1 - London and the Early Years

Summary

Robert Willis was born at the turn of a new century, but into a world which was still thoroughly ancien régime. His background was one of patronage and preferment; his upbringing that of a gentleman amateur. He had the confidence of the social superior, a belief that intellectual achievement was his birthright. Yet the circumstances of his birth and upbringing also fostered a certain aloofness. Willis's detached self-possession surely derived from his background and the autonomy it both required and fostered.

FAMILY BACKGROUND

The Willis clan had risen to prominence through Robert's grandfather Francis Willis (1718—1807, Figure 1) physician to George III from 1788. The reverend doctor was famed in his own day, and has since become notorious, as one of the pioneers in the treatment of the mentally ill. His methods ranged from use of the straitjacket to encouraging his patients to read Shakespeare — a passion evidently shared by his grandson, who acquired a rare First Folio edition of the plays. The Willis family papers in the British Library and those still in the possession of the family are tied up with the bureaucracy and politics of the king's illness. As they make clear, treatment of the king's bouts of apparent insanity was highly political.