Letters to J. L. Levison from Combe and others

The collection is composed of 20 non-chronologically numbered items, letters and fragments, as follows:

• 1 - Letter to Levison written from Grafton Place, London. 3 July 1827
• 2 - Fragment, Mr. Fletcher, Bookseller, Southampton, 15 February 1821 [postmark]
• 3 - Folded paper or envelope with black edge and black wax seal, addressed to Levison, from Sir G. S. Mackenzie, November 1827 [postmark]
• 4 - Letter to Levison, from Joseph Becker, 10 Bedford Street, Strand, London, 30 August 1848
• 5 - Letter to Levison, from Dr. Alderson, undated
• 6 - Letter to Levison, written from Sheffield, 15 October 1839
• 7 - Letter to Levison, from Benj Elkins, 5 March 1845
• 8 - Letter to Levison, on behalf of Mrs. Loudon, from 58 Bowater Terrace, Woolwich, 30 April 1838
• 9 - Letter to Levison, from Mr. Wilderspin, 5 January 1833, written on paper holding printed report about a lecture given by Wilderspin on infant education, from the 'Wakefield Journal' 30 November 1832
• 10 - Letter to Levison, from George Birkbeck, 9 November 1830
• 11 - Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 14 September 1830, in which he refers to a 'communication about the Siamese youths' and intoduces his brother Dr. Andrew Combe 'who will tell you any thing about Phrenology as it exists here better than I can write'
• 12 - Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 7 August 1829, in which concern is expressed about the Phrenological journal and how 'we came to the resolution of condensing our page, and putting into 6 sheets nearly as much matter as our present 10 contain, and reducing the price to 2/6 each number', and in which he states that 'If this step, of lowering the price and appealing to our readers does not bring an accession of subscribers, we must submit to our fate'
• 13 - Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 19 November 1828, with a note from Donald Campbell, Clerk to the Phrenological Society, 20 November 1828, in which both refer to Levison's work on 'spectral illusion'
• 14 - Letter to Levison, from 8 Gower Street, London, 2 May 1828, in which the writer (possibly Spurzheim) refers to witnessing a quarrel between Combe and Scott
• 15 - Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 2 January 1828, in which he asks that Levison will favour him with his 'remarks on Mr. Scott's paper and mine'
• 16 - Letter to Levison, from Scott, and Combe, 12 December 1827, informing that 'the Cast sent by the Hull Society with an Account of the Individual' was presented at a meeting of the Phrenological Society, and thanking Levison on behalf of the Phrenological Society for the 'Essay on Physiognomy'
• 17 - Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 28 September 1827, referring to Levison's 'Essay proving that man's cerebral organization destines him for civilization'
• 18 - Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 28 September 1827
• 19 - Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 8 August 1827 and 15 August 1827, which contains notes on 'The measurement and development of the head of the old gentleman'
• 20 - Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 19 July 1827, referring to Levison's treatise on toothache which 'could never have come more opportunely' because Combe was 'suffering under the malady at the time, and found information in it essentially useful', and also referring to his ignorance on the 'Phrenology of Birds and the Lower animals'

The collection also contains a photographic image of part of the letter designated No.12, noted above ( Letter to Levison, from George Combe, 7 August 1829).

J. L. Levison lived for a time in Hull, England. He was the author of Mental culture, or, The means of developing the human faculties, published in 1883, and printed for Levison and sold by Jackson and Walford, London, and also of Practical observations on the teeth and gums with the best means for their preservation published in 1838 by Longman, London.

George Combe was born in Edinburgh on 21 October 1788, the son of a brewer. He went to the parish school of St. Cuthberts in either 1794 or 1795, and then on to the Royal High School. Between 1802 and 1804 he attended classes at Edinburgh University. In 1815, through an article in the Edinburgh review, there was an attack on the phrenologists Franz-Joseph Gall (1758-1828) and Johann Gaspar Spurzheim (1776-1832). Spurzheim visited Edinburgh to defend himself through a series of lectures, and George Combe attended these becoming an ardent disciple and exponent in his own right. From 1818 he began writing and lecturing on phrenology, and in 1820 he formed the Phrenological Society and started the Phrenological journal. In spite of formal criticism of the science and arguments within the Society, by 1836, Combe had become a candidate for the Chair of Logic and Edinburgh University, though in the end his candidacy failed. Combe's publications included: Elements of phrenology (1824); System of phrenology (1825-1853); and, The constitution of man considered in relation to external objects (1828).

George Combe died on 14 August 1858.

Open to bona fide researchers, but please contact repository for details in advance of visit.

Transferred from the Library, Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, July 2009. Accession no: E2009.34.

Compiled by Graeme D. Eddie, Edinburgh University Library, Special Collections

Also within Special Collections, Edinburgh University Library, can be found the Records of the Phrenological Society of Edinburgh, and a manuscript version of the susbtantial part of the 4th edition of George Combe (1788-1858), and his System of Phrenology.