(Material researched & presented by Barbara Armstrong)

The second person in Victoria to advertise his use of homœopathic treatment for his patients was a veterinary surgeon, Richard Thomas Wallis.

Richard was born around 1820 at Halstead, Essex, son of veterinary surgeon William Wallis and his wife Esther. England's 1841 Census shows that Richard was already working in his father's profession. According to his advertisements, he became a Member of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons. In 1848 Richard married Catherine Burton. England's 1851 Census shows that they had a one year old son, Frank Burton Wallis. They were living at Brentwood, Essex.

Richard, his wife, and their two infant children arrived in Victoria aboard the Bangalore. They arrived on 4 September, 1852, just 11 days before Thomas Goodwin. Unlike Goodwin who settled in Melbourne, the Wallis family decided to live in Geelong, where Richard immediately advertised that he had commenced in his profession as a veterinary surgeon. At this stage there was no mention of his use of homœopathy as part of his treatment, although he later (in 1867) claimed that he had used this therapeutic practice since 1852. To-date there is no documentary proof of this claim.

Interestingly, Richard's initial point of contact for people wanting to engage his services in Geelong was Mr Benjamin Poulton, Chemist. (By 1866 Mr Poulton had moved to Melbourne where for the first time he commenced advertising his business as a homœopathic pharmacy.)

Richard's first residence was at Halstead Place, Villamanta Street, New Town, Geelong.

It was not until July 1853 that his advertisements started to mention homœopathy. 

MR R. T. WALLIS, FELLOW
of the VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION,
LONDON, begs to inform Horse and Stable Proprietors
in Geelong and its Suburbs, that he continues his
VETERINARY PRACTICE, at charges in a ratio to the
requisite skill and attention bestowed. Residence
       HOMŒOPATHIC DISPENSARY,
           Halstead Place,
                  Villamanta-street

In a letter to the Editor of the Geelong Advertiser he stated that inoculation was 'the most speedy means of cure for Scab in sheep, although alternate doses of Rhus Toxicodendron (poison-oak) and Arsenicum have been employed beneficially, divesting the malady well-nigh of its malignant and destructive nature'. 

Later in the same year it appears that Mr Wallis had decided that he would expand his practice to include human patients. He advertised as follows:

MEDICAL NOTICE TO GOLD DIGGERS
HOMŒOPATHY offers the most
speedy, safe, and effectual means of cure for all
diseases - Chronic or Acute. Gold diggers and others who
may be suffering from Catarhal affections, Epidemic dy-
sentery, and their sequel, will best consult their own bodily
and pecuniary interests by communicating with Mr
WALLIS, Homœopathic Practitioner, Halstead-place,
Villamanta-street, Geelong.
NOTE - Suitable medicines furnished gratis, on pay-
ment of half-guinea fee.
P.S. - The remedies can be transmitted per post twice
a week, on receipt of a letter describing symptoms of malady,
together with address accurately stated, and a
reference for payment in Geelong.

In late 1858 Mr Wallis told his landlord that he intended to leave Villamanta Street in mid-February the following year. However, because of the 'delicate state of health' of his wife, Richard arranged to stay on. Because of disagreements about the terms of the new lease, the owner then served Wallis with a notice for him to leave and the case went to court. ²³ The reasons for the illness in the household became clear when the newspaper reported the death of his infant daughter, Blanche Cooper, of congestive pneumonia. 

According to the family headstone where she was buried, she was not even one week old.

A few weeks later Mr Wallis announced that he had moved around the corner to Parkington Street. 

In the Geelong directories for 1854, 1856 and 1858 he was listed as a Veterinary Surgeon. By February 1860 he regularly used the title 'Doctor', although he had no recognised qualifications as a doctor of medicine.

In April 1860 Mr Wallis gave a lecture on homœopathy at the Mechanics' Institute, the meeting being chaired by the Mayor of Geelong. ²⁶ A few allopathic doctors were present. Mr Wallis had invited them to attend, as he said that at one time he had been a member of the guild of 'the allopathic brotherhood'.

After sketching the rise and progress of the science of homœopathy, the lecturer proceeded to recite numerous cases, wherein cures had been effected by homœopathic treatment after the patients had been given up by their allopathic advisers. The lecturer then went on to demonstrate the fallacy of attributing homœopathic cures merely to the effects of diet, or to a stricter system of medical discipline, or to imagination, or in short to the more self-repairing powers of nature when fair play is allowed her. As for diet, he contended that many of his patients whom he had treated homœopathically with the greatest success, were poor persons who had it not in their power to commit dietetic excess; and as for imagination, he refuted that fallacy by the argument that several other of his patients, whom he had almost miraculously cured, were children, - too young to perceive anything, and therefore especially unconscious of any fancied superiority of a homœopathic globule over an allopathic dose.

Dr Wallis' family grave (Geelong West Cemetery) Photo courtesy of Peter Torokfalvy

Showing his allegiance to homœopathy, when Richard's next son was born in early 1861, the parents named him Samuel Hahnemann Wallis. Sadly, Samuel died just 9 weeks later.

Wallis was twice listed in the 1861 Geelong directory, once as a Homœopathist, and separately under 'Medical Practitioners'. The Medical Act of 1862 made it illegal to use the title 'Doctor' unless registered as a legally qualified medical practitioner approved by the Medical Board. Therefore in the Directory for 1866 he was no longer eligible to be listed as a Medical Practitioner, instead being listed as a Homœopathist. By this time he was at Myers Street, Geelong.

At the beginning of May 1867 he auctioned off his household furniture and effects and moved to Ballarat, where he advertised as follows (illegally using the title of 'Doctor'):

DR WALLIS
HOMŒOPATHIC PRACTITIONER (recently
of Geelong), begs to inform the residents of
Ballarat and its vicinity he has become their profes-
sional ally, and trusts his initial introduction
of the above "therapeutic practice" anent [concerning] Victoria from the
year 1852 will ensure in its behalf a just meed [reward] of their
approbation and support.

He was living in Doveton Street, in a 6-roomed brick cottage with a detached kitchen. The owner of the property put it up for sale a few months later, in September. 

The final record of Richard Wallis, homœopathic physician, was his death notice in the Geelong Advertiser.  He died at The Hospital, Ballarat West, on 5 April 1868. His headstone states that he was aged 48.

According to his death certificate he died of meningitis and apoplexy of 3 months' duration. Several days later he was buried at the Western Cemetery, Geelong in the same plot as Blanche Cooper and Samuel Hahnemann. He was survived by his wife, Catherine, and 5 of his 7 children. Catherine and two of their spinster daughters were also buried in the plot next to Richard.

©   Barbara Armstrong      

       www.historyofhomeopathy.au