Letter 1548

Fuller thanks Sloane for the gift of his ‘Natural History of Jamaica’. He is impressed by Sloane’s work, noting that it will improve the island’s reputation for two reasons. Firstly, it proves that the illnesses and distempers appearing in Jamaica appear in England too. Secondly, it demonstrates that local plants cure local diseases. Fuller will be in London in about ten days to thank Sloane personally. John Fuller, Senior married Elizabeth Rose, daughter of Fulke and Elizabeth Rose of Jamaica, in 1703. He managed the family sugar plantations in Jamaica and in 1705 took control of the family furnace where he became an ironmaster and gunfounder. His wife’s mother later married Sir Hans Sloane, making Sloane Fuller’s stepfather-in-law (J. S. Hodgkinson, Fuller family (per. c.16501803), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, May 2005 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/47494, accessed 2 July 2013]).