Colonel William Sydenham

Colonel William Sydenham was appointed Governor of the Isle of Wight 1647 to 1659

He was a Parliamentarian Army General.

Colonel William Sydenham, M.P. for Melcombe, later became the Governor of the Isle of Wight. And a contemporary wrote of him, 'He was one of the most brilliant men of the day and had a paramount influence in the councils of the Parliaments only second to that of Oliver Cromwell'. At the Restoration, he was put on a list naming him as one of the twelve most dangerous men in the Kingdom, but by then his health was fading, and he died at home in Wynford Eagle Manor in 1661, aged 46.

Brother of Dr Thomas Sydenham who fought for the Parliament throughout the Civil War, and, at its end, resumed his medical studies at Oxford. He became the undisputed master of the English medical world and was known as 'The English Hippocrates’. Among his many achievements was the discovery of a disease, which was then known as 'Sydenham's Chorea'. We know it today as St Vitus Dance. A colleague, Dr John Browne described him as, 'the prince of practical medicine, whose character is as beautiful and as genuinely English as his name. He died, after a distinguished career, at his house in Pall Mall on the 29th December 1689, aged 65. He is buried in St James Churchyard, Piccadilly. A memorial stone dedicated to Thomas can be found halfway up the staircase of St James Church, Pall Mall. It was put there by the now defunct 'Sydenham Society’. The staff at the church are completely unaware of who he was.

External links

* www.dorset-info.co.uk/civil-war/