After which he was apprenticed to Ebenezer Robie of Sudbury,[1] who had been educated in Europe, and a disciple of the renowned Boerhaave, and was an eminent physician.
Dr. Oliver's distinguished professional acquirements; his prompt and unremitted attention to the sick; his tender and pleasant demeanor while treating them during their distress; his moderate charges and forbearance to the poor, together with the general success which attended his practice, operated to render him for nearly half a century, one of the most popular while he was one of the most eminent and useful physicians in the Commonwealth.
[1] Prescott took an early and decided part in the American Revolution by entering warmly into those measures which were necessary to vindicate our national rights, and by assisting cheerfully and largely in their defense.
In 1776 he was appointed a brigadier general for Middle-sex county by the executive council of Mass Bay: he also was in the same year chosen as a member of the board of war.
He with his brother James and Jonathan and Amos Lawrence, and eleven others, were appointed to a committee to determine that the resolves of the continental congress relative to the "Test Oath", so-called, "be faithfully carried into effect".
He was in stature six feet in height, somewhat corpulent, and possessed and ever practiced a peculiar suavity and politeness of manners, and a gentlemanly deportment, which strongly endeared him to the people, always commanding esteem and respect.
His son, also named Oliver (4 April 1762, Groton – 26 September 1827, Newburyport, Massachusetts), graduated Harvard College in 1783.
; entered Harvard College In 1779; graduated in 1783; studied medicine with his father, but completed his professional education with Dr. James Lloyd, a celebrated physician of Boston.
He was one of the original founders of Groton Academy, was a trustee and treasurer of the institution, and manifested a laudable zeal for the promotion of education and science.