Oliphant, David, 1720-1804 (Scottish physician and Jacobite)
Dates
- Existence: 1720 - 1804
Biography
Doctor David Oliphant was born in Scotland in 1720, at Pitheavlis, near Perth. He studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh in 1797 and 1798, and became a physician.
He espoused the cause of the Stewarts and took an active part in the Battle of Culloden. After the defeat and before June 1747, he managed to escape from Scotland, and landed at Charleston, South Carolina, where he lived for many years practising his profession and taking a leading part in the political discussions of the time. He was a member of the 'Provincial COngree' held at Charleston, and also a member of the Legislative Council in 1776. In addition to other offices, he was repeatedly elected to the Senate of South Carolina as representative of St. George, Dorchester.
On the breaking out of the American War of Independence, he offered his services to the Government, and on the 4th of July, 1776, received his commission as Director-General of the Southern Hospitals until the surrender of Charleston, when he became a prisoner of war.
His health failing, in the year 1785 he removed to Newport, R. I., and he decided to remain there permanently. In the year 1786, he married Miss Ann Vernon, [Miss Vernon was his third wife. He had one son by a previous marriage, who was accidentally killed.] a grand-daughter of Governor Ward, of Rhode Island. He lived in Newport, continuing there the practice of medicine until his death in 1804, at the age of eighty-four years.