Medicine, family and public advocacy
Born in 1852, Weatherly became the proprietor and medical superintendent of Bailbrook House, a private mental hospital near Bath. His books addressed practical care as well as specialist concerns: Wellcome’s collections include his ambulance lectures, home-nursing manual and an 1882 work on treating mental illness in private dwellings. He married Gertrude Maud Morten in 1877. They had three daughters, all commemorated at Bathampton; his brother Frederick became known as a lyricist.
Weatherly’s public life also included local theatre and wider medical reform. In A Plea for the Insane, published in 1918, he challenged the legal and administrative barriers that delayed treatment. He argued for earlier, more flexible care and attacked economies that damaged patients’ lives. His campaigning continued through the interwar years, including support for Montagu Lomax’s criticism of public asylums. His arguments formed part of the wider reform movement that preceded the Mental Treatment Act of 1930. He died in 1940.
Perception and conjuring in The Supernatural?
The held volume was published by J. W. Arrowsmith in Bristol, with Weatherly’s preface dated November 1891. He dedicates it to the physician Daniel Hack Tuke and explains that he is writing for the general reader. Chapters examine perception, illusions, hallucinations, dreams and reports of ghosts, distinguishing experiences associated with ordinary life from those encountered in illness or under the influence of drugs.
