author
Staff Surgeon Dochard
An early 19th-century British army surgeon and explorer, he is remembered for helping record a demanding expedition through West Africa. His surviving work offers a close-up view of travel, medicine, and colonial-era exploration along the route to the Niger.
1 Audiobook
Travels in Western Africa, in the years 1818, 19, 20, and 21, from the river Gambia, through Woolli, Bondoo, Galam, Kasson, Kaarta, and Foolidoo, to the river Niger
by Major William Gray, Staff Surgeon Dochard
About the author
John Dochard is generally identified as a British staff surgeon who took part in expeditions in West Africa in the early 1800s. French Wikipedia describes him as a member of the John Peddie expedition and says he kept its journal; it also notes that he later worked with William Gray after Peddie's death, when the British government asked them to continue efforts connected with the exploration of the Niger.
He is best known to readers today through Travels in Western Africa, in the Years 1818, 19, 20, and 21, a travel narrative associated with William Gray and Staff Surgeon Dochard. Library and public-domain catalog records consistently link his name to that book, suggesting that his reputation rests less on a large body of published writing and more on this firsthand contribution to African exploration literature.
Reliable biographical detail about Dochard appears to be scarce in easily accessible English-language sources, so many personal facts about his life remain unclear. Even so, his name survives in exploration history as a medical officer whose observations helped document a difficult journey through West Africa at a time when Europeans were still trying to map and understand the course of the Niger.