The Quack Doctor

For part 1 about Swaim’s Panacea, click here.

Woodcut commissioned by Swaim, showing Hercules battling the Hydra.

Within a few years of establishing his products, William Swaim was enjoying the benefits of endorsements from some of Philadelphia’s most eminent physicians, including Nathaniel Chapman, William Gibson, William Pott Dewees, Thomas Parke and James Mease – and he didn’t even have to make them up.

For the past ten years or so, sarsaparilla had been attracting renewed medical attention in the US as a blood purifier, so it was probably with this in mind that the doctors were well-disposed towards Swaim’s medicine. Swaim combined the sarsaparilla syrup with oil of wintergreen, giving it a pleasant taste that made it a hit with patients too. Gibson’s endorsement gives a further clue to its popularity:

I have always found it extremely efficacious, especially in secondary syphilis and mercurial disease. I have no hesitation in pronouncing it a medicine of inestimable value.

The symptoms of secondary syphilis, of course, disappear of their own accord before the disease goes into a latent phase – no wonder the Panacea and so many other treatments of the time claimed success.

In 1827 the New York Medical Society appointed a Committee on Quack Remedies, and the Philadelphia Medical Society soon did likewise. While the New York Committee acknowledged the possible benefits of the Panacea and other sarsaparilla-based syrups, the Philadelphia one was tougher, gathering numerous cases of people who had taken the medicine. The outcomes of these cases varied from no effect at all, to ‘a most violent and alarming bowel complaint’, to death. Analysis showed that the remedy contained corrosive sublimate (mercuric chloride).

Later, the New York Committee released its own analysis, done at the time of the investigation but not published, which showed that they too knew all along that it was mercury - so there, Philadelphia. A new analysis in 1831 also showed the presence of arsenic, but the ingredients varied from batch to batch and it was the luck of the draw whether you got the poisons.

By this time the doctors’ enthusiasm had waned. Chapman wrote:

Nathaniel Chapman, pictured 1846

Early in the history of that article, I was induced to employ it, as well from professional as common report in favour of its efficacy, and was well pleased at the result in several cases. But! more extensive experience with it soon convinced me that I had overrated its value, and for a long period I have entirely ceased to prescribe it.

Gibson admitted that: In several cases that came under my notice, ptyalism has followed the use of it. (Excessive salivation, a symptom of mercury poisoning.) Their testimonials, however, were now out of their control and there was nothing they could do to stop Swaim continuing to use their names.

In 1836, long after the US physicians had backtracked on their endorsement of the nostrum, British journal The Medical-Chirurgical Review condemned them in true Tunbridge Wells style:

We were utterly astonished to find an impudent PANACEA bolstered up with the names and certificates of some of the first authorities, in the medical profession, of the United States!…

We are mortified and grieved, beyond measure, to find professional propriety (to give it no other name) at so low an ebb among our brethren in America! This admonition from Europe will surely rouse the faculty of the United States to some sense of the duty they owe to their brethren throughout the world.

The early success of Swaim’s Panacea inspired imitators to cash in with their own versions, and they were completely blatant about it. ‘Swayne’s Panacea’ hoped to dupe punters who weren’t paying attention, and ‘Shinn’s Panacea’ was sold with the statement: The subscriber having discovered the composition of Swaim’s celebrated Panacea, has now a supply on hand for sale.

One of the heavyweight rivals was Parker’s Renovating Vegetable Panacea, the ads of which contained fighting talk:

In justice to myself, I have been induced to reply to a false and unjustifiable attack made upon me and others by Swaim, the vender of a certain Panacea in this city.

I have been acquainted with the ORIGINAL RECIPE FROM WHICH SWAIM MANUFACTURES HIS MEDICINE FOR UPWARD OF TEN YEARS. IT WAS OBTAINED FROM MY FATHER-IN-LAW, WHO NOW RESIDES IN THE STATE OF NEW YORK, WHO HAS USED IT FOR THIRTY YEARS , AND PERFORMED INNUMERABLE EXTRAORDINARY CURES WITH IT.

Parker used his own version of the Hydra image, which, in a nice dig at Swaim’s battling Hercules, shows the mythical beast already defeated:

Swaim’s reply tried to turn the copy-cat ads to his advantage:

This medicine had been used for seven years before an attempt was made to imitate it; but the great demand for it, and its wonderful success, have induced a great number of persons to imitate it in various ways—upwards of fifty different mixtures have been got up in imitation of it, which is a convincing proof of it being a medicine of great value.

Although the initial fame of the medicine declined, it continued to be made throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, latterly with a different formula involving  alcohol and a huge amount of sugar.

1894 ad from the Galveston Daily News

SWAIM’S PANACEA.—This Medicine has acquired a very
extensive and established celebrity in Europe and America,
and its virtues are known and acknowledged by many of the most
respectable physicians of both countries. As an alterative, and
in various diseases, particularly in cases of inveterate corruption
of the blood descending to the second generation, it stands unri-
valled. Its safety and innocence have been fully tested, so that
it may be administered to the most tender and helpless infant.
No one, however, is advised to take it without being first con-
vinced of its efficacy and of the rectitude of the proprietor’s in-
tention. He has been induced to establish agencies in England
in consequence of the repeated and large orders for the Medicine
from various parts of the kingdom. He respectfully informs the
public that they can be supplied wholesale by EVANS, SON, and
CO., 85, Lord-street, Liverpool; EVANS and LESCHER, 4 Cripple-
gate-buildings, London; and retail by most of the respectable
Druggists in England, Ireland, and Scotland.

Source: The Liverpool Mercury, Friday 7 August 1847

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If you’re Welsh, don’t be annoyed at being left out; count yourself lucky.

Although I’ve chosen a British ad here, the medicine’s home was Philadelphia, where William Swaim settled after a career as a bookbinder in New York. A probably apocryphal tale has him finding the panacea recipe scribbled on a blank leaf of a book he was binding; another story, related in James Harvey Young’s The Toadstool Millionaires, has Swaim finding out the ingredients from a reputable physician called Dr Quackinboss. Although this sounds made up, the name (but with the spelling Quackenboss), genuinely did belong to a New York doctor in the 1820s. (And for purposes of mild amusement, here is a modern example.)

Swaim’s advertising materials included booklets endorsing his nostrum, and the following unpleasant picture appeared in these and occasionally in his ads. You might recognise it if you saw the colour version recently displayed on the Ephemera Assemblyman blog. In this one, the bottle of Panacea is more prominent, and the facial expression more grotesque, but the depiction of the legs is thankfully less gruesome for the lack of colour.

Notice that the caption says ‘The representation and her actual appearance after having been Cured by the use of Swaims Panacea.’ I think they must mean ‘The representation of…’ but anyway, AFTER is the interesting word here. This image was supposed to encourage people to buy the medicine. Just think! Take this stuff and you too could spend the rest of your life hiding in a darkened room, tragically plastering your face with yet more mercurial preparations while the looking glass mocks you with the ghostly memory of the carefree beauty you were long, long ago.

The logic behind the use of this picture is difficult to grasp – any further theories welcome in the comments, but it could be:

1. In that state, Miss Linton should actually be dead, so the very fact that she’s sitting in a chair grinning is a testament to the miraculous power of the Panacea.

2. The horror of the image would exert a strange fascination on punters and compel them to read the promotional book. This is what happened to ‘Morleigh,’ the British writer of Life in the West, (1843):

‘…fronting the title page, we have a full-length portrait of a lady, or skeleton in a ball dress, grinning horribly. If this lady is cured, thought I, it would be very advisable for her to stay at home. Faugh! the very portrait has made me ill. I threw the book aside with scorn, little thinking that in a few days hence, when the book had mysteriously disappeared, I should earnestly seek a copy, and devour the contents with as much gusto as a starving sailor would munch an old shoe.’

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To be continued…

In the next post – what was actually in Swaim’s Panacea, the proprietor’s on-off relationship with the medical profession, and how the Panacea’s success spawned blatant imitations.

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Picture courtesy of the US National Library of Medicine

I originally posted this on my (now defunct) other blog before I started The Quack Doctor, so I thought I’d move it over here as not many people will have seen it before:

Are your spirits hurried and your brain in need of comforting? Are you suffering from the effects of hard drinking? Do your parts need warming and invigorating? Look no further. Here’s an 18th-century panacea to combat every possible woe.

The advert below is from an Adams’s Weekly Courant, which  happened to be the main newspaper in Chester during the time my book is set.  The paper was run by Mrs Elizabeth Adams, who took over her husband’s printing business after his death.

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RESTORATIVE VIPER DROPS

THESE Drops have for these twenty Years past, in the Proprietor’s private Practice, proved themselves upon some hundred patients, to be an excellent Medicine, beyond any other Chymical Preparation offered to the Publick within the Compass of his Knowledge.

They restore greatly in weak Habits; strengthen weak Backs, warm and invigorate Parts that are languid and weaken’d by Gleets, or other Injuries; they help Digestion; comfort a cold Stomach, and expel Wind both from thence and the Bowels; they remedy the effects of hard Drinking; cleanse the Ureters from slimy and sabulous matter, thereby taking away Gravel pains in the back; compose hurry’d spirits, and take off Flutterings and Lowness, comforting the Brain and causing Chearfulness; they are a noble Balsamick also for all outward Bruises and Wounds, consolidating the Part injured, almost instantly; cure Burns or Scaldings, if immediately applied, in a surprising Manner, and without leaving disagreeable Marks or Eschars.

Any Persons by applying to the Proprietor, at his Shop, will be directed to People of undoubted Credit, who will satisfy them of the great good Effects of these Drops, in the above Cases, for which they are recommended, and in some very dangerous and complicated Disorders, not here inferred, for the sake of brevity.

They are pleasant to take, not giving the least Nausea or Offence to the tenderest stomach.

They are sold in bottles of Three Shillings, with the Cypher and Inscription, as here in the Margin, and in Eighteen-penny Bottles, at the Chymist’s Shop, the Golden Head and Key, at the corner of Bell Savage Gateway, Ludgate-Hill; at Mr Jefferys’s Bookseller, in Pope’s-Head Alley, Cornhill; and also at the Printer’s of this paper.

And for the real Excellence of this Medicine, and its absolute Difference from some Things called VIPER DROPS, any Persons may satisfy themselves, by coming to his Shop, with a Lump of Sugar at any Time, and have a proper Dose of them gratis, for their Satisfaction and Benefit.

At the above Places may be had, The PATENT ANTIVENEREAL ELECTUARY, Price Six Shillings in the Pot, with Directions.

Source: Adams’s Weekly Courant (Chester) 13 August 1754

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“Dr” Richard Rock was a high-profile quack whose usual stomping-ground was Covent Garden – as shown in Hogarth’s The Four Times of the Day (Morning) where his products are being advertised on a billboard (difficult to see in the picture here, but it’s just above the page’s head to the left of the scene). Although the advertising copy refers exclusively to London, Rock probably used the printers of the Weekly Courant and other provincial newspapers as distributors.

If the Viper Drops had lived up to all their claims, there would have been no need for Chester Infirmary to be set up a year later, and I would have had to find something else to write a book about.

Consumptives
There is Hope
for You!
Derk P. Yonkerman, Specialist,
discoverer of a remarkable Cure for
Consumption.

To every consumptive person there is  hope  of  life
and health,   for,   incredible  as  it  may  seem,  a
specific which cures Consumption has at last been
found.    Seeking   year  after  year,  working  early
and late, complete success  has  at  last  crowned
the  efforts  of  that  renowned  Specialist,  Derk  P.
Yonkerman,  and  to-day  hundreds  of  former  con-
sumptives, once hopeless and helpless, testify with
joy  and   heartfelt  gratitude  to  the  healing  power
of  his  remarkable  discovery.   This  latest  product
of science is, we  believe,  destined  to revolutionize
the treatment of consumption, for it has  cured after
all other remedies tried and failed  and  changes  of
climate proved  unavailing;  so  potent  is its healing
power  that  even  cases pronounced hopeless have
been by it restored to perfect health.
If you are  in  consumption  you  may  prove   for
yourself the virtue of this wonderful specific.
………….. ABSOLUTELY FREE
Simply send your  name  and  address to the Derk
P.  Yonkerman  Co., Ltd.,  Dept.  444, 6, Bouverie
Street,   London,   E.C.,  and  they will forward by
return   of   post  a  free  trial  treatment,  together
with   explicit   directions  for  the  treatment  and
cure  of  Consumption.  Don’t  delay.  If  you  have
Consumption  your   life  is   in   danger  and  you
should   not   hesitate   to   avail  yourself  of  this
marvellous cure.

Source: The Penny Illustrated Paper, Sat 4 February 1905

A rare foray into the 20th century today, with Derk P. Yonkerman’s Tuberculozyne. Yonkerman hailed from Michigan – or to be more precise, a town named Kalamazoo. (Which I had only ever heard of as the name of the cat in Della and the Dealer, but I looked it up and the modern-day city looks absolutely delightful.)

In 1882 Yonkerman graduated from the Ontario Veterinary College and began practising at the Cleveland Veterinary Infirmary in Ohio. In 1901, after tests on cattle, he announced a treatment for TB, claiming to have discovered a way of introducing copper into the blood in order to kill the bacilli (Davenport Daily Republican, Iowa, 6 June 1901). By early 1902 the product was being advertised in the US, and it reached Britain about a year later.

In the UK, a month’s treatment cost £2 10s and comprised two bottles of liquid labelled No 1 Tuberculozyne and No 2 Tuberculozyne. After every meal, the patient had to put thirty drops of each into a glass of milk, stir well and drink immediately.

The BMA analysed the two mixtures and found No 1 to contain potassium bromide, glycerine, oil of cassis, tincture of capsicum, cochineal to give it its bright red colouring, caustic soda and water. No 2, a brown liquid, was glycerine, essential oil of almond, burnt sugar, water and 0.01% copper. The estimated cost of ingredients for the two together was 2½d.

Patients could send off for a free sample, which was a ½oz bottle of each liquid. If they did not go on to purchase further supplies they would receive regular letters offering increasing discounts.

In 1912, the American Medical Association publication, Nostrums and Quackery, quoted the BMA analysis and noted that, whereas in the past British quacks had once been a nuisance to America, ‘the current has set in the other direction and now instead of the American public being fleeced by the English medical fakers the American quack is finding the English public “good pickings”‘. This was due in part to the US Food and Drugs Act of 1906, which meant quacks like Yonkerman had to be very careful what they claimed. The British laws were less strict, allowing for much more exaggerated claims in the advertising and packaging.

Sources:

Secret Remedies: What they cost and what they contain, British Medical Association, 1909

Nostrums and Quackery: Articles on the the Nostrum Evil and Quackery reprinted, with Additions and Modifications, from the Journal of the Americal Medical association, 2nd ed. 1912

Famous for its trademark showing someone walloping the living crap out of a reanimated skeleton (if skeletons can be said to possess any living crap), Radam’s Microbe Killer was a fraud.

Its inventor, William Radam, published a book, Microbes and the Microbe Killer (189o) describing at great length his quest for a cure for his own rheumatism, which he believed to have been caused by microbes. A florist and nurseryman, Radam associated the killing of microbes in the human body with the killing of pests on plants. He sought to find a harmless antiseptic gas that would cleanse the human body just as fumigation destroyed the bugs in his greenhouses.

In the book, Radam is unspecific about the methods that led to his claimed success, saying vaguely “A little more improving, and I had the antiseptic that proved to be an antiseptic, without having experimented upon my body.” (p49, revised edition 1895) Analyses, however, showed that the remedy was more than 99% water, with traces of sulphuric acid, sulphurous acid and ash (Journal of the A.M.A., 1910)

For more in-depth information about Radam, his remedy, and the opposition he encountered, there are interesting articles at The North Texas Skeptic and Quackwatch.

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Wm RADAM’S MICROBE KILLER

Nearly   all   well-read   people   are  familiar
with   the   scientific   investigations  of  Profs
Koch and Pasteur,  respectively  of  Germany
and   France,   as   well  as  a  number  of  other
scientists of almost equal renown, whose ex-
periments have proven conclusively that all
diseases are causes by microbes in the blood.
They are called microbes, because they are a
living   matter,   and  only  discovered  by  the
aid   of    powerful   microscopes.       But  until
William Radam discovered his Microbe Killer
Medicine    there   was   absolutely   nothing
known in the annals of  Medicine  that  would
destroy these Microbes or Germs of Diseases
existing   in   the   blood.   The  Microbe  Killer
does Kill the  Microbes  in  the  blood  without
fail, as the thousands of testimonials we have
in our possession demonstrate.
Microbes   being   the  cause  of  all  diseases,
Microbe  Killer will therefore cure  them.
WE EXCEPT NO DISEASES WHATEVER.
Ladies and  gentlemen  desiring  light  upon
the Microbe Theory, as well as upon any dis-
ease they may be afflicted with, are cordially
invited to call and get pamphlets for full  par-
ticulars. We will  forfeit  $1000  if  any  single
one  of   our  testimonials  can  be  proven  as
not genuine.
RADAM’S MICROBE KILLER CO.
For  sale  by  E.C.   FLEMING,  Druggist,  No.
South Detroit Street

Source: The Daily Gazette, Xenia, Ohio, 16 November 1889

Here’s another product from the enigmatic Dr De Roos, who once again uses the ploy of warning the punters against charlatans. The Renal Pills were still available in the early 20th century, when the results of analysis were reported in More Secret Remedies. The pills were made of sodium carbonate, soap, a resin that might have been derived from ammoniacum, and some unidentifiable vegetable tissue. All this was covered in a thick layer of powdered liquorice.

The pills arrived on the market in the late 1840s and, in 1851, some adverts included a testimonial claiming that they were ‘worth a guinea a box’ – a phrase that later became the famous slogan for Beecham’s Pills.

PAINS IN THE BACK, GRAVEL, LUMBAGO, GOUT,
RHEUMATISM, DISEASE OF THE KIDNEYS, BLAD-
DER, &c. THE COMPOUND RENAL PILLS correct acidity
of the stomach, and indigestion, promote the functions of the
liver and kidneys, thereby preventing stone in the bladder and
kidneys, with many other serious disorders to which these impor-
tant organs are subject. Listlessness, weakness, peevishness,
and complaints long supposed to be nervous, often arise solely
from contamination of the blood with certain impurities which
should have been carried off by the kidneys: several unsightly
eruptions of the skin and face also arise from the same cause,
and may be as readily removed by these Pills, which in 19 cases
out of 20 cure with a rapidity almost marvellous. 1s 1½d, 2s 9d,
4s 6d, 11s, and 33s per box through all Chemists.
THOUSANDS OF TESTIMONIALS MAY BE SEEN BY ANY ONE.
Sold by:—Hughes, Chemist, Bangor; Roberts, Chemist, Con-
way; Griffith, Chemist, High-street, Carnarvon; Edwards,
Chemist, Denbigh; Hughes, Chemist, Holyhead; and Moore,
Chemist, Newtown; and at least one agent in almost every town;
but should difficulty occur, enclose the amount by Post-office order
or otherwise, to 25, Bedford Place, Bloomsbury Square, London
and they will be sent securely packed per return.
NOTICE AND CAUTION.—Injurious imitations of the
above by Quacks and others, who forge testimonials
to puff off their useless trash, sufferers should
guard against the recommendation of the spurious or other
articles, by dishonest vendors, who thereby obtain a larger profit.
The genuine have the words “WALTER DE ROOS LONDON,”
printed in white letters on the Government Stamp, by order of
Her Majesty’s Hon. Commissioners, to imitate which is felony
and transportation.

Source: The North Wales Chronicle, Sat 11 November 1865

Although no proprietor is shown in the following advertisement, the Vegetable Life Drops were one of several cures touted under the name Dr Walter De Roos. De Roos was an enigmatic character and the name was purported to be an alias for one John (or George) Robinson, who might well have bought the business in 1858 from brothers Alfred and Samuel Barker. Whether or not De Roos was ever a real person, his Compound Renal Pills were still being sold under that name in the early 20th century.

     THE MOST WONDERFUL MEDICINE IN THE WORLD!!
          CURE IN FOUR WEEKS.— THE GUTTÆ VITÆ, or,
         VEGETABLE LIFE DROPS, Protected by Royal Let-
ters Patent;  Sanctioned  by  the  Faculte  de  France,  &c., have in
numberless   instances  proved  their  superiority  over  every  other
advertised  Remedy  for  langour,  lassitude,  depression  of  spirits,
irritability,  excitement,  fear,  distaste  and   incapacity   for   society,
study or  business,  indigestion,  pains  and  palpitation  in  the  side,
giddiness,  noise  in  the  head,  &c.  This  medicine  strengthens the
vitality of the  whole  system,  gives  energy to the muscles, speedily
removes nervousness, renovates  the  impaired  powers of life, and
invigorates  the  most  shattered  constitution.  For   skin   eruptions,
sore throat,  pains  in  the  bones, and those diseases in which mer-
cury, sarsaparilla, &c.,  are  too  often  employed,  to  the  utter  ruin
of health, its surprising efficacy has only to be tested.
   Before wasting valuable  time  in  seeking  aid  from  instruments,
electricity, galvanism,  with  similar  absurdities  professing  to  set
aside medicines, by American impostors and others, whose boas-
ted “distinguished qualifications”  consist  solely  of  their  consum-
mate  impudence,  sufferers  will  do  well   to  make  fair  trial  of  a
remedy, which concocted on scientific principles cannot fail.
Price 4s. 6d. And 11s., or four times  the  latter  at  33s.  per  bottle,
through all Chemists,  or  direct  from  25,  Bedford Place, WHERE
THOUSANDS OF TESTIMONIALS MAY BE SEEN.

Source: The North Wales Chronicle, October 24 1863

For all this advert’s outrage against impostors, Walter De Roos was summoned to Uxbridge Petty Sessions in 1864 by solicitor and anti-quackery campaigner William Talley under the New Medical Act , which provided for a fine of £20 for anyone falsely claiming medical qualifications.The doctor did not turn up, but was represented by his “learned counsel” – coincidentally also called Mr Robinson – whose entertaining exchanges with Talley are documented in Extraordinary Success of the New Mode of Treatment. The prosecution failed and De Roos – or whoever he was – went on to cause further damage.

He was implicated in a suicide in 1865, when 24-year-old James Miles was found drowned in the canal at Higham, Kent, having suffered a period of depression. Among the deceased’s belongings were 30 letters and pamphlets from Dr De Roos impressing upon him that he must continue to take the doctor’s medicine – and demanding immediate payment for it. Bearing in mind De Roos’s pamphlets had titles like Private Hints on the Causes, Symptoms, and Cure of All the Secret Disorders Incident to Both Sexes and The Medical Adviser: On Certain Infirmities and Disorders of the Generative and Urinary Systems : the Premature Failure of Sexual Power, with Plain Directions for Its Perfect Restoration : Practical Observations on Marriage : Its Disqualifications, and Their Removal it is hardly surprising that the newly married young man was troubled.

Local surgeon Mr J.J. Ely said of the pamphlets: “I have no doubt whatever they would cause a great depression of spirits.”

The Aperitive Vase, a cure for constipation, is somewhat coyly advertised here, but adverts from earlier in the 1840s left less to the imagination:

The apparatus is a fountain in miniature, so small that when filled it may be concealed in the pocket until it can be used conveniently; when, by an hydraulic double-action within it, the water which it contains is propelled into the bowels, and instantly procures the desired relief, as effectively as a dose of opening medicine. The Fountain may be used by the most nervous lady without the knowledge or aid of any second person. (The Era, Aug 13 1843)

 Image: Detail from Réaction. Distraction. Précipitation by Charles Philipon, 1850s. Courtesy of the US National Library of Medicine.      

      T H E   U S E   O F   W A T E R  as  an  aperient  is  neither
distasteful  nor  injurious  as  opening  medicines  are:  its  operation
is instantaneous, and without the slightest  uneasiness;  consequently
it is found to be a remedy  preferable  to  every  other  for  Indigestion,
Costiveness, Bile,  &c.  But  those  who  desire  to  relieve  effectually
the stomach and bowels by  this  natural  physic,  and  to  resort  to  it
comfortably, must apply it  with  the  APERITIVE  VASE,  constructed
for invalids and ladies, and sold only at Scott and Llewelyn’s  Medical
Repository,  369,  Strand,   the  third  house  from  Exeter  Hall.  Also,
SONIFERS, by which a deaf person may magnify voices to the  pitch
at which he hears distinctly. Descriptions sent post free, on receipt of
two letter stamps.

Source: The Daily News (London) Saturday 31 January 1846

Dr Scott and a business associate, Mr Pine, revealed the extent of their medical knowledge in 1844 when a 5-year-old boy was rushed to their premises after falling into the river near Waterloo Bridge. According to the inquest report in the Medical Times (6 July 1844), Scott ‘looked at the child, and exclaimed— “Be off with you—take it to Charing Cross Hospital.”‘ The rescuers set off the for the hospital but the child died on the way.

 Now giving due force to these circumstances, said the Medical Times in reference to Scott’s advertisements, but more especially to the singular rejection of this poor child for treatment, and supposing for a moment that Dr. Scott, like thousands of others, really has no other title to doctorship but his own sovereign will, what a significant instance we have before us of the mischief of empirical pretensions.

Weston was an entertainer who toured Australia and New Zealand from the 1860s to the 1880s, putting on free two-hour shows featuring jokes, songs and comic tales that incorporated lots of plugs for his products. A NZ correspondent to London’s The Era in August 1872 wrote of Weston as follows:

FRANK WESTON, the Wizard Oil Prince, is here. He is a comical card, possessing a great amount of dry Yankee wit, humour and assurance. His entertainments are free, and it is needless to add that he draws “crowded houses” nightly. The usual style of his public announcements are that “he will dig down and speak a piece.”

Audience members would receive a booklet called Frank Weston’s Australian Companion: A Selection of Valuable Recipes for Cooking, &c., with Much Information about Horses, Cattle, Social, Witty, and Other Important Subjects

As well as the Wizard Oil, Weston manufactured Weston’s Magic Pills and Mexican Mustang Liniment.

The image shown was printed as part of the following advert:

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THE GREAT AMERICAN MEDICINES
     WESTON’S WIZARD OIL
          PRICE HALF A CROWN
  Established in Australia in 1864.
  A   MEDICINE   to  be  taken  in-
ternally,   and  used  externally,  for
all   NERVOUS  DISEASES   and
INFLAMMATORY   ACHES   and
PAINS, composed of the choicest
Aromatic  Herbs,  Healing   Gums,
Balsams, and Vegetable Oils.
    Cures      Rheumatism,     Sci-
atica,        Gout,           Neuralgia,
Cholera,    Spasms,    Headache,
Coughs and Colds, etc,
   WESTON’S   WIZARD   OIL  has
the   power    to   distribute    itself
over   every   part    of    the   body
internally   as   well   as   externally,
curing the  most  inveterate  cases
of     tumors,    ulcers,      scrofula,
diseased   liver,    piles,   swellings,
wounds, etc. etc.
I N T E R N A L   U S E—Weston’s
Wizard   Oil,   as   a   medicine  for
inward  use,  may  be  relied  upon
as a prompt relief for a depressed
vital   action,   and  a  regulator  of
the   disturbed   circulation  of  the
blood,   produced  by  any  cause
whatever.

Source: The Northern Territory Times and Gazette, Saturday 2 May 1885

According to a correspondent of the Monthly Gazette of Health (vol 5 1825), the proprietor of Goss & Co was a former shop assistant going by the unlikely name of Mr Crucifix.

While Mr Crucifix insisted that his company had genuine surgical credentials, it had a terrible reputation among the medical profession. The Medical Adviser and Guide to Health and Long Life, edited by Alexander Burnett, particularly had it in for him, mounting a sustained campaign against Goss & Co in 1824:

Goss and Company! Good God! Was there ever such a heap of filth and infamy as this swindling firm of straw! Was there ever such a cancer upon society – such an adroit and plausible system of rapacious plundering!

The Adviser also remarked that the letters M R C did not stand for Member of the Royal College, but for MURDERING, ROBBING CHARLATAN.

                 ”Domus et placens uxor.”—HOR.
                  Thy house, and (in the cup of life,
                That honey-drop) thy pleasing wife.
H A P P I N E S S  “the  gay  to-morrow  of  the
mind,”  is  ensured  by  marriage;  ”the  strictest  tie
of perpetual Friendship” is  a  gift  from  Heaven,  cementing
pleasure with reason, by which, says Johnson, we approach
in some degree  of  association  with  celestial  intelligence.”
Previous,  however,  to  entering  into  the  hallowed  obliga-
tion of marriage, it becomes an impressive duty not only  to
regulate the passions, but to cleanse the grosser nature from
those impurities which the freedom of unrestricted  pleasure
may have entailed upon it. To the neglect of  such  atten-
tion, are attributable  many  of  those  hapless  instances,
which while they excite the commiseration of  the  behold-
er, should also impress him with the fear of self-reproach.
Luxurious habits will effeminate the body—a residence  in
the tropics will too much relax the elastic fibre—but more
especially does the premature infatuation of youth too fre-
quently reduce the natural dignity into a state of inanition,
from whence the agonized sufferer more than doubts the
chance of relief. To all such, then, we address ourselves,
offering  hope–energy–muscular strength–facility;  nor
ought our advances to appear questionable, sanctioned as
they are by the multiplied proofs of  twenty-five  years  suc-
cessful experience.
The easy cares of married life are sometimes disturbed
by the want of those blessings which twine the nuptial
wreath—for the female habit is often constitutionally weak
—yet it can be strengthened, and deficient energy improved
into functional power.
In every case of syphilitic intrusion, as well as in every
relaxation of the generative economy, we pledge our reputa-
tion to cure speedily and permanently. Earnestly solicitous
to  expel  the  unfeeling  empyric  from  the  position so pre-
sumptuously taken by him, we deviate  from  general   prin-
ciples  with  less  hesitation;  and   confident   in   our   own
honourable integrity as Members of the College of Surgeons,
we invite sufferers of either  sex,  (especially  those  entering
into  matrimonial  life)  at  once  to  our  house,  where  daily
attendance is given  for  personal  consultation;  and  imme-
diate answers are returned  to  country  letters,  which  must
minutely describe the  case,  and  contain  a  remittance  for
advice and Medicine, which can be forwarded  to  any  part
of the  world,  however  distant.  No  difficulty  can  occur,  as
the Medicine will be securely packed, and carefully protected
from observation.
                     GOSS & Co., (M.R.C. Surgeons).
7, Lancaster Place, Waterloo Bridge, Strand, London.
*** Just published (Twenty-First Edition), 1st, The AEGIS
of LIFE, a similar commentary on the above Diseases.—
2d. HYGEIANA, addressed exclusively to the Female Sex.—
3. The SYPHILIST, a Treatise on Lues Venerea, Gonor-
rhoea, &c. May be had at 23, Paternoster-Row, London; F.
Hobson, Leeds; and of all Booksellers, Price 5s.

Source: The Leeds Mercury, Saturday 29 April, 1837

A correspondent to the Medical Adviser described his experience thus: 

When I wrote to Goss & Co., I enclosed a pound bill, and asked their advice. I received a letter by return of post, asking all particulars, (useless to them), for example whether I was fair, tall, handsome, and many other things of little consequence. I was quite disgusted; they concluded with a request for 5l., and they would send me a box of medicine. I received the medicine and a modest request for 25l. and they would cure me … Their medicine I took to a Chemist, and he said I could have got it, bottles and all, for 5s.