Joshua Ward

At the 1715 general election Ward was returned as Member of Parliament for Marlborough, through the artifice of one of the mayors, but was unseated on petition in 1717.

[5][6] His pills, which he claimed could cure any illness, are suspected of containing large amounts of antimony, which is poisonous and could cause permanent liver damage.

It used a process discovered in the seventeenth century by Johann Glauber, in which sulphur is burned together with saltpetre (potassium nitrate), in the presence of steam.

He opened hospitals for the poor in Westminster and the City of London, and the clinics did not charge people for their service.

[14] A statue of Ward, by his good friend Agostino Carlini, is in the Victoria and Albert Museum.