James Davenport Whelpley

James Davenport Whelpley (23 Jan., 1817-15 April 1872) was an American physician and author.

Whelpley was born in New York City, January 23rd, 1817. His father was Rev. Philip M. Whelpley, pastor of the 1st Presbyterian Church in New York City, and his mother was Abigail Fitch Davenport, a descendant of the first minister of New Haven.He graduated from Yale College in 1837.After graduation he acted as assistant in Rogers' Geological Survey of Pennsylvania, for two years, and then entered the Medical Department of Yale College, where he graduated in 1842.He remained in New Haven until 1846, engaged in the study of the sciences, and in literary pursuits. He then went to Brooklyn, New York, and began to practice his profession, but was soon obliged to relinquish it from ill-health. In 1847, he moved back to New York City, and became the editor and one of the owners of the American Whig Review, to which he had been a frequent contributor from 1845. While holding this position, he formed a project of establishing a commercial colony in Honduras in 1849, and in furtherance of this enterprise, spent two years in San Francisco, purchasing and editing one of the daily papers there. His arrangements were disturbed by the presence of the filibuster William Walker in Honduras, and upon going there he was detained by Walker for nearly a year, and was forced into service as a surgeon.Escaping to San Francisco, he returned early in 1857 to the East, and again devoted himself to literature, and to scientific studies. For the last ten years of his life he was a great sufferer from asthma, which gradually developed into tuberculosis, of which disease he died, at his residence in Boston, 15 April 1872. He was a member of the American Academy. His scientific research was chiefly in physics and in metallurgy.

His first wife was Anna M. Wells, of Roxbury, Massachusetts, who he married in January, 1848, and died July 29th, 1859, leaving one daughter.His second wife was Mary L. Breed, of Virginia, whom he married in the autumn of 1861, and who survived him, with their three children, including Mary Taylor Brush.