Presented by Morris Duane and accessioned, 1964 (1964 3008.dms).
René La Roche was a Philadelphia physician and epidemiologist born on September 23, 1795. La Roche completed a medical degree at the University of Pennsylvania in 1820 and became an active member of the Kappa Lambda Association of Philadelphia as well as editing medical journals and publishing on yellow fever. La Roche was a Fellow of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia from 1827 to 1861.
La Roche married Mary Jane Ellis in 1824, and during their marriage they had one son, named Charles Percy de La Roche, and two daughters before Mary Jane's death in 1844. René La Roche died on December 9, 1872.
He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1827.
The LaRoche Papers hold an assortment of documents, most of which deal with Rene LaRoche, a nineteenth century Philadelphia-based physician. A U.S. passport from 1827 and a passport from Sardinia are included in the collection. The letters are from the 1850s and are often letters from Ayres Philips Merrill to Rene La Roche.