Finding aid was originally created in 2015 by Historical Collections staff and included illustrations by Le Paumier, Lorraine, Bloodhart, Rossiter, Brodel, Jordan, and the unknown artists. In 2026, archivist Amanda Greenwood processed the Elizabeth Mandell historical prints collection, the caricatures, and illustrations by Dunkarton, Cruikshank, Faber the Younger, Dighton, Wales, Dali, Hogarth, Birnie, and Jenner.
"Very Ill!": The Many Faces of Medical Caricature in Nineteenth-Century England & France Online Exhibit
The collection comprises mostly of anatomical illustrations of humans and animals by professional medical illustrators and medical practioners, but there is a good number of caricatures. Many of the images depict 20th century surgical prodedures; there are also physiological illustrations included in the collection. Most items are drawn in pencil on illustration paper with cardboard backing. In addition, there are some drawings in notepads and on tracing paper.
The University of Virginia has taught the study of human anatomy as part of the medical curriculum since its first session in 1825.
The creator of several of the drawings in the collection, Harvey E. Jordan (1878-1963), was on the faculty of the School of Medicine at the University of Virginia between 1907 and 1949 and had a strong interest in anatomy throughout his career. Jordan served as a Professor of Histology and Embryology, Director of Anatomical Laboratories, and, from 1938 to 1949, as the Dean of the Department of Medicine (in 1950 the title changed to "Dean of the School of Medicine"). During his tenure as Dean, Jordan started a Division of Medical Illustration at the Univeristy. Among the many professional societies to which he belonged was the American Association of Anatomists, and throughout his career he wrote many papers on the subject of microscopic anatomy.
In addition to Harvey E. Jordan, the collection also contains work by illustrators including P. Le Paumier, Helen Lorraine, and Ted Bloodhart. P. Le Paumier (dates unknown) was a French illustrator whose work was published in the book Travaux pratiques d'anatomie. Cahier d'ostéologie, by French anatomist André Latarjet (1877-1947). Helen Lorraine (1892-1980) was a medical illustrator who graduated from Johns Hopkins School of Art as Applied to Medicine (1916) and studied under Max Brodel and J. Shelton Horsley. Lorraine's illustrations were produced for Dr. Charles Bruce Morton (1908-1966), a University of Virginia School of Medicine graduate (B.S. 1920, M.D. 1922) and professor of Surgery and Gynecology at UVA from 1927 to 1954. Little is known about the other illustrators. Some works in the collection are not identified.
Another set of prints included in this collection are the Elizabeth Mandell historical prints collection, which consists of prints, illustrations, and pages from an unidentified text. Items include 3 anatomical plates; 3 surgical plates; and a print of a physician and patient from the Illustrated Times, London Dec. 8, 1880. Also included: an image of a doctor and patients from an "extra supplement to the Illustrated London News, May 19, 187?"; and illustrations from the International Medical and Sanitary Exposition. The 4 loose pages contain an entry on Anatomy and are taken from the same text as the anatomical and surgical plates (possibly an encyclopedia).
In 2026, the English and French caricatures were added to the collection.
Collection is open to research.
Some materials may be subject to copyright restrictions.
University of Virginia Anatomical Illustrations Collection, #MS-67, Historical Collections & Services, Claude Moore Health Sciences Library, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Va.
The illustrations are arranged by the name of their illustrator, and by chronology, then grouped by the subject of the drawing. The exceptions to this arrangement are items where the artist or subject is unknown or if there is no series for individual artists.
The bulk of the illustrations in the collection were donated by Dr. Claude Coleman to the Plastic and Maxillofacial Surgery Department at the University of Virginia. The collection was transferred to the Claude Moore Health Sciences Library in approximately 2009.
"Very Ill!": The Many Faces of Medical Caricature in Nineteenth-Century England & France Online Exhibit
Caricature by definition is a representation in which the subject's distinctive features or peculiarities are deliberately exaggerated to produce a comic or grotesque effect. Nineteenth-century medicine provided caricaturists with a wealth of material. Artists humorously exaggerated medical conditions and physical characteristics. Bulbous noses, protruding stomachs, and hunched backs were some of the more common features drawn to extraordinary proportions. Bizarre treatments, massive doses of pills, and excessive bloodletting, prescribed by trained physicians and quack doctors alike, were all lampooned. Suffering and discomfort from disease and the patient's reaction to medical treatment were also fodder for the satirist's pen.
While some caricatures were straightforward in their message, others contained yet another layer of meaning. Medical conditions could symbolize failed interpersonal relationships, national political affairs, and everything in between. Ailments caused by the follies of fashion, such as ill-fitting footwear or constricting corsets, inspired many drawings. Artists also directly linked illness to excesses in nineteenth-century social life, particularly over-consumption of food and alcohol.
The 37 caricatures displayed in this exhibit are divided into two groups: English and French. The English prints are predominately drawn by two of the more famous British caricaturists, James Gillray and George Cruikshank. The French caricatures include artwork by J.J. Grandville, Louis-Léopold Boilly, and Edme Jean Pigal.
English Caricature: Precariousness of Life Heroic Medicine Pray Remember the Poor Debtors Quacks & Nostrums Doomed Relationships Fashionable Follies Nineteenth-Century Excess English Artists Footnotes, Bibliography, & Links
French Caricature: Scenes of the Day Medicine in France Medical Caricatures or Political Commentary? Hunchbacks: Mocked or Mocker? Public Health: The Need Is Pressing Wet Nursing: Paying Consumers French Artists Footnotes, Bibliography, & Links
All of these illustrations were digitized and curated in an online exhibit written by Sara Huyser and Janet Pearson, members of the staff of Historical Collections and Services at the Claude Moore Health Sciences Library, University of Virginia. Steve Stedman designed the Web exhibit. Special thanks to Joan Echtenkamp Klein and Andrew Sallans for their assistance.
The web archived exhibit can be found via the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine here:
The caption of this image describes the 'Extraordinary Effects of Morison's Vegetable Pills', re-growing a man's legs overnight. Morison's Vegetable Pills were the brainchild of James Morison (1770-1840) and sold from 1825 onwards. Morison believed that all disease was caused by an impurity of the blood that could only be purged by his vegetable pills. The pills, a laxative based on a variety of herbs, including rhubarb and myrrh, were sold in chemists, grocers and even libraries. Morison believed that his pills could be taken in large doses but a number of deaths proved him wrong. Many labelled him a quack and his pills a poison. The print is by Charles Grant Jameson (active 1832-1850); artist: Grant, Charles Jameson; maker: J Kendrick; place made: London, England, United Kingdom.
From The Graphic: an illustrated weekly newspaper, page 109
5 figures: 1. extempore dressing on the Battlefield. 2. ward tent and apparatus for steaming throat and bronchial cases, Guy's Hospital. 3. (ditto), St. Mary's Hospital. 4. a bad accident case: London Hospital. 5. bath lift: Middlesex Hospital.
Extra supplement to the Illustrated London News May 19 1877.
Colored etching by G[eorge] Cruikshank: Source of the Southwark Water Works, or [headed] Salus Populi Suprema Lex. Published by S. Knight, [1832]. 51x32.5cm. Printed on broadsheet with text poem beneath: Royal Address of Cadwallader... water-king of Southwark [John Edwards]. Concern at pollution and threat to public health.
The satirical poem 'Royal Address of Cadwallader ap-Tudor ap-Edwards ap-Vaughan, Water-King of Southwark', published in 1832, is a comment on the pollution of the River Thames, the main water supply for London. The crowd chants "Give us clean water" and "We shall get the cholera" – 1832 being the year that a major cholera epidemic hit London. The writer of the poem and the people in the illustration appear to believe that cholera is spread by vapours from rotting waste – the miasma theory of disease. However, John Snow (1813-1858) discovered that cholera is a water-borne disease. Despite this, many physicians still accepted the miasma theory. The illustration was drawn by the artist and caricaturist George Cruikshank (1792-1878).
Inscription: Lettered with title, "Ex Marmore Antiquo," three lines of description of subject beginning "He grounded his Precepts upon Aesculapius. ...," and production details: "P. P. Rubens Del.," "I. Faber Fecit," and "Printed for & Sold by Tho: Bowles next the Chapter House in St. Pauls Ch. Yard and John Bowles at the Black Horse in Cornhill."
This satirical response to "fast living" centers on a figure whose left side is a skeleton holding a spade before a tombstone lettered with a quote from Romans 6.23, "The wages of sin is death," with other biblical admonishments below. The figure's right side is fashionably dressed living aristocrat standing in a parkland with a temple similar to one at Stowe in Buckinghamshire. Emblems of the Order of the Garter are part of the man's dress and items that refer to gambling and partying are strewn around his buckled shoe. These include part of a "EO" wheel (an 18th century game similar to roulette), dice and a shaker, cards, and a masquerade ticket to the Pantheon in London. A scroll that confirms the man's "Pedigree" suggests that rank offers no protection from mortality.
This cartoon by J. A. Wales.found in Puck on April 14, 1880 satirizes the Eclectic Medical College of Pennsylvania, a diploma mill selling fake medical degrees in the later decades of the 19th century. "Professor Grind-Em-Out" is, no doubt, the school's "Dean," John Buchanan, who was finally arrested in 1880, due in part to his exposure in the popular media.
Etching depicting a group of male academics and students, many wearing mortar boards, gathered around a professor who reads form a book inscribed 'Datur Vacuum.'
Within a lugubrious coat-of-arms, Hogarth depicts three well-known quacks with a group of twelve portly physicians. The three quacks at the top of the print are Joshua Ward, perhaps the most famous charlatan of his time; Sarah Mapp, a well-known bonesetter; and John Taylor, an oculist. The bewigged physicians dispel the stench of death by sniffing the pomander attached to the top of their canes. According to Hogarth, proper physicians and disreputable quacks are all members of the same Company of Undertakers. The Latin caption, Et plurima mortis imago, translates as "And many are the faces of death."
A sheet full of dozens of images of men and women's caricatured heads, after Hogarth's "Characters and Caricaturas" illustration.
A sheet full of dozens of images of men and women's caricatured heads, after Hogarth's "Characters and Caricaturas" illustration.