The term neuromyelitis optica (Devic’s syndrome) refers to the co-occurrence of acute myelitis and optic neuritis. Regarded for many decades as a clinical variant of multiple sclerosis, neuromyelitis optica has only very recently been recognized as a disease in its own right with distinct pathogenesis, prognosis, and treatment.

While the history of classic multiple sclerosis has been studied extensively, little is known about the early history of neuromyelitis optica. Here we would like to draw readers’ attention to a now forgotten early British case, which appeared in 1850 in the precursor of the BMJ, the Provincial Medical and Surgical Journal, as part of a series of “Brief notes of medical cases,”1 …