John Southall

John Southall was an English author and professional "bug destroyer" active in the early eighteenth century. He is known for A Treatise of Buggs (1730), a work widely described in modern library and public-domain editions as an early scientific study devoted entirely to bedbugs.

What makes Southall interesting is the mix of voices in his book. He writes partly as an observer, discussing the habits and spread of bedbugs, and partly as a practical tradesman offering methods for getting rid of them. That blend of curiosity, experiment, and hard-earned experience gives the work a surprisingly modern feel.

Very little biographical detail about his life was easy to confirm from reliable sources consulted here, so the safest picture is a simple one: Southall endures as a vivid minor figure from London print culture, remembered less for a long bibliography than for one strange, useful, and historically fascinating book.