Alexander Small

Alexander Small was a Scottish surgeon and scholar who lived from about 1710 until 31 August 1794. He was born in Perthshire, the eldest son of Patrick Small of Leanoch and Magdalen Robertson of Straloch. He served in the British army as a field assistance surgeon, and by 1733 he was a surgeon with the Royal Artillery on Menorca. In 1736 he arrived in London and began practising as a private surgeon. Around 1777 he wrote an essay on the importance of good hospital ventilation for patient recovery and the control of disease, which was later presented in Edinburgh and France, and in 1783 he was working with Charles Spalding on an improved diving bell. He was a friend and frequent correspondent of Benjamin Franklin for at least thirty years, writing to him on subjects from hospital ventilation to agriculture, and in 1773 he was elected to the American Philosophical Society. He died at Ware in Hertfordshire at the age of 84.