Valpy Fulton tells of South’s medical men and their milieu

Rex Weavers. Photo by Christine O'Connor.
Rex Weavers. Photo by Christine O'Connor.
There are gems to be found amid the small print of a book delving deep into the lives and times of early medics of the South, writes Shane Gilchrist. 

A summation of both contents and approach, the title of a book by Robert Valpy Fulton suggests not only a certain fascination with medicine, but also an indication its author liked to roam as far afield as those whom he depicts.

Published in 1922 by the Otago Daily Times and Witness Newspapers Co. Ltd, Medical Practice in Otago and Southland in the Early Days: a Description of the manner of life, trials, and difficulties of some of the Pioneer Doctors, of the places in which, and of the people among whom, they laboured was in many regards a labour of love.

So, too, has been the recent digitisation of Fulton's work by Dunedin man Rex Weavers, who, having discovered the book in a Dipton shed more than three decades ago, recently returned to its pages.

‘‘I found the book in the 1980s among a whole lot of material in a back shed at my in-laws','' Weavers explains.

‘‘At that time my wife and I owned Lisburn House, which was built as the Fulton's suburban property. It was the Fulton connection that drew our interest to it.

‘‘The small print deterred me from actually reading it for many years but I just came back to it last year. When I was reading through it, I began to digitally scan it. I enjoyed it. I like poking around into the past.''

Weavers spent six weeks scanning more than 300 pages of text. Still, he believes his efforts might offer researchers and others valuable insights into an important period in the history of Otago and Southland.

‘‘Digitising the physical book makes it more accessible for professional researchers as well as those interested in delving into family histories. That was my motive for digitising the book - it enables people to search the text.

‘‘The original was in a two-column format and used a very small font. Finding anything by reading the original would be very time-consuming and frustrating.

‘‘A contents section based on chapter headings has been added with clickable links to the chapters, and the resulting PDF file can now be searched on one's computer,'' Weavers says.

Encapsulating a series of articles Fulton had written for The Otago Witness, the book sheds little light on the author, who died on May 1, 1924, and was buried in the West Taieri cemetery.

For the record, he is the son of James Fulton, who with brother Robert arrived on Ajax in 1849. They came from Lisburn, near Belfast in Northern Ireland.

Soon after arriving, James married Catherine Valpy, the daughter of William Valpy, one of the richest men in New Zealand at the time, and the couple farmed at Ravenscliffe, West Taieri.

‘‘The Fultons constructed Lisburn House on their 11-acre [4.45ha] suburban section at Caversham around 1864,'' Weavers says.

‘‘Lisburn House was occupied by another brother, Francis. In 1865 James and Catherine had a son, Robert Valpy Fulton, who later became a medical practitioner.''

(Interestingly, a recent Otago Daily Times article (Saturday, 7 November, 2015) stated that the first car Cooke Howlison imported, a single-cylinder 8hp Rover, was sold to a Dr Robert Valpy Fulton.)

As legendary Otago newspaperman George Fenwick wrote in the preface to Medical Practice in Otago and Southland in the Early Days: ‘‘ ... Dr Fulton probably scarcely realised, when he set out to deal with the life histories of the medical practitioners of those bygone years, what an onerous task he had undertaken ...

‘‘His labours gradually and insensibly extended into far more comprehensive work than the simple biographies of the men with whose careers he has made his readers familiar ... ''

Weavers agrees.

Although he found the accounts of various medical men interesting, Fulton's rendering of ‘‘all the by-play that went on'' is more fascinating.

So, along with details on medical training (particularly in Scotland) and frequent diversions into the development of medical treatments (including the use of antiseptics and anaesthetics to more rudimentary practices such as tooth-pulling), Fulton offered descriptions of the geography, geology, flora and fauna of various parts of Otago and Southland.

There are various descriptions of changes made by settlers, particularly in the Dunedin area, where gullies were filled in, hills removed and streams diverted or piped underground.

‘‘I liked when he'd describe aspects of Dunedin,'' Weavers says.

‘‘For instance, at one point he writes about a deep gully in Moray Pl, and if you walk around you can still see how the land falls away quite sharply in some areas.‘‘Fulton seemed to have no restraints as to where his attentions wandered.

‘‘His book is a veritable treasure trove of local history. Some people might recognise a family name and like to know where a relative lived and worked.''

The fact Fulton's book originally comprised a series in the Otago Witness shouldn't be overlooked, Weavers notes.

‘‘People would comment on articles and add their own insights and information. It grew as it went along.

‘‘He also promised there would be more, but he died soon after, so that idea was thwarted.''

 

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