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Letter from John Fleet to George H. Hall, 1789

In 1788, John Fleet and George Holmes Hall became the first two graduates to receive medical degrees from Harvard. Here, in the following year, the two are in correspondence concerning treatment of several of their patients.

A Dissertation on the Puerperal Fever, 1789

Dr. Laterrière’s thesis was first presented orally at the Harvard commencement ceremony in 1789. He dedicated the printed version to Drs. Warren, Waterhouse, and Dexter as “Gentlemen not more distinguished by their literary accomplishments, and their professional abilities, than respected for their attention to students, and their talents for instruction.” This copy of the Dissertation was given to Dr. John Collins Warren by Laterrière.

Mémoires de la P. de Sales Laterrière et de Ses Traverses, 1873

Pierre Laterrière, who first studied medicine under M. de la Rochambeau in France, came to Harvard and received the degree of Bachelor of Medicine in 1789. He went on to practice medicine in Canada. Laterrière’s Mémoires, although written at the end of his life and not published until 1873, contains the earliest account of a student’s experiences at Harvard Medical School and remains a seminal historical document of the institution during its first years.