Mrs Spilsbury's drops (1796)

Oxford Journal 24 Dec 1796

To Mrs. SPILSBURY, Soho Square, London

Nov. 17, 1796
MADAM,
ANIMATED by the most lively sensations of gratitude, and anxious for the welfare of my fellow-sufferers labouring under similar complaints, I consider it an act of duty and of justice to make my Case known to the Publick. I was most severely afflicted near twenty years with a violent scorbutic complaint, accompanied with a fever on my nerves, a visionary and relaxed state, and the usual debility that always occurs from this malignant disease. After trying for a long time the various skill of many of the most eminent physicians in town and country (some of whom pronounced me incurable) I was rendered wholly incapable of business, and reduced to a most deplorable and hopeless condition; both my legs, particularly the right one, as well as my thighs, were greatly swelled and inflamed, attended with alarming ulcers that discharged a corrosive and exceedingly offensive matter, which destroyed, in its progress, the sound parts of the skin; the paroxysms of pain were so frequent and excruciating that I could obtain no rest either day or night, and I became a miserable object of compassion to all around me. Afflicted in this most dreadful manner, as my last and only hope! I had recourse to your EXCELLENT ANTISCORBUTIC DROPS; by taking them according to the printed directions, and persevering in the use of them for three years, I have, thank the Divine Providence, received a complete Cure, and am now in perfect health.
I am, Madam, your ever-obliged and
humble Servant, W. TURNER
Winslow, Bucks.

Attested by James Bannister, Curate of Winslow.
Reverend E. Ashe.
Joseph Dudley, Thomas Wilson, Church-Wardens

N.B. As all the symptoms attending the above Case are too numerous and too dreadful to relate in an advertisement, every person desirous of further information, is requested to apply to the above Mr. Turner, who will most willingly relate the whole account of his disease and cure.

The Drops are sold at the Dispensary in Soho Square, and by all the general Venders of Patent Medicines in Town and Country.

Notes

This testimonial was printed in many newspapers around the country. Mrs Spilsbury was the widow of Francis Spilsbury, who published a book, Free Observations on the Scurvy, Gout, Diet, and Remedy (6th ed., 1791), full of testimonials like this. Antiscorbutic drops were taken for scurvy.

William Turner is recorded as a lace-dealer at Winslow in 1784 and 1798.