requisite necessary to Accomplish my Scheme of reading Lectures on Natural History2—with your hearty recommendation and Advice—I shall ever Entertain a most gratefull remembrance of it in my Mind, Esteem it a most singular favor and ever remain inviolably your most Devoted Obliged and Obedient Humble Servant
John Shippen
Dr. Franklin
Addressed: To / Doctor Franklin / Craven Street / present
8. Dr. John Shippen (1741–70) was the son of BF’s old Philadelphia associate, Dr. William Shippen (for whom see above, III, 428 n), and the younger brother of Dr. William Shippen, Jr. (above, IX, 219 n), of whom BF had seen a good deal during William’s medical studies in Britain. John, after graduating from the College of New Jersey, had taken his medical degree at Rheims; he is said to have returned to America in March, 1768, but the date is clearly in error. Roberdeau Buchanan, Genealogy of the Descendants of Dr. Wm. Shippen, the Elder (Washington, 1877), p. 7.
9. Presumably a nickname for all or part of Guy’s Hospital.
1. BF obliged, and accepted a bill on Dr. William Shippen for £25. It is among BF’s papers in the APS, Vol. LXVII, No. 10; see also DF to BF below, Nov. 20.
2. He delivered a course of lectures on fossils in Philadelphia in 1770: Pa. Gaz., April 5, 1770; Charles R. Hildeburn,” Descendants of William Shippen,” PMHB, I (1877), 109.