The Strange Story of Dr. James Barry

I first learned of the intriguing Dr. "James" Barry when I was in medical school and beginning to collect books relating to medical history. In a bookshop on Cape Cod, I asked the proprietor if he had any rare or interesting medical books. After some pondering, he showed me to a glass-fronted case of his "rarest" books and removed a volume published in 1881, written by a Colonel Ebenezar Rogers. A Modern Sphinx was the first published book, albeit fictionalized, about Margaret Ann Bulkley(or perhaps, Miranda Stuart Barry), known for most of her life as Dr. James Barry. Fascinated by the tale, I spent far more than I had planned for that particular book hunting trip. In hindsight, I am quite pleased that I purchased the book as it has only increased in value and is not often found. Thus began my fascination with--most likely--the first female British surgeon.

I recently finished another account of the mysterious doctor: The Strange Story of Dr. James Barry: Army Surgeon, Inspector General of Hospitals, Discovered on death to be a woman(London:Longman's, 1958).



This non-fiction account, written by Isobel Rae, is the first attempt at capturing the fascinating life of Barry without the shading of romance or speculation. Rae attempted, rather successfully, to fill in many factual gaps that had remained unknown in earlier articles and books. The Misses Racster and Grove had written a far less enlightening book in 1932 entitled: Dr. James Barry: Her Secret Story. Rae, on the other hand, was the first biographer allowed unlimited access to "The Barry Papers" at the British War Office.

Barry remained vague about many details of her early life. Born late in the eighteenth-century, it is believed that she graduated from the Edinburgh School of Medicine in 1812. Though apparently a brilliant student, it would seem that Barry was aided in her deception by high-powered connections. It has also been suggested that James Barry was intersex, rather than exclusively female. What is known for certain, however, is that Barry completed forty years as an army surgeon for Great Britain, eventually promoted to an Inspector General of Hospitals in South Africa and what are now the British Virgin Islands. A fastidious dresser, strict vegetarian and obsessive adherent to protocol, Barry remained an enigmatic and puzzling persona to most who met her. Upon her death in 1865, it was discovered by the charwoman who was instructed to prepare the body for burial that the doctor was a she rather than a he. The story made headlines around the world, with many of Barry's former associates claiming that they suspected all along. Regardless, Dr. Barry, according to her evaluations by the British Army, was a skilled and effective physician. In addition to fulfilling her obligations to military hospitals, Barry served Colonial civilian communities in her various posts as well, many of which were abandoned by the doctors of the East India Company. Her obsession with proper diet frequently set her at odds with superiors who were far more concerned with cost savings than what was contained in troop rations.

Barry was certainly not the first woman to disguise her gender in order to study and attain a position in the medical field, but her length of success was unprecedented.


Dr. Barry and her dog, Psyche. Taken in Jamaica in 1862.

Passionate Collectors:The Fabled Cookery Book Collection of Esther Arresty

Esther Arresty, who died in 2000 at the age of 92, began to assemble one of the most incredible collections of rare cookery books as the young wife of a retail executive after World War II. Her husband's work brought them around the world and allowed Mrs. Arresty to develop an extensive network of dealers in her field of collecting. She was a passionate collector and there is no doubt that her love of cooking and history intensified that passion. Once, after receiving a check from her husband for a new mink coat, Esther spent the money on an Elizabethan-era cookery book that she discovered in a London shop.

My great-Aunt Penelope was fortunate to visit Arresty's collection many years ago when it was still housed in her New Jersey home. The Arresty's house was lined with floor to ceiling shelves full of treasures. The collection is extensive and represents every part of the world and spans over five centuries. Her books made quite an impression, especially as it contained treasures from the first cookbook ever printed(1475 in Venice) to a letter from Frederick the Great of Prussia to his chef.

Esther was incredibly generous with the invaluable information contained in her rare books and wrote three wonderful books in her lifetime. My favorite of these is The Delectable Past, published in 1964. It is an incredibly well-written account of culinary history from the Roman Era to the twentieth century. The Best Behavior from 1970 came next and provides a fascinating history of ettiquette througout history. The Exquisite Table was published in 1980 and is a celebration of French cooking. What is so wonderful about all of these books is that Esther's enthusiasm for food is clearly evident. As she was an accomplished home cook as well as an expert on the history of cooking, her adapted recipes tempt the reader to rush to the kitchen and experiment with historical cuisine.

The Esther B. Aresty collection of cookery books is now housed at the University of Pennsylvania. A partial bibliography of her collection can be viewed by clicking here.

Summer in Maine: Part II

I am working on another post about particular books after a busy Fourth of July weekend. Until then, I wanted to share a few pictures from my holiday on the coast of Maine.


A friend's porch in the small coastal town where we watched a traditional Fourth of July parade.


Reading De Foe's account of the Great London Plague in the hammock.


Tarts that I baked for an anniversary dinner laid out on the dining room table.



Visiting the ice cream shop in Port Clyde, Maine.


On Sunday, we visited the Loster Lane Bookshop in Owls Head. It is famous for being an Aladdin's cave of reasonably priced books. One is unlikely to find anything particularly old or rare, but the shop is full of reading copies just perfect to take back to the summer house for an afternoon read. I have been coming here since I was a little boy. Half the fun of this shop is looking through the crowded stacks for a treasure.


A view of a cove from one of the rooms at Lobster Lane. I have never visited another bookshop that has such a view of the sea.


Some of the packed shelves and tight spaces in the shop.

Summer in Maine: Part I

Enjoying a cool summer evening in Maine.

My goodness...The Fourth of July weekend is here already! After many days of dreadful heat and humidity, it is a joy to be sitting in a shady garden by the sea. I will spend the next week or so visiting book shops along the coast that I have not visited since last summer and a few that I have never been to before.

Just yesterday, after a wonderful lunch with a cousin and her husband, I spent some time in Goose River Exchange on Bay View Street in Camden, Maine. It is packed full of great books and ephemera. I saw an old favorite in the books for children section: The Animal Story Book by Andrew Lang, published in 1896. The wonderful engraved illustrations were all done by Henry Justice Ford(1860-1940), but his cover design for the 1896 edition is really stunning.

Here are some photos from yesterday:


My office for the day...I cannot think of a better spot to write blog posts.


Wonderful, ripe blueberries in my cousin's garden in Camden. Rather early this year!


A delicious lunch, prepared by Cousin Liv.



The wonderful title page and binding designs of H.J. Ford.


Moxie and Maine micro-brew beer to celebrate more than thirty years in business at Goose River Exchange.

The Little Boy in the Moon Garden

The Garden Behind the Moon by Howard Pyle(Charles Scribner's Sons, 1895)

There are certain books that never cease to evoke pleasant memories of my childhood. Many of these books were written and illustrated by Howard Pyle(1853-1911), perhaps best known for his depictions of pirates, Robin Hood, and King Arthur's court. I adored those books, especially because they had belonged to my great-grandfather as a little boy and felt like sacred objects in my hands. As they were owned by a family of bibliophiles, children in the family were taught early on to respect and carefully read their books. Luckily for my generation, they survived beautifully.

One of Pyle's books, and certainly not his most famous, brings back wonderful memories of my maternal grandparents and their garden at their summer home on the Maine coast. The Garden Behind the Moon(Charles Scribner's Sons, 1895), was read to us in the deep, soothing voice of our grandfather. His copy was, and is, kept in a wicker bookcase on a large ocean-facing porch at their house. That particular porch has a fine view of a moon gate, installed in 1920. It is a stone gate with a round opening and a teal green door that leads to my grandmother's cutting garden. Because one must go through the moon gate to enter the flower garden, it has always been referred to as the Moon Garden. My grandmother has always enjoyed spending many happy hours in her gardens and as the cutting garden is her pride and joy at the house, my grandfather had a sign erected that reads: "Caroline's Land." A large and interesting gate, often closed, certainly stirred the imagination of my young mind. Being read a book about a magical garden behind the moon made such imaginative stirrings ever more redolent.

The Garden Behind the Moon is a story of little boy named David, often teased by the other children in his village, who follows a moon angel along a silvery path to a garden full of children at play. Pyle's prose is rather poetic, evoking happiness and serenity for a boy who felt rather adrift and unwanted at home. In the garden, he is accepted by the other children and treated incredibly well. Of course, everything eventually ends and as he grows up he must leave the garden behind the moon. At that point in the story, Grandfather's voice would become low and wistful, especially when he read the following passages:

He did not know that he was growing into a man; that it was not moments that were passing, but years of time...He though that he had been only a few minutes in passing beyond the Moon Angel; but it had really been ten years, and in that time he had grown from a child into a man.

I can still hear my grandfather's voice as he read that book to us and how it led me to ponder growing up. As a six year old, growing into a man seemed eons of time in the future, though the summer seemed to end before it even began. Though I am in my thirties now, I am happy to have the memories of our own moon garden and the expectation of seeing it again each summer.

Some of Pyle's Wonderful Illustrations:


David looking up into Hans Krout's Face


Standing with the Moon Angel


In the Garden Behind the Moon

From Lady Warrender's Lips to Queen Alexandra's Ears...Sort of...

Lady Maud Warrender, amateur singer and accomplished gossip.

I am going through an interesting archive at the moment. Amidst a cache of bookplates I found a clipping from a London columnist named Mr. Gossip entitled: "Queen Alexandra's Deafness". It reads:
In her amusing book, "My First Sixty Years"--to be strictly accurate, she is sixty-three--Lady Maud Warrender notes that Queen Alexandra's deafness, despite her clever and attractive efforts to conceal it, led to amusing incidents.
When somebody told her that the old Duke of Rutland had died, she said: "Isn't that wonderful! How did he do it?"

Lady Maud Warrender(1870-1945), or "Maudie" as she was known to her posh friends, frequently performed at house parties of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra. A friend of the likes of Elgar and Madame Melba, she maintained a presence in both the musical and royal worlds. Such exposure to such interesting people must have made writing a gossipy memoir an inevitable undertaking.

O Childhood! Ever Blest and Bright: Portraits of the Children of Victorian Nobility

The Children of the Nobilty, published in 1838.
As it is the weekend, I thought I would share something truly special: The Children of the Nobility, published by Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longmans in London in 1838. A large folio, the book is a collection of drawings by Alfred E. Chalon that depict various children of prestigious nobility, many of whom were friends of the young Queen Victoria. They are hand-colored and wonderfully charming images of these privileged children, often pictured with a favorite toy or pet. Each drawing is accompanied by a poem about the children. Edited by Mrs. Louisa Fairlie, they are sentimental verses by distinguished members of the royal court.

Alfred Chalon(1780-1860) was a Swiss-born portrait painter. Noticed early on in his career by Princess Victoria, he was the first artist commissioned to paint her portrait after she became queen. His drawings of these children are quite intimate portraits, no doubt due to his esteemed status as a court painter and friend to many of the nobility.

Mrs. Louisa Fairlie(1810-1843) lived a relatively short life and was a favorite niece of the novelist, Marguerite, Countess of Blessington(1789-1849), a novelist and friend of Queen Victoria. One of the verses in the book of portraits was written by Countess Blessington.

These books of portraits were popular among the nobility of the Victorian era and provide amusing insights regarding fashions, domestic settings, and life among the upper class.


Viscount Grey de Wilton and his sister, Lady Elizabeth Grey Egerton. Children of the Earl of Wilton. Note Lady Elizabeth's pull toy of a horse.


The Earl of Dalkeith and Lords Henry John and Walter Charles Scott Douglas. These were the three sons of the Duke of Buccleuch and Queensbury


Lady Elizabeth Jane Somerville, standing on her tip-toes to reach the piano keys. Her favorite doll sits on the chair behind her. She was the daughter of Sir William and Lady Maria Somerville