James Monro (1680–1752) was born in Scotland. He was the only son of Alexander Monro, principal of Edinburgh University and a devoted Stuart royalist. Following the civil unrest of the Revolution of 1688, James moved with his father to London, and later entered Oxford University to study medicine. He returned to London and set up practice, and was later elected as physician to Bethlem Hospital, where he treated patients for insanity. The Monro family were to have a long relationship with Bethlem Hospital, and James’s son John and grandson Thomas also worked there as physicians. John wrote of his father in his 'Remarks on Dr Battie’s Treatise on Madness' (1758): ‘He was a man of admirable discernment, and treated this disease (insanity) with an address that will not soon be equalled.