To Thomas Jefferson from Louis Valentin, 28 December 1803
From Louis Valentin
Nancy, December 28th. 1803.
Sir
I have the honour to send you, herewith, a copy of my treatise on the yellow fever. this Work is the first that had been published ex professo in our language, and agreeably to the desires of our first School of Physick, as you Will See it in the advertisement. Seven months ago, I had already trusted to an agent of the french government, another Work of mine the title of Which is: Résultats de l’inoculation de la Vaccine &c. With Some experiments on sundry domestic animals.
I Shall be Very happy if you have the goodness to accept of them. Such a favor Will add exceedingly to their Weak Worth. for the materials I gathered and the practice I acquired in the treatment of the yellow fever, I am, in a great measure, indebted to my residence for five years in your Country. it is the Sincerest Wish of my heart, that Scourge might relinquish it entirely
I remain, Sir, With the highest consideration and most profound respect
of your excellency the most humble and obedient Servant
Louis Valentin
M.D. at Nancy
RC (DLC); at head of text: “his excellency Mr. Thomas Jefferson, President of the united States of america”; endorsed by TJ as received 11 Oct. 1805 and so recorded in SJL. Enclosures: (1) Louis Valentin, Traité de la fièvre jaune d’Amérique (Paris, 1803; No. 920). (2) Louis Valentin, Résultats de l’inoculation de la vaccine dans les départemens de la Meurthe, de la Meuse, des Vosges et du Haut-Rhin (Nancy, 1802; No. 952).
Louis Valentin (1758-1829) went to Saint-Domingue in 1790 as the chief physician of the French army there. Forced from the island by the revolution in 1793, he lived in Virginia, became a member of the American Philosophical Society, and directed hospitals for French mariners until he returned to France in 1799. He studied contagious and epidemic diseases, wrote treatises on inoculation and other medical subjects, and, using his housemaids as human subjects, experimented with the transmission of the smallpox virus between humans and a variety of domestic animals for the purposes of propagating vaccine. He wrote the first biographical work on Edward Jenner (Biographie universelle, ancienne et moderne, new ed., 45 vols. [Paris, 1843–65], 42:453-4; Elinor Meynell, “French Reactions to Jenner’s Discovery of Smallpox Vaccination: The Primary Sources,” Social History of Medicine, 8 [1995], 287, 295, 297, 299; Louis Valentin, Notice Biographique sur le Docteur Jenner [Montpellier, France, 1805; No. 421]; Vol. 35:490-1).