Lucas Pepys

The son of William Pepys, a banker, and his wife Hannah, daughter of Dr. Richard Russell of Brighton, was born in London on 26 May 1742.

degree, Pepys obtained a license to practice from the University of Oxford, took a house in London, and on 10 February 1769 was elected physician to the Middlesex Hospital, and held office for seven years.

He attended two days a week at Kew Palace, where the king was, from four in the afternoon till eleven the next morning, having a consultation often either with Sir George Baker or Dr. Richard Warren.

[1] Pepys had a large practice, and after Edward Jenner's discovery he was an active supporter of the National Vaccine Institution.

[1] Pepys married, on 30 October 1772, Jane Elizabeth Leslie, 12th Countess of Rothes in her own right, and widow of George Evelyn of St Clere, Kent, and had by her two sons, Charles and Henry, and a daughter, Harriet, who married William Courtenay, 10th Earl of Devon.

He married again, on 29 June 1813, Deborah, daughter of Dr. Anthony Askew and his second wife Elizabeth Holford, who survived him.

Like her husband, Lady Rothes was a strong and determined character, who fought a lengthy legal battle against her uncle Andrew Leslie to assert her right to succeed her brother, the 11th Earl, as Countess suo jure.